Who Am I?

Who am I?

I know that sounds like a basic question.

And I can give you a basic answer.

I can respond to that with, well, not to sound redundant, but… the basics - age, gender, height, general physical description… but that isn’t who I am.

I can respond with some of the things I do - where I work, hobbies I have… but that isn’t who I am, either.

I can respond with who I am in relation to others - spouse, parent, sibling, employee, friend… but I don’t really think that tells you who I am, either.

So… who the heck actually AM I?

None of those things listed above as possible answers are lies, so they are all, in and of themselves, accurate responses to the question. I am all of those things, and yet also none of them at the same time.

Lots of people are my age. My gender. My height.

Lots of people have the same hobbies as I do. The same relationship status.

But none of those people are me.

I can ask 100 different people who I am, and I’d likely receive 100 different answers. Sure, some of them may have some overlap, but who I am to each person will likely depend greatly on when they met me, under what circumstances, and at what stage in both my life and theirs.

If you ask my kindergarten teacher, you’d get a very different answer than if you asked my college academic advisor. If you asked my teenage daughter, you’d get a very different answer than if you asked my best friend from when I was her age. Honestly, you’d probably get a different answer if you asked my sister vs. my brother. My son vs. my daughter. My husband back when we first started dating vs. now, 20-something years later!

I’d like to think that I’m someone you’d like. But the truth is, depending on the day, my mood, the circumstances… I can honestly say that I’m not even always someone I like.

And you know what? Maybe that’s actually okay.

Because every day I learn more about who I am, as well as who I am not. I learn which pieces of me feel like home, and which feel like an ill-fitting costume I am trying out. I learn which parts of me are actually me and which are due to years of conditioning from societal expectation.

I am not the same person that I was last decade, last year, last month, last week. I am not even the same person I was an hour ago when I pulled out my laptop to start writing this post. Each word that has poured onto the screen has changed me in some way, and helped redefine the words I use to identify myself.

So maybe there’s no clear cut answer to this question, but maybe that’s okay. I’m proud of every version of me that has brought me to where I am today, and I am excited to meet the version of me who wakes up tomorrow morning.

So now I ask you - who are you?