My Experience In My Life

E.E. Cummings explained “It takes courage to grow up and turn out to be who you really are.”

Changes happen every day in a life. Whether it’s the phases we go through in childhood, the places we’ve lived, and the people we are surrounded by. I chose the song Changes by David Bowie because everyone goes through changes and this song has certain aspects that are ironically relatable to my life. For example “ a million dead-end streets” when I lived in Pittsburgh, our house was on a dead end street and now I live in a Cul-de-sac. I wonder if when I move out I’ll live on another dead end?

If you saw me how most people saw me, you would be too. But you don’t because you’ve only seen a part of me. You see what I mean?” That killed me. I thought about all the people I used to know. I thought I always did a pretty good job at being myself but I don’t remember at all, I really don’t. If I was less of myself and more of a phony then maybe all the other phonies would like me more, but I didn’t want to be a phony. I wanted to be me. Just then, the girl’s phone rang. It startled me and I nearly fell out of that goddam window. No kidding. She answered it and it turned out her sister and D.B.’s flight wasn’t as delayed as they thought it would be. I could hear the whole conversation because it was so goddam quiet where we were. When the call ended, the girl turned to me and smiled really nice and wide, which amused me. I was never really one to smile at all, but some part of me decided in that moment that I should smile right

In society, people are made to believe that they are what they are, that what they become is not their doing, but an inevitable product of living. I don't believe that. People are who they want to be, what they make themselves. They can let themselves be made by the masses, assimilating to the norm because “that’s what everyone else is doing”. But I don't want to be that, I want to be the person that I want to

Every day I told myself to just be strong. I told myself to be so strong no one else will notice that inside I was falling apart. Every day I told myself that, and I did exactly that. But that is only half the story. Every night I broke down in tears until I couldn’t be strong anymore. I felt heartache, I felt loneness, I didn’t feel as if I was worthy. As I lay there in bed knowing I am loved, knowing I am not alone, and knowing I am worthy, I asked myself how did I get to be like this. Why did I allow one person to take my who I am from me? After many months of holding myself together in public and breaking down in private I realized it’s because I didn’t love myself. Loving yourself is a process, and a process you might not always get right, but one worth striving for.

I have not always been myself; the person I am today is very different than who I used to be. I have seen myself sprout and bloom into a confident, young woman in a matter of three years. I remember arriving at my high school during freshman year a nervous wreck; I had very few friends despite being in the same school system my entire educational career. The previous year had left a stale taste in my mouth, and I longed for a fresh start. I remember walking through the wide hallways with countless bodies bustling around me. Seeing all those different people made me think. Who was I exactly?

My logic suddenly made no sense. I no longer had anyone to blame for my passivity except myself. I had subjugated myself when I knew I was just as capable. I had tried to change who I was for years when I shouldn’t have changed anything. I should have just been strong, trusted myself, and gone after what I wanted.

Everyone tells you life isn't easy right? That there’s going to be obstacles that you’ll have to overcome . For me, the biggest obstacle was to change, I couldn’t be another failure in the system, neither be a burden. Many fail to realize that change isn’t bad, is to better yourself on who you really are.

I started by letting go of the forces that weighed me down. With every burden I shed, the colors seemed to grow impossibly brighter. Finally, I was happily strolling down the path to who I would become. No longer was I pressured by others’ expectations. No longer did I stress over disappointing or pleasing those around me.. I was free to pursue my own satisfactions and set my own standards.

I’ve spent a great deal of my life trying desperately to be different. When I was in elementary school I never listened to the same music as everyone else, I used to pride myself on not following fashion trends, not liking the popular kids, doing whatever I could to make myself seem special and I would make sure to point this out every chance I got. I had to make sure everyone knew I was my own person, special, different. I was doing this from a very young age, which when I got to Jr. High meant that I didn’t actually have many friends. All that time and energy I had put into trying to be different had paid off, but I was sad and alone. “There is nothing sadder than a child who has barely seen the world, yet who has seen enough of it to know

t’s always been a fight with myself. If I just lose one more pound I’ll look prettier, but soon one pound isn’t enough. Next is ten, then it’s twenty, and finally it’s deciding how many pounds I can lose without dying. It’s a never ending spiral of going over the boundaries you’ve made for yourself. Recovery hasn’t been easy, and it will always be this way. These tendencies are something I created because I thought they were right. Now, I have to relearn everything I thought I already knew. Luckily, I’m being taught the right way. I’m being taught that being me, is really OK after

When I was nine, I remember asking myself what it meant to be human, to be an inhabitant of this world. I couldn’t figure out an answer, I mean, I was nine; nine year olds aren’t exactly meant to know the meaning of life. If I were to ask myself that question again, I still couldn’t give you an answer, not a good one anyways. When I was four, I used to sit in the corner of my closet sized bedroom and ask myself a lot of questions, a lot of them were incredibly advanced for my age, that set me aside from the kids in my class, the thing that brought me back to their level was my lack of answers to said questions. I could never come to a conclusion; it was a problem that continued into my teenage years, I have never really been good at conclusions.

I was what you would classify as a social climber throughout high school. I worked my way up the social hierarchy stepping on other people’s backs, hurting people’s feelings, and crossing boundaries that were firmly established. I spent three years getting my name out there. In the process I acquired tunnel vision forgetting that it wasn’t about how many people knew your name, but rather when your name was said what came to everyone’s mind. I scorned my soccer friends, my “nerdy” friends, and my church friends all to become popular. I left these people in the dust, when they cared the most about me. I became everything I once scoffed at: reckless, self-centered, and most of all a social chameleon. I took a match to the past Sydney and the path she had forged until it became nothing but dust for the ability to recreate.

Learning to accept myself, even the parts that I didn’t particularly like, forced me to develop a new understanding about life. Nothing will ever be perfect, but you have to make the most out of every situation thrown at you. And even though I may never find my name plastered on a trinket, my name has more meaning to me than a plastic flashlight ever will.

A life-changing event is not something to be taken lightly. Throughout our lives, we encounter many obstacles and changes, some of which bring us joy and excitement, others of which may be hard for us to handle. When I look back on my relatively short life, it may, at first, be hard for me to think of an event that has truly molded and shaped the person that I am today. I have encountered several changes, but at the time, they felt like mere speed bumps along my path. Looking back now, it is easy for me to see that these changes were not by chance, but were placed in my path to form the person that I am today.