Who Am I? And What Do I Want?

 I think it's easy enough to say that without a shadow of a doubt, Uncle Iroh is the best character in Avatar: The Last Airbender. The portrayal of someone so wise and understanding when the world would have you divide yourself. To grasp and learn the insights and knowledges of all peoples, of all walks of life, and to piece it all together to make a whole and incredible understanding of it all. To be one who chooses peace over war, who quenches the fires of anger with calmness and kindness.

Then the wisdoms that he shares through his journey with his nephew, Zuko. Or even all of the wisdoms he shares with any of the characters in the story. Many of which are wisdoms that can be applied to the viewer and sparks a genuine thought process.

As the title already writes, I am focusing on the part where Iroh questions Zuko and asks him to "ask the big questions in life. Who are you, and what do you want?"

The thing is, my answer is: I don't know. Who am I supposed to be? Who am I trying to be? What am I doing to get to where I think I need to be going? Is this the choice that I want to make? Am I building a future I can be proud of?

I don't mean to write any of that as a way to be somber or seeking sympathy. I genuinely write that because I just go day to day living life in the moment but not really thinking much more on the next day, the next week, the next month, etc. Because in reality the choices I make today will lead to my tomorrow. How will I build myself to eventually get to some goal that I wish to achieve?

I can even take my weightlifting/gym-going as a starting point. How could I expect to lift some obscure number of pounds in some certain lift if I don't train myself? One does not magically go from deadlifting 10 pounds to deadlifting 500 overnight. There is a long journey in between that requires pushing oneself to go harder to train longer to incorporate different lifts and accessory muscle training. There's more to it than a single facet training style.

I find that most cases (and a lot of it is discovered in hindsight), life is like a gemstone: it's multi-faceted and if you only focus on one part of it, you'll never understand it. When we admire a gem, we look at how all the cuts and facets make it sparkle and shine. To enjoy its entire beauty we take a step back and view it from afar to increase the amount of light shining on it. We don't normally go incredibly up close to look at one side of it all. Certainly we are allowed to if we want to, but that one side won't be the big picture.

There's a video that I would like you to watch if you're here: https://youtu.be/GT2f-WM86oQ

The video is a speech by Matthew McConaughey and how he talks about who his hero is. And the answer is himself, but 10 years in the future. But 10 years later, he isn't his own hero as his hero is still 10 years in the future. It is in an attempt to chase after something and you might as well chase after yourself in the future. Why? Because you'll be building yourself to reach the heights you'd expect your hero to be at. And when you get there, you still have more to grow and more to chase.

On a semi-similar note, there was a TikTok (oh boy here we go again haha) that partially inspired this post: https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMdXaqqyX/ 

Now if you don't already know, I happen to have the same stuffed animal that this creator has. And the video personifies the puppy as saying how they have watched the creator grow up from being a kid to now an adult accomplishing so many things in life. And when I first saw this TikTok, I thought to myself, "well I have that same puppy. I wonder, would he be proud of me? Where I've been, where I am now, where I plan to go? Would he be proud or would he be ashamed?"

And maybe it's silly or childish for a 21 (almost 22) year old man (kind of weird to call myself a "man" but I know it's technically true and slightly more true than saying I'm a "boy") to still keep his stuffed animals. but honestly I don't really care. It was and is my childhood and I don't care about the stigma that may come about it. I am nostalgic with my stuffed animals. I have memories with them and traveled quite literally the world with them. Anyways, best I move on now.

I go to think, is Pupps (as I've nicknamed him from his given name of "Puppers", which you also might notice is akin to DragonPupps) proud of me? He's been with me since April 23rd, 2006, when we went for a family vacation in Hilton Head Island, SC. I was 6 years old, going on 7 in a few months. And 15 years later, he's still with me at 21 going on 22. In a ways, he's seen me grow up from the tail end of 1st grade through the vast majority of my public schooling, traveled with me to every vacation or extended departure from home (mainly long weekend or few day getaways), came down to Liberty, and still sits beside me day to day in 2021. From childhood, to adolescence, to now young adulthood, he has seen me at my life's highs and lows. And the question that still remains is, is he proud of me?

All of this ties into the central idea of who am I? What do I want from my life? Am I even proud of myself, as anything that Pupps could be proud of is a projection and personification of my inner thinking and conscience. Pupps is a physical representation of my thoughts and feelings. The voice in my head as I think (sometimes) becomes Pupps. So the question really isn't is Pupps proud of me. The question is: am I proud of myself?

I know where I've been, I know where I've gone. I know what I've done, what I do, and what I must do. Is everything that I have decided on that brought me to where I am today something that I can take pride in? The answer? Some parts yes and some parts no.

I know that life sometimes has harder moments. I know that sometimes "you" make bad choices or decisions, be it a poor reaction, a misplaced comment, the flooding of emotions to lead to clouded judgment, etc. But sometimes there is something to be learned from it and while yes it is very easy to sit down and think and think and think upon the mistakes I have made and be sorry for myself and to "kick" myself over making those poorer decisions. However, despite it all, I want to start looking for what I have learned in those bad decisions. To embrace it all: the highs and the lows, to learn from it and to be ready to become someone new and someone better. Failure is sometimes not an option, but sometimes it also leads to being one of life's greatest teachers. Everything I know now through what I have done is experience. And that experience can fan the flames to make me into someone I can 100% and confidently be proud of day to day.

And to think all of this was inspired to be written because of a TV show and a TikTok regarding a stuffed animal.