A Journey to Self-Discovery Starts With A Look Into the Past...

So, when figuring out who you are where do you start? Your parents, your friends, other family members? Maybe, but if you yourself are unsure of who you are, how much more could they know? So my first theory on how to find out "who" I am ( saying that phrase makes me feel so lost and clueless somehow...) was to try a bunch of different activities to determine whether or not I liked them, and a variety of other means that would otherwise seems as though I am "dating" mayself, which sounds lame when you say it aloud, but whatever.  The problem with the method as I came to see, was that the approach it takes is one that assumes that eveything that I had ever done "before" this self-discovery just doesnt count, and is only concerned with the "after".  But now I am starting to think otherwise.  So I am now trying to pull from my memory specific events, titles, activities, friendships, interests and so forth that can tell me about me, beause I have always been what I am, I am just trying to understand who I am, so it is not at all as if I am lost, just maybe undiscovered??? Yea, I'll run with that.  So looking back on all those personality sheets, and books and worksheets I've filled out over the years, (which first off, the fact that I still have them tells me that I like to keep stuff. Why? I dont know, maybe for times like this! So for one I am an archiver, sort of...) So looking at those questions of whats your favorite color and book and stuff like that I see some commonalities.  One, I have always liked to read. Two, my favorite color has almost never stayed the same, but more specifically I have never really had only one at a time, they were always in variations.  In the fourth grade I liked navy and purple, in the seventh grade I liked pink and brown, which tells me that I enjoy things like colors more when they are associated with others that compliment the other... i guess, or maybe im just making that up, but it sounds nice so I'll keep it.  But I find the color thing funny because now, my favorite colors are yellow and gray and I had never really thought of how I pick colors and not one color.  Something my mom used to say to me a lot was that it was hard for her to find me things that I liked becuase it always changed! I can say that I never really liked a certain character like barbie, or who ever.  I liked toys and I had barbies, but I wasnt specific to any one kind where as my sister has always like tweety bird for example.  I did like mickey mouse for a time but it was never a fixation.  Some of the other things that pretty much stayed the same throughout time was my favorite subject: english. Least favorite varied between math and history, eventually settling to history with science staying saftely in the middle.  Hobbies were: reading, which is still true, just not as much as it used to be, singing.. uh not nearly as much as I used to, writing, well that is self explanitory, but I dont do that as much, I used to journal every day, now I do it maybe a few times a month if that, and I used to write short stories and poems which I havents since my junior year of high school, but my blogging is making up some ground.  Other things I liked to do was watch movies, and coloring and stuff like that.  I didnt meet a friend that I would have for a while untitl I was in the sixth grade, which is also the time where I stopped transfering schools and stayed in one district and she and I are still friends.  I didnt have many sleepovers or go to any parties and my social life in middle and high school was below average compared to the other kids I knew, so with that I'd have to improvise.  Somethings I would have liked to do in high school would have been to play tennis and to be on the dance team, and I really wanted to be on National Honors Society, I made honor roll and Renaissance most often but at my school you had to be nominated and all that other good stuff to be on NHS.  I was pretty active in other areas though like on STAR which was basically like an advisory board for at risk kids and I was on the executive board for that and went out of town a lot.  I was really close to many of my teachers and was good at making lasting relationships with them. I planned on going away to school after high school and graduating early.  I did graduate early, but I didnt go away to school, and now, a year from then this is where I am.  I am working a retail job, and married, and going to school for nursing.  I volunteer at a local hospital for my work study and during the school year I am pretty busy.  I tend to really challange myself and set the bar pretty high. I have always been academically smart and am a lover of a challange.  So I've looked at where I was, and Im sitting where I am now, having to decide where I want to go, and how I will get there.  Its only really been a year since I was a "kid".  Since I was in high school and I felt like the world was my oyster, but it feels much longer, and I have to keep reminding myself that I am still young, I am still capable, but somehow I have forgotten. Even the simplest of concepts.  I think the biggest reason is becuase I personally had stopped.  Some things I have stopped over time like my writing fell, off and eventually so did my interest, my reading.  I used to read over 50 or so books a year without effort.  And I used to feel... I cant even think of a word... able.  Or confident I guess is what I am looking for, because there were obstacles and hinderances and blockages to many things growing up that are irrelevant right now, but it never mattered.  I never saw them. I never felt incapable.  NEVER. And I can say that absolutely.  I had feeling of fear, and had problems of uncertainty of myself and confidence, but I never once felt like I couldnt.  It never crosses my mind "what if it doesnt happen?"  And when I started to try and live out my dreams and apsirations, as life does, things started to change, some for the good and some not so much.  For one thing I gained an incredible and amazingly smart, and patient husband who doenst recieve enought credit.  But I think that I let things that should have only been used as alterations, or editing techniques to my plans, become periods, not commas.  And thats what I mean when I say stopped.  I'll say my sensitivity grew as my creativity lessened and everything I took personally.  The world was out to get me and I just could not understand for the life of me WHY! Why  this was happening to me.  And it wasnt necessarily a bad thing.  I had just never encontered reality and when it came, it hit me hard.  My emotions became bigger than what was ahead of me and I lost focus all too quickly and too often.  I felt stripped of all that made me, me and was looking for something, someone to tell me it was wrong, and the re-dress me of who I thought I was and should be.  When I looked around for some kind of blue-print or example there was none. I just had to wing it.  I became more and more aware of my struggle and the lack thereof of others around me such as my husband and friends with no way to cope, no way to recover.  Part of me didnt even realize this shift until too late.  Until it had already taken a toll on my and my relationships.  I was frustrated and confused and emotional and super sensitive.  I needed a common ground.  A starting point, a constant, something that would never change, beacause there is something I have to learn and my future depends on the success of it. It was around this point that I was tired of arguing and being frustrated and unhappy and all the feelings that I felt that I had to stop and think about me.  That it is more than finding out my favorite color, or something to do with myself to keep busy or whatever.  I had to decied that I was worth searching for.  So I started a blog, because if I know one thing that I had always learned from best was from myself through writing.  How can I make this the best life possible for me? The biggest thing I can do for myself right now is to keep going. To not look at the past and compare it to now, beating myself up and making myself sad over the things I cannot get back.  How can I maximize the moment?  Because after-all no matter how much I may try, my permanant address is at Here-and-Now blvd. And my right now will change and effect my future now.  Just as simple as going to school and working hard now will eventually change to going to work and enjoying my career now. So, this is where I am.  Deep in thought and ready for reform.