i am me.

It was 1998 back then. Stood alone in faculty office, I was fascinated by a piece of writing hanged on the wall. For 30 mins I stared at it, lifted my mind up above the ceiling.

The very next day having coffee in the faceless crowd at cafeteria, the plain sentences and simple words still grabbed all of me. It wasn't as easy as it is now to search for articles via the internet. So I went to the faculty office again to write it down on my notebook disregarding the curious pairs of eyes:

i am me - "My Declaration of Self-esteem"
by Virginia Satir

In all the world, there is no one else exactly like me -
everything that comes out of me is authentically mine,
because I alone choose it -
I own everything about me -
my body, my feelings, my mouth, my voice, all my actions,
whether they be to others or to myself -
I own my fantasies, my dreams, my hopes, my fears -
I own all my triumphs and successes, all my failures and mistakes.

Because I own all of me, I can become intimately acquainted with me -
by so doing I can love me and be friendly with me in all my parts -
I know there are aspects about myself that puzzle me,
and other aspects that I do not know -
but as long as I am friendly and loving to myself,
I can courageously and hopefully look for solutions to the puzzles and for ways to find out more about me -
However I look and sound, whatever I say and do, and whatever I think and feel at a given moment in time is authentically me -
If later some parts of how I looked, sounded, thought and felt turned out to be unfitting, I can discard that which I feel is unfitting, keep the rest, and invent something new for that which I discarded -
I can see, hear, feel, think, say, and do. I have the tools to survive, to be close to others, to be productive, and to make sense and order out of the world of people and things outside of me -
I own me, and therefore I can engineer me -
I am me &

I AM OKAY

photo by sitruc, 2006, seoul, korea