Yes, today is the day I make the damn list. I’m already a little sick… I’m sweating… I feel like crying… Physical qualities, looks… ugh… on the other thought, I’ll write this another time though… I will start with the personality traits … Strengths: smart, communicative, with a good sense of humor, sociable. Cons: stubborn, often ironic to the point of cynicism, sometimes mean… Hmmm… What kind of person am I? Well, I’m a doctor. Wait, that’s your job. Are you just a job? Have you no value as a human being? If you have no value, what are you passing on to your child?
Hmm… What makes me feel so worthless?
Yeah…well…reporting yourself to different measurement systems. What do you mean? The first thing that comes to mind is the education system which, with the help of grades or qualifications, places you on a step of a ladder. Something is not quite wright, because even though I had good to very good grades, I always felt pretty stupid and bad about myself. Well, it depends on your perception, on who you’re comparing yourself to. If you compare yourself with Einstein, you are quite stupid, but if you compare yourself with someone else, with Jane Doe… you know who, you are quite smart. Hmm… in other words I could look at things differently. I’m both stupid and smart at the same time. But… if that’s true, it’s true of all the things that characterize us, namely, I’m good and bad at the same time, it depends on who I’m relating with, I’m generous and stingy at the same time, I’m beautiful and ugly at the same time, poor and rich at the same time, superior and inferior at the same time, mediocre and extraordinary at the same time, victim and abuser at the same time, and the list goes on.
Well… if I’m already all these things at the same time, it means that only I have the power to decide how and what I am in each moment. This means that what defines my value as a human being is myself and no one else, because only I see the whole person. I am capable of both contrasts. The others only see what I decide to show. And then? What prevents me from considering myself valuable? The lack of the feeling of acceptance, happiness, fulfillment that starts from the moment I start to relate myself to some measuring system. Hmm… then I’d better stop comparing myself to others.
What is a human being? According to the dictionary, a human being is a superior, sociable being, characterized by thinking, intelligence, articulate language, capable of creation. But that’s what we all are from birth. Why are children happier than adults? Because they don’t relate to systems, they don’t constantly compare themselves with others, they don’t try to measure themselves with each other. Not from the start anyway. This is the influence of adults on them.
Different sayings heard as a child automatically come to mind… Hey, it’s not nice to do that, it’s not right to think like that, who do you think you are? You have to always be kind and generous and extraordinary and smart and beautiful and rich… Hmm… but we are all of these and their opposite at the same time. According to society I shouldn’t be half of myself. Maybe we should rethink molds, patterns, systems, or even how we relate to them. But before we do that, we should understand them better, and we can’t do that without following their evolution through history to realize their relevance.
Other echoes of childhood come to mind… who do you think you are to know better than others who have studied the problem for years? I know and I don’t know at the same time. Same as people, other things, institutions, authorities and so on can be characterized as good and bad at the same time, useful and useless at the same time, what gives them value is what we choose to do with them.
Yes, I think I get it now. In my opinion, we all have value in ourselves, we are all full of contrasts at the same time, but the power to decide what we want to show the world belongs to us, it is only up to us what we do with it.
To be continued…
7. Aaah, power, it tastes delicious… Mmm… I want more. Have at it until you choke!
