Featured
Stories

Ivanna Ihekwoaba, Low Entropy Volunteer Writer

What does it mean to lose ourselves? To lose something implies we had something in the first place. To lose yourself is to have found yourself first, and lose sight of who you found. Let’s dive deeper into what this means. 

How do we get to know ourselves? Well, from birth it seems like it’s pretty explanatory. When we are asked our age, we count from the second we entered this world. Our wants are influenced by our surroundings (which is completely normal and also basic psychology). We also begin to learn a lot of things from other people with more life experience. We trust our parents’ words to guide us far enough to where we can handle things on our own. 

But when is that exactly? This answer is different for everyone. 

As babies, we don’t hold memories, but we do alot of what we want. We felt safe to attempt crawling down the stairs while our parents were freaking out about how we were getting too fast for them. I’d like to think that, in those moments, we might have known exactly who we were. We just can’t remember. And that is the beauty of life. In some stages of our lives, a fluid memory allows you continued growth and formation. 

So how do we know who we are? 

We keep doing and trying things. We go to that horror movie and cringe at a particular scene, and you decide that perhaps horror is NOT the genre for you. You try out for the basketball team and discover that you cannot, for the life of you, dribble. You could learn, but you don’t actually want to; you decide that basketball is better watched. You attend a friend’s party and amidst all the loud music and talking, you notice a dog in the corner of the room and five minutes later, you don’t feel so bored anymore. You decide you like dogs. Twenty minutes before an important exam, you feel your chest tighten and you begin to take shallow breaths. After multiple occurrences and seeking medical help, you discover you have anxiety. When you come to this knowledge, you decide to surround yourself with tools to help you feel supported. 

I could go on. This is just a speck of an idea as to how we begin to define and find ourselves.

Everything is going well, you are making friends and reaching out to people. Then all of a sudden, those friends begin to feel a little like strangers. That favourite meal of yours becomes a chore to cook. You begin to think many thoughts — and a lot at once. You begin to spend your days focusing on the negative and not the positive. Things feel a bit too familiar and you become lethargic. Life becomes routine and boring. Passion becomes lost in translation.

You feel lost.

And that is where we have probably found ourselves a lot in our lives. This is completely normal, of course, we are constantly growing and, some days, the sun doesn’t shine because it rains all day. But this rain is necessary for us to grow.

—

Leave your thoughts for Ivanna in the comments below. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and YouTube to stay up-to-date with Low Entropy news!