Sorrow fully accepted brings its own gifts. It can be transmuted into wisdom which, if it does not bring joy, may yet bring happiness

Pearl S. Buck

I am Me. The essential essense that makes me who I am cannot me quantified or explained or defined in a text book. In a hundred years, maybe someone will know I existed, perhaps they'll know my birthdate and where I lived and what career I pursued but they will never know me. For it is the Essense that makes us who we are even if we lose a limb or our face gets scorched until we are no longer recognizable or we learn to be more responsible or become more proactive and thus change our perception of the world. It takes a life time to understand that essense and know what it consists of. Some never reach that understanding. That understanding is what I strive for: self-actualization. Know thyself.

Every day I learn a little more about how to live, how to enjoy, how to grieve, how to love. The capacity I have for doing these defines who I am; and yet, do I want to be defined in these terms?

When I think about who I am, the first thing I think of is how I see the world, what my reactions are to everyday stimuli. But How do I explain that to a person? It has to be something they observe and understand and incorporate into their perception of their world, a world with me in it. So instead I tell them about what occupies my time: I'm a student, I'm a former caregiver for foster children, I'm a High School Graduate. Identified by how I lived my life, whether I chose those circumstances or not. What happens when I am really not those things, but instead am so much more than that?

I love to talk to people, especially when they have stories to tell; and the best part is not the actual story, but how they tell it, how their personal comments and inflections reveal their own essense. A story is a story, it is the essense added to it by the one who tells it that fascinates me.

Let me tell you what people notice about me: I'm very friendly. Within certain boundaries I am very open and trusting. I approach the world with a child-like enthusiasm, and even if I don't do so well I try my best. Having human interaction is so essential to me that without it I become listless and disoriented. Cuddling, caressing, even just a hug or a handshake, these things are as vital to me as eating and sleeping.

There is so much I can tell you. My parents planned to have me, they were relatively poor when I was born. Now my father makes double the average income. I have been engaged - yes, an arrangement made with the intent of marriage - twice. I have never gotten above an A- in any class I've ever taken. I suffered from a debilitating depression in the Spring of 2006 that prevented me from going to school and almost kept me from graduating. I am distant from my family and for most of my life I had no close friends. But what do those things say about me and how I handle life? Is that really me? Am I a victim of circumstances? Is there a pattern you can discern so that you can know the real me? I could tell you who I am to other people: I am the beloved companion of a young man named Henry, and the sometime caregiver of many beautiful children, the daughter of a Nuclear Engineer and a Psychologist, the friend of a young writer from Texas. But what do these relations tell you? You won't see me the way they see me. What does it realy matter?

Why are you reading this? Do you want to know me? Humans are drawn to novelty, anything that sparks their interest becomes a mild to moderate obsession for a while. Then that interest fades. If something that is novel becomes internalized, then it is familiar, and kept around for the sake of personal structure. Do you intend to keep me? Or will you get bored and move on? Why would you want to keep me? Why do you want to know me? Are you giving me a chance? Or just trying to entertain yourself?

More than anything I want to be noticed. Because notice inspires communication, and I want to communicate. I desire to connect, and reaffirm my place in this world. Mother Theresa said that many in this world are sick from lack of good food and water, but so many more are dying from simple lack of love, and she said that the lack of love is the greatest poverty. This I believe to be true. When I am alone and isolated I fall ill and the world is daunting. To reach out and be embraced, this is, for me, what it means to be alive. I want to feel vital. You might read that to mean "necessary for life". I certainly want to feel needed. But I also want to feel alive.

It takes a subtle mind to appreciate me: note what I do not say. I have not said I desire happiness. I don't. I do not want to be happy all the time. I want to hurt, I want to feel scared and insecure, I want to struggle. Because if I didn't, then I would appreciate all of this much much less. Kahlil Gibran said, "Your joy is your sorrow unmasked. And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises is oftentimes filled with your tears. And how else can it be? The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain." This I believe. The pure joy of being alive today and feeling content, being able to love and live and understand and grow, would be so much less if I had not once been so full of pain and sorrow that I nearly died. If you do not wish to know me deeply, you will not experience me in full, and lose so much.

I want to inform you of my existence. I want to invite you to know me, all of me. I want to know you. As intimate as I have been in this introduction, I want to know you just as intimately.

'I know we haven't met, but I don't want to be an ant. You know? I mean, it's like we go through life with our antennas bouncing off one another, continously on ant autopilot, with nothing really human required of us. Stop. Go. Walk here. Drive there. All action basically for survival. All communication simply to keep this ant colony buzzing along in an efficient, polite manner. "Here's your change." "Paper or plastic?' "Credit or debit?" "You want ketchup with that?" I don't want a straw. I want real human moments. I want to see you. I want you to see me. I don't want to give that up. I don't want to be ant, you know?'
- Waking Life