I Lost Myself in Rio de Janeiro

Though, truthfully, I had never even found myself.

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Recently, I moved to Rio de Janeiro.

Rio holds a special place in my heart. It was the first city I visited in Brazil, and several months later, it was also where I became fluent in Portuguese. The city has seen several versions of me.

Returning has me reflecting on who I tell myself I am.

For a long time, I defined myself by the things done to me. This is to say whenever someone asked me about myself, I would present myself as someone who had been physically, emotionally, and sexually abused. My role as someone who has suffered was central to my sense of self.

Over the past few months, I have been finally releasing my suffering. As I do so, my internal role as a victim of abuse has become increasingly absent from my identity.

With the loss of this pain-based identity, I am left with a question I can’t answer.

Who am I?

This question makes me think of two quotes from Eckhart Tolle. The first comes from A New Earth in which he describes his work as a spiritual healer. He says:

“I usually congratulate people when they tell me, ‘I don’t know who I am anymore.’ … Is it possible to let go of the belief that you should or need to know who you are?”

The second quote comes from his first book, The Power of Now, where he describes the moment in his life directly following the release of his pain-based identity.

“For a while, I was left with nothing on the physical plane. I had no relationships, no job, no home, no socially defined identity. I spent almost two years sitting on park benches in a state of the most intense joy.”

I don’t think I’d label my current feeling as intense joy. It’s closer to a state of complete acceptance.

I have also been using this time to examine my life’s events and rewrite the story I tell myself about my life’s events.

In this process, one word takes center stage: lucky.

I am lucky to have had such a challenging childhood. If we all must pass through a period of suffering, I am lucky to have gotten my suffering done early. With any luck, the worst of it is already behind me.

I am also lucky to have had my heart broken a year ago. That experience was the straw that broke the camel’s pain. In the aftermath, I had the opportunity to experience the worst of myself with frightening intensity. I am beyond lucky I had the strength and courage to face and fix the flaws in the way I experience the world.

Looking at my life through this lens, there is very little I cannot attribute to luck.

I used to source my identity from my pain. Now that I no longer find my sense of personhood in suffering, I can tell you this behavior, all along, was a coverup for the simple honest truth: I don’t know who I am. I have never known, and with any luck, I never will.

I feel a deep sense of freedom right now.

I have no preference for which way my life might go. If I am asked to suffer again, surely, on the other end of it, I can find a way to attribute it to luck. I have nothing to ask of life, thus I have nothing to expect from life.

So here I am, sitting on my metaphorical park bench. And I am incredibly lucky to have found that park bench in beautiful Rio de Janeiro.

My question for you today is:

How do you define yourself? Are there any moments in your life you source your identify in? Or how has your sense of identity changed as you’ve grown?

Thanks for reading :) Now I gotta get back to my park bench.