If you are in your 20's I'm sure you have heard the phrase, "This is the time to find yourself." I used to obsess over this phrase and made it my mission to find out who I really am. I always thought it would be so cool to reach that end point of whatever finding yourself meant. I couldn't wait to say I have found myself and this is the way I'll be always. But, thinking about it now what about being one way sounds fun at all? I want to have many layers, many personalities. Some days I want to be the studios college student who finishes papers on time and aces every test, and the next day I want to blow everything off and road trip with my best friend with no destination. Finding yourself seems exhausting to me, that's why it's not about finding yourself.
For anyone who knows me I am a huge Troye Sivan fan and have been for years. A couple years ago he posted a video on YouTube called "Becoming You" where he says the phrase, "It's not about finding yourself, it's about creating yourself" and the many years ago I heard it, it went in one ear and out the other. Recently I had re-watched the video and something stuck when I heard that quote. All of this time I have spent so much time just trying to figure out what "finding myself" even meant. How was one supposed to find themselves? Was I going to wake up one morning and know exactly the way I was supposed to go about living? These questions took up all of the time. After hearing that quote I knew I had something new to obsess over, creating myself.
So what does creating yourself look like? Creating yourself mean doing things that you want to do, simply because you want to do them. It's not conforming to the ways of society and doing things that you feel others want you to be doing. A year ago I found myself stuck in a position where I was going through the motions of someone I thought I wanted to be. Once, I realized that wasn't who I was, I became much happier. When I was in this year long span of trying to keep up with something I thought was right, I tried to stay in a straight line of things. I tried to keep my style a certain way, I found friends with all the same thoughts, and I spent my time doing things I didn't really want to be doing. I was feeling bad for wanting to not be just one person.
Truthfully, there's no guide book to life, and no one can tell you how you should be living. Take a year or two off from college if you want, travel and explore. Go after that person that you think you may never have a chance with. Pick up and move to a new city just because, try new foods and new cultures. Read books, and be inspired. Creating yourself is about trying things and when you find something you love, sticking to it and making it part of who you are. Take risks and don't let anyone tell you that you're doing it wrong. There's never just one way to somewhere. Finding yourself means trying to reach the end of a never ending road, creating yourself means picking up all the pieces along the way.
