It seems as though I am light enough that a strong wind could carry me anywhere, and for years now the winds of interest have blown particularly hard. No matter what I've tried, it seems that I have never been able to anchor myself particularly well either. "When will I be taken next?" is the question that plays on repeat in my head when I am less delusional. When will I be taken next?

Countless hours of reading and research reveals so many different beliefs and solutions. One tribe, my tribe, says that there is an authentic self that dwells within us and for some, like me, it can be more obscured than for others and that we must bring it out of the shadow and into the light. A different tribe, my other tribe, says that our self is a fleeting fantasy and that clinging to the self will only bring suffering in its wake. Another tribe, a tribe I am also a part of, says that our identity is nothing more than our relationships with all other things and that there is no way out, that we need to just peacefully let the world pull us along. As much as I would like to find myself, to lose myself, and to be myself, I find it impossible to wholly commit to any form of self and make no progress, simply being blown along from self to self to self.

I want so dearly for all three of those selves to just work for me. To have a deep and genuine self that I am comfortable with, free of vain attachment, that naturally arises from being in tune with the world around me but isn't as terribly flighty as I really am. I fear, however, that that kind of thing is really impossible. I also fear that I must become too cold and philosophical to really begin to understand who I am. I have spent so long trying to find a correct path and feel no more closer to a destination than before. Every time I have started down one, I have allowed the wind to blow me off course. Even from the progress I've made, I feel totally alien.

Of course, perhaps I am just young and growing and all of this will come to me with due time and a self will finally take root with time and achievement and choke out the others. Or perhaps, I really should just let it all go.

Heat from fire, fire from heat.