This essay was inspired by If I Had Wings:

...I can see in myself wings as I feel them
If you see something else, keep your thoughts to yourself,
I'll fly free then...

...You can't share in a dream, that you don't believe in
If you say that you see and pretend to be me
You won't be then.

How can you ask if I'm happy goin' my way?
You might as well ask a child at play!
There's no need to discuss or understand me
I won't ask of myself to become something else
I'll just be me!...

It would seem that our own worst enemy is one that we are already very familiar with: ourselves. Who we percieve ourselves as being ultimately effects who we are and who we become. Our perspection and self-image directly effect our actions and who we associate with in society.

It is really difficult not to absorb and start to accept the criticism of people around you. After all, the people you know have a level of authority, beyond yourself and your conscience. You look outside and you see that not everybody can see the beauty that you can see. It is difficult not to internalize those values and not to start to think negatively.

Negative thinking is increadibly destructive. If we start to believe that we can not act, then we start not to act. The big picture is big, and it can be quite frightening and difficult to view in the perspective of your everyday action. You start to act for tommorow, but are limited by the downfalls of everyday life in the present. You think at one level, you must be prepared for tommorow, but in many cases you can not actually live up to that goal in the immediate future.

Our world is big and complex, and as such moves slowly and can be fustrating. At times, we all want to give up. How can I continue the fight if all I am seeing is defeats? Many a great army has asked that question, and the successful army says, "we lost the battle, but we are winning the war". I have certainly seen my fair share of lost battles and defeats over the past couple of months, but I have a hope for a better tommorow.

It's easy to get absorbed in the world around you. The world we live in sometimes breaks my heart. I see so much evil and dark clouds at times, that it gets the point where I can see we are embarking on a mission of no return. I see the attrition of the War in Iraq 2.0, Rapp Road, Crossgates Mall, and worst of all insitutions and the people that make them up, that are prejudical and bigoted. Sometimes it is difficult to see a silver lining. Yet, if you look farther, you can see the progress of our society has made at improving our world in the past few years and our society's mild rejection of the afformentioned things. There is hope for a better tommorow.

At the same time, I sometimes forget who I am and who I am becoming. I have completed 6-semesters of study in college, studying a variety of topics, but concentrating mostly in Political Science and Computer Science. I have good grades, although certainly not as good as some of my competitors. It hurts not always coming in first, but I guess they call that life. I have a diverse set of interests, and the most I explore the interest, the more the interest becomes myself.

Think about it for a moment: when you have something that strikes your interest, you tend to start socializing with people of the same interest, and you also start becoming knowledgable in the subject. Before you know it, you almost start becoming part of the interest. We all have the ability to change who we are, and we don't always act consciously of that change.

While I find myself becoming closer to the groups that I like, I still view myself as an outsider, somebody who can never become one of many things. This is certainly true, as many fields contain inherit family-based bariers to their entry. Agriculture is one such field, in where the capital and skills are limited to those families who already participate in the system. The rest of us mere mortals can dream and reap the benifits, but we can never be. A similiar thing could be said to be true, even with democratic politics. Without the blood, you can not be a full elite, although you can work your way up in the system.

It is not always easy to know who you really are now or who you are becoming. You live always in the present, and never in the future or the past. The problem is the present is extremely limited, and to get a good perspective, you have to look at your past and judge where you have come from. The past inevitably is filled with distortions, repressed thoughts, and other biases, that give you an unrealistic perspective on who you really are.

In the end, it is often difficult to know what story you want to believe about yourself. One too great makes you overshoot your targets, and causes a great disappointment when you believe you deserve something, and you fail to get it. One too little leads you to not leave up to your potentials, and your life rapidly becomes a story of pitfalls.