i contain multitudes
I picked drawing as a hobby at the tender age of six. For me, drawing was like breathing - no, it was breathing. When people asked me to introduce myself, I state my name, immediately followed by, "I am an artist."
When I graduated high school, I had to choose between two paths: going down the - in the words of my parents and teachers - starving artist road, or securing a financially stable future with a STEM degree. I picked the latter, of course. In a sense, I was pressured. I thought the adults around me knew better than 17-year-old me. What did I know?
When I made my decision to undertake a degree in chemical engineering, I felt myself straying from the fixed identity I picked for myself. Don't get me wrong. I actually fell in love with engineering, loved the sophistication of my subjects, loved the eureka moments when I finally worked out a problem I was stuck on for 30 minutes. I had a taste for complexity, and so engineering was right up my alley.
However, with the effort required to pass my subjects, I started drawing less. Stretches of long, grueling months passed without being able to draw. I felt myself panic - do I have the rights to call myself an artist when I no longer draw as frequently? I felt like a walking contradication.
But then, I thought to myself: Why am I stuffing myself in a box? Why am I entertaining the perception that I am meant to follow a single path in my life?
For some reason, it was easier for my brain to think of artist and engineer as two separate identities, two separate people. It took me a long time to realize that I can be both at once. I did not have to draw all the time to be an artist. I did not have to analyze process flow diagrams all the time to be called a real engineer, either.
I know I am not the only one who felt this way, and I am not only talking about our contradictory thoughts when it came to our life paths. Even our thoughts and personalities can be contradicting. I call myself an introvert, but sometimes I find myself yearning to be surrounded by many people. I can act one way, but deep down feel another.
We are not flat characters in a children's story. We are complicated, three-dimensional beings who are perpetually evolving, always responding to varying stimuli in our environment. I am not the same person I was yesterday, and that is okay. For me, contradiction equates sophistication. If I am not contradicting myself from time to time, then my perspective is not diverse enough.
This is what they called having "multitudes" - the varying thoughts, feelings, and path within ourselves that can simultaneously complement or contradict one another.
My love for art is a contradiction for my love for STEM - interests in opposite ends - but they complement me, contributing to the depth of my being. Doing one thing more doesn't negate the existence of other.
This piece felt more like a stream of consciousness than a coherently logical argument, and I know it may not be that deep, but to me, it is a topic of importance.
My advice for you is this: contradict yourself. Be everything you want to be. You are not defined by one thing. You can be everything you want to be.
I leave you with the following excerpt from Walt Whitman's seminal 1855 poem 'Song to Myself' from his collection Leaves of Grass, expressing the beautiful, desperate contradiction of being human: Do I contradict myself? / Very well then I contradict myself, / (I am large, I contain multitudes.)
Much to think about.