Make peace with self

I must say that this is the most impressive two months I ever lived for nearly 24 years.

The world is so much more beautiful in the lens of western world. The air is cleaner, no single ventolin used in this past two months. The water is clearer, you can drink from your own sink. The traffic and public transportation is more bearable, I almost always sit and read in subway, no significant hassle experienced. The sidewalk for pedestrian is there, waiting for you to walk, wide and safe. The food is coming from the best sources, abundant vegetables and fruits, cheap almond milk, variety of cheeses, affordable salmon. The people are minding their own business.
Life is less stressful than it was before.

Yes, those are admirable, but those are not the mere reason of the impressiveness.

I'm impressed by how living away from your comfort zone is letting you discover yourself in the most intense way. And by comfort zone I mean all the familiarity I had back home. Family, friends, food, material possession, social norms.

Day by day, second by second, I have a galore of chance to get to know the truest form of myself more. It started with the most basic question: what kind of person do I want to be?

The answer might involve further discovery of self, but at least now I figure out what kind of person I don't want to be.

I don't want to be a person with many faces. Being different person around different people. Talk differently, act differently around certain kind of people. I don't want to hide things and spend my energy to serve people's perspective towards me. Because then I have to ask myself, which one of those person am I?  

I aspire to be the same person whether I'm with my nephew or my college friends.

I want me to do, or not do, things not because of someone else's presence or judgement, but because of the reason I inherently believe and the logic I essentially embrace. As for me to be labelled as certain thing is none of my business, because I cannot control people's perspective. One thing I can fully control is myself.

The truth is, I'm no longer relying on a sense of pure good and bad because the more I grow up the more I understand that all norms are relative, the world is not black and white. So the extra question I ask myself when I decided something, whether serious or trivial, is do I still have the same decision if I were surrounded by different people, for instance, if I were surrounded by the familiarity mentioned above? It is because of me that I decided to do this, or because of the others? And if the answer is yes, it is for the first reason, then I'm gonna do it. If it is not, then I'm in a full control of myself to not do it.

If I'm being kind with my closest friend, then I'm gonna be kind with whomever it is. I'm being kind not because she/he is A or B, but because it is what I am. If I don't drink in front of my parents, then I don't drink even if I'm in a bar with friends. My action is not based on my parents' presence nor my friends' judgement, it is because of what I do believe. If I don't smoke in front of my boyfriend's mom, I don't smoke even if I'm alone. Because it is what I am, not because I am afraid to be labelled as such thing.

Whenever I go, whomever I'm with, it has to be the same Tita Adelia that I am. That is the only way I can make peace with myself.

Now I get it why is there such phenomenon called 'coming out'. Because to make peace with yourself, you have to be able to be the same person wherever you are, whenever you are, whomever with you are. Hiding things, being a person with many faces, is somehow exhausting.

For my case, although it is not as easy at it seems, I'm fortunate enough that my version of self is widely accepted by society. I couldn't imagine how miserable it is to be oneself that happened to be the opposite side of constructed norms. It is like I want to befriend them. I want to hug them, tell them that it is okay to be your version of self, as long as no one on this mortal earth is harmed because of who you are.

Make peace with yourself is like the most fundamental thing you can do to reach the state of being happy. And I never feel as content as this before.

If it is not for the long distance I took apart from my comfort zone, I might not be able to even think about this all. I will be too busy dealing with everyday's routine, ride the sardine can train in the morning, fulfil superior's expectation in the daylight, craving for high quality sleep in the night.

So I'm not wrong if I say that this is the most impressive two months I ever lived for nearly 24 years, am I?