Embracing Your Authentic Self

Saturday

March 10, 2018

One of my greatest self-discoveries is that I am free to be who I really am. I'm not obligated to wear masks to gain other people's acceptance. Sometimes I felt like an outcast, but as I've said a million times: I'd rather be me than by anyone else. 

And then I found Nicolai Hel. "Never have I identified with a character with this soul-stirring intensity," I wrote in "Shibumi: My Favorite Novel," a 2013 blog post.

As I write about my favorite novel, by coincidence, I also have the theme of my favorite movie as our featured Filipino song of the week. 

The story of Nicolai is my inspiration for "The Art of Understated Perfection," a 2014 two-part blog story in 2014. "I have chosen a path where I found inner peace. Then the story of a young man led me to an even deeper understanding."

"Like Nicholai, I, too, am an orphan with a disdain for the superficial, a need for solitude and an unfathomably deep streak of independence," goes my second part.

I was also inspired to write a poem, "Shibumi." I first posted it on January 2017 on the same Facebook cover photo. It was also published in the online literary sites Our Poetry Archive (June 2017), The Poet Community (July 2017) and Destiny Poets (March 2018)

Here is a brief passage:

A Zen garden
express the ineffable
that lies hidden.
It is true beauty,
as delicate as gossamer,
as real as a tree.

Destiny Poets

Our Poetry Archive

The Poet Community

My Favorite Novel

The Art of Understated Perfection 1

The Art of Understated Perfection 2

Photo courtesy of AlphaCoders.com