Welcome, my new stranger!
“You have to be prepared to burn yourself in your own flame: how to renew yourself without first turning to ash?” – Thus Spoke Zarathustra (Friedrich Nietzsche).
How I've Changed… I was thinking the other day. I'm not the same anymore, I've changed little by little. A gradual change. A slow process, until one day you see the first signs in small details. Who is this person who seems to be speaking out? Where does this unknown courage come from, sometimes only perceived after words said or actions taken?Friendships, a first point indicative of this mutation.
Affection exists and so do memories, but what about values? No, these are not the same anymore! First clue, something is different.
And in these moments of change, you often feel lost... And now? Which way?
For a while, you feel suspended, as if lost in limbo, difficult to recognize. Who am I?
Two years, maybe more, maybe less. There is no initial and precise milestone, but unconscious choices, which subtly led and directed you to this change.
Until one day you see the big puzzle and how the pieces, which before seemed to fit together perfectly and draw the map of your life, no longer have the proper format. The pieces have transformed, some have extended, some have shrunk, and the puzzle now has a new cutout.
You still rationally try to identify with what once sustained you. But it's false, it doesn't make sense anymore.Little by little, the person you knew is no longer there, he no longer resides in you. She's gone, that's why you feel alone. You don't recognize yourself. But this is just a passing process, so that a new person can emerge.
The moment comes when you recognize that, yes, there is a new person in there, with feelings, wants, desires and strength. And now you want to know and create intimacy with this new being, but it can still feel counterintuitive.
I don't know you, what do you want?
Some days, she's just a stranger trying to invade your world. You don't accept it, reject it and then run away in search of the old person.
But now something no longer fits. The puzzle is different, it asks for new pieces.
In others, the new person is a source of admiration, the one you always wanted to meet. Slowly, you find new comfort in it.
But will it be just a passenger? No, the time has come!
You secretly yearn to welcome and create space for this new person, who seems to belong to you. But wait a minute that new person is you! It exists in there, it is alive and asking to be accepted. Maybe she was always there, but blindly you didn't hear her.
Yes, she lives and you finally realize that she has always been there, she just hid, not knowing if you would have the courage to welcome her.
“I've changed!” you finally acknowledge with all your might.
It's no use turning to the old friend anymore. Anyway, you realize she's died and let go...
Let go of who you always believed you were. The most difficult and painful part, because no one accompanied him for so long, for all his life, in all, exactly all the moments, but her. But now you know she's gone.
Little by little, you then understand that you are ready to welcome the new person and this recognition is reassuring. This is you, this is me.
When the time has come to assume the consequences of being who you are, yes, you will have losses along the way and, like all loss, a feeling of nostalgia is part of it.
You are then faced with the loss of some and some, who will have to leave, I do not say left behind, because it is not a race, only a transformation.
Friendships, ideas and beliefs may no longer have space and being at peace with loss is not so simple. But you can no longer force and pretend, the new person is honest, honest with you. There is no longer any way to betray yourself for acceptance.
And so, slowly, you realize that there are other worlds and other realities where you can feel at home again. New people, yes, still unknown, but who will awaken in you their new look, their new truths.
It's not easy to stop being the one you know. You thought you knew where and to whom you belong, but now you discover that you belong to yourself.
You live the subtle farewell and the fear that accompanies it, because it is still present, after all, there are no more guarantees. Those you chose to leave behind. And despite imagining that, yes, it is still possible to go back, you recognize in yourself that this possibility does not exist from now on, because who you were is no longer.
I moved, I undressed, I said goodbye, to find you.
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