What Makes You & Me Who We Are?

The moving parts of the story meant for today’s post seems to have been in place except my body, quite on it’s own seemingly decided to catch some flu virus and immobilise me for a week. Well, almost. The one day I ventured out into the world felt like a train had run over me by the time I crawled back into bed. Once again, things would go quite out of my control.

I’m getting used to this. I’m also getting quite good at accepting the randomness that life insists on throwing my way time and again.

So, in between the times fog didn’t cloud my brain, I pondered whether things have always been largely out of my control. Or a chronic, strong inclination to a positive outlook in life, accompanied by a healthy dollop of foolish youth is what skewed that question. Which actually makes answering this difficult. And then of course the mind did what it’s fantastic at— the rabbit hole type of thing. How objective can I or anyone be?

To extract only the thing that somehow wound up swirling round and round my head is the topic I don’t even know whether I had a choice in picking or not. Is free-will really free? Do I have a choice to direct where and how my thoughts construct themselves? When they fall on food. The moon. Picking myself apart. Picking the face of the woman opposite me in the lift apart; is it how I’ve trained the mind? Or I’m trailing behind it, an eternal slave? Does a rocket scientists' mind ever hover and operate on such a low plane?

Not for the first time did I wonder what makes me me or anyone them? Nor was it the first to wonder at how self absorbed humans in general are. Which gives them a certain arrogance. Or, to be absolutely correct, how self absorbed I am. Here I was thinking about a philosophical question but I still managed to put myself in the centre. The paradoxical quality that seems to tinge everything came to the fore. Why do I always forget that though? I marvel all the time at how much we love our stories. How much we’ve etched into our consciousness the same story in countless, myriad of ways and we never seem to be satiated.

Herein lies the paradox for me; I have never written anything new yet I keep at it.

We bend over and backwards to spice up the sameness of the days of our lives. Yet, only a little spice because if too much tumbles out then seismic shifts beneath our feet occur. We somehow know only grace holds the projections that shatter to pieces should the truth of what dishes out the gifts of life seep into our lives. But, we insist on keeping to uniformity, traditions and customs. And even then in a convenient manner. One that allows us to keep doing what we want to. At the same time, I see why customs and traditions are important. They centre and help grow roots which anchor us amidst all kinds of the weather conditions we encounter in our lives.

If I had a complete loss of memory, would I turn into a new person? Just choosing acceptance over random events seems to have put a distance between the person that used to kick up dust, bang a table or let the tongue loose and the calm, non reactive person that now emerges as I let things go the way they will. Is this what maturity looks like? Is it giving up or in?

Am I in surrender or docile mode or do I waste time asking the wrong questions? After all, however will I get the right answers if the questions are?

For me, the condition of dementia always ends up being in the middle of the who I am questioning. If all the moving parts that went into who I am were to steadily move away from me, who will remain? Me? Will I be different because a part or parts of my brain let me down? So, is it thoughts, memories and all the composite parts that we hold onto that makes us who we are? Well, if I turn my thoughts to those who haven’t had long to do that— children...is the same true? But even with babies, one gets a distinct sense of who they are. Put ten babies in a room and observe them for half a day, you end up with a powerful sense of what lies behind the eyes that seem to peer into your own soul. Even pets will imprint a distinct essence of their spirit in your own awareness.

So what would a severe, nasty case of dementia leave of me? I can’t say a shell. My own sister’s body immobilised her for two months but she was there all right. Yet, in her coffin, it was a shell that I stood watching. Every cell in my own body knew that she wasn’t in that body, but I could feel her presence so strongly. It permeated the very air during the farewell we held for her. When her soul finally flew away from the body that held her hostage.

Laying in bed for a week held long days for me. But it was the first time in my life I wasn’t upset, irritable and downright impatient that I was held hostage by my own body. Life had shown a different perspective of a hostage situation that made mine pale into nothing.

It was the first time I didn’t agonise about the timeline of the story I thought I was meant to write. It wasn’t a breeze for the body but it sure was for my spirit. Stories will always be on rotation at story-ville.

If I let go of the notion that purple is my favourite colour, would I get what it means to empty my cup so that it may runneth over? If I saw myself shaking all long held notions of who and what I was, why has that always felt like disappearing? Why has expansiveness never crossed my mind?

The only difference could possibly lie in that it would be the self, in the stead of myself that remains. Does that make sense?

It could very well be that I’ve had little control in my life. With the gift of hindsight, events that happened ended up nicely wrapping around carefully crafted narratives that make up the story of who I am in this life. A personal narrative. I noticed though, that it got harder to answer the who I am question to anyone as years passed. How could I compress myself? Everything seems transient. When I define myself, isn’t that just confinement? Another loop that goes off?

Does it matter which chocolates I get? I still get some. Chucking out preferences could hold surprising finds. I am who I am.

The big event now taking place is that I’m finally waking up. From what… I’ve no idea yet. Maybe from a dream within a dream. I sure hope to places that lie beyond the paradox that is life. Where truth is the single most hardest thing to consistently hold in the mind and depths of one’s being. Beyond which I sense the tools to break the chains of the never ending story are to be found.

Still sounds like me, doesn’t it? Lol. What makes you you?

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