Really!!! All these years of life, reading, writing, soul searching and introspection and Frank Zappa already had it all figured out….Frank Zappa? Not Albert Einstein, Brene’ Brown, Socrates, Anne Lamott or Henry David Thoreau? I really should have NOT listened to parents, teachers, priests, and TV…. As a younger woman, I should have gotten into more trouble, be myself, and not care what anyone else thought. But I wanted so desperately to fit in, be good, be accepted and I was already punished so much for the smallest infraction that I was always scared. I am still….always scared! Scared to stand up for me, scared to speak out, scared of not being good enough, scared of being left out, scared of not being loved. When you spend your entire life trying to fit in and embrace the unspoken but very established and mandatory qualifications of success it is very hard to let go! Although historically we hold up and celebrate the rebels and the non-conformists of the arts, religion, politics, and science, we beat and punish our children into socially acceptable submission. We are taught that the only aspiration needed for true success is to fit in and be what “they” expect.
Now I am at a time when I just do not care anymore…I have nothing to lose…and maybe that is the secret…to truly be strong enough to not “fit in” and be myself, I must feel like I have absolutely nothing to lose. For lack of other things to call this part of my life…”nothing to lose” sounds right.. I really should be celebrating this as a marvelous new freedom! Although I suspect grieving all of the things I wanted to do but didn't, is a part of getting to that wonderful "nothing to lose"!
"In my Mind" Amanda Palmer
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