shakespearemom

What if the person you thought you were was really just a mish-mash of all the things other people wanted you to be? You thought all these years that you loved your eggs a certain way, or had certain habits, or did certain things because you loved them that way. You thought you had the perfect home, the perfect life, the perfect opinions.

But then, when you are finally on your own, left to your own devices, you discover that you really prefer vastly different activities, habits, or homes.

I know I have done this. When I lived with my parents, all those years, I really thought I wanted the things they wanted me to want (I know that sounds confusing, but it really isn’t). I wanted to dress a certain way, act a certain way, even think a certain way. And if I itched to do or think something different, I’d sit down with myself to talk through it, reasoning all the excuses for why I shouldn’t think differently.

And then I went to college. And a met a man who didn’t want to be told only what he wanted to hear (he regrets that now, he informs me…says he had no idea what he was doing). And I met teachers who really wanted to know what I thought. And I discovered that, most of all, I really wanted to know what I thought. And what I thought mattered a whole lot more than what everyone else thought.

Now, after years of re-training myself, I think I have a pretty good idea what I think. I allow myself to disagree with everyone (though I am tactful, and often keep my opinions to myself). I also allow myself to change my opinion, to recognize when I’ve misjudged something. But I am the one who changes my mind. I am not goaded into it. Not EVER.

Yet I still listen too well to what other people think, enough that their opinions make me doubt myself when I shouldn’t. Others’ opinions–often too quickly and too loudly voiced–make me doubt my parenting skills, my taste in clothing, my life choices, even my abilities.

Fortunately, in the end, I usually realize they have opinions which are no more valid than mine, and since I’m the one who has to live with my choices, I’d better be the one to make them. And so I’m fine, at least until another overopinionated person tells me I’m not. And then it’s back to reassessing that what I’m doing is what I should be doing.

Are we all like this, or am I the only one off her rocker?

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