A Stranger In My Own Clothes

Who you are… your sense of identity…

What you do with your time… your energy…

What you’ve experienced, the good and the bad…

How you show up and meet the world…

All of these elements of self and more are malleable.

Your personality isn’t preordained.

You can become exactly who and what you believe you’re capable of becoming.

The strength of your belief, or lack thereof, is your only true limitation.

(Physical outliers, genetic gifts, and circumstantial fortune notwithstanding.)

But as far as your perception-of-self and what you believe is possible for you…

Limitless, for your brain is like a computer. 

During development, your software was written for you.

By your parents. By the kids you grew up with. Your teachers. The culture you were raised in. The experiences you had before you knew what to do with them. 

They all shaped who you’ve become—but they don’t have to dictate who you will be.

Which is why many people come to feel like they’re living a life that somebody else scripted for them, rather than a story they willingly chose for themselves.

Because that’s exactly what happened.

Even the choices you think were yours… were quietly influenced by all the above.

Now, as an adult, you have agency.

You have a choice.

Change nothing. Let the momentum of your life carry you into more of what you’re already experiencing. If you’re happy with your current orientation, wonderful.

But if you don’t feel aligned, if you don’t love the shape your life is taking… 

You can strip off the masks others put on you, or that you thought you should wear.

Neither path is better or worse. 

They just lead to different places.

Removing the masks and writing your own software isn’t easy. 

You’ll go through periods of not recognizing who you are, like being reborn every time you open your eyes in the morning. Which can be awfully disorientating.

…

I remember months where each morning felt like a different set of hands was preparing the espresso I’d been making for years. I remember spending hours and hours on the treadmill after my workouts, practicing how I wanted my body to move through space. I remember feeling like a stranger in clothes I’d owned for years.

I spent a long time sitting in silence and stillness after my old life left, watching, listening, waiting, waiting, waiting longer than I ever thought I’d need to. Turns out, when you take away the business, the work, the relationships, the interests that were never truly yours… coming to understand what is really yours takes time.

…

You’ll also have to confront your fears, anxieties, and insecurities—for to become your most honest self, your energy needs to flow without resistance. Left unresolved, fears, anxieties, and insecurities create blockages that you quietly contort yourself around.

But there’s a gift in the disorientation, in the shadows: 

You get to build yourself into the exact version of you that you’ve dreamed of.

Which brings a sense of freedom, lightness, and alignment that is unmatched.

With love from the forest,

~ Alexander