Be Original!

How often do you come across people who imitate? Or who mock? Or who flatter? Flattery that will be so evident and yet they pretend that  to be natural. Now introspect, are you one of them? May be yes , may be no, may be you don’t know or may be you don’t want to know. To help you comprehend what am speaking about, let me introduce you all to a term- “Idealized Self”. This happens to be the root cause for all sorts of mockery, flattery and fake personalities that exist in this world. Although few people are aware of this demon, they just give in to it to gain acceptance, to gain popularity;  acceptance that will be pseudo and popularity that lasts not long.

So what is Idealized Self? Idealized Self Is a image a person paints about himself in his mind, that resembles how he wishes to look like in the society, and that which differs from what he actually is! For those who identify it and yet they continue with it, the reason is cryptic.   For the rest, the initiation point of this condition may go down to ones childhood or adolescence. For instance while you were in 10^th std, someone said disheveled or spiked hair looks cool and you started spiking your hair, whereas  the inner “you” liked cropped hair cut. Or a girl stuffed her bedroom with teddy’s just because someone said it looks cute to people, whereas she hasn’t got any particular liking towards them. To add on, boys using “dude” as a suffix or prefix to every sentence they speak and girls using “aww” every now then to look extra sweet etc. The point is where does that lead one to?

Anyone with little sensibility and fair amount of judgment will catch you in a flash and that would leave a lasting impression of you in their minds. Am not at all speculating whether or not you should change your behavior, adapting to changes is a must but  what am emphasizing is stick with your real self. Stick with what you like, or what you dislike and stand by it when time comes.

I have also seen people who refrain from telling their perspectives  when a collective decision is to be taken, only to vote at last,  in favour of what the majority thinks. This parasitic approach gains you disrespect from the same majority and also hampers your own growth. People having this tendency  to flip flop their views will end up wishing  “had it been this way?” or “ had I done that?”. They’ll be eventually called losers,  and someone with just a wishbone and not a backbone.

But friends, here’s the good news, its never too late to rectify. Try to bridge that gap between the “REAL YOU” and “ IDEALIZED  YOU” . If you are a boy and very emotional and you act to be raw, drop that mask. If you are a  girl who is tomboyish  and you pretend to be fragile, let go of it. Be proud of what you are. Chuck all those people who try to influence your decisions.  They ‘ve got nothing to lose whereas you ‘ve got everything at stake.  You decide what to do and what not. Of course you’ll face hurdles, you might completely fail, your judgment of things might  be 180⁰ to the proper ones. But remember, good judgment comes by experience and experience can come only through bad judgment. Be original, and if you have to be eccentric for that, so be it!