Identity - "Who are you?"

It's hard for me to engage in debates about identity. People get very heated about it sometimes and have, what I consider, very rigid ideas about identity. I've never liked labels although I don't reject them entirely. They have some usefulness at times but then end up being boxes that limit our perspective. There are even labels to describe people trying not to fit into labels. I get it. I'm a tad bit gender fluid or pansexual myself. Or not. Whatever.

Is it really important to have an identity? Is that what people really care about? Or is it the freedom to say "I am me", and not have someone tell you you aren't. Would Hong Kong locals feel so proud of their identity if they were not being told that they are not Hong Kongers but something else? I doubt it. Our attachment to identity has a lot to do with our resistance to being labeled by someone else. That's not a bad thing.

But I think the core of the issue is really about self determination, not about a place or culture.

What about me?

I was born and raised in America to parents who were children of immigrants. I don't feel American. I never have. I don't feel European either. I don't feel like my families religion or ethnicity. But all of these things have influenced who i am. I'm not straight gay or bi and pansexual as a term just feels so redundant as a term to me. I am myself, am I not? But even that is always changing.

I've spent 12 years in Asia. If I were to claim myself Japanese, most people would find it ridiculous. I'd find it ridiculous. Maybe if I really confirmed to all the stereotypes of Japan, it'd be a little less ridiculous. I'm sure in 2019 some people would defend my right to call myself Japanese, even as a white person. But why bother? Is it really so important to belong to this place, just because I feel a connection to it. I don't even believe in countries.

I feel as Japanese as I am American, as Hong Kong as New Jersian. But when people look at me they see "a white guy who likes Asia". That's the best they can do. But I don't LIKE Asia. I would probably like Europe more. I don't prefer Asians to Westerners. I like people who don't fit in.

So why do I stay here? Why haven't I gone to Europe? I could if i really wanted to but I feel a connection here. It isn't a "like" or an "interest". It's like a magnet. When I leave, I feel something pulling me back. It starts off as a small tug but before long it becomes an intense feeling that keeps me up at night. I belong here. For some strange reason. I'm called here, by forces that logic can't comprehend.

I am deeply attracted to Chinese medicine, Buddhist and Taoist ideas, but no matter how strongly others insist that these ideas are from the east, I just feel that it's the east that has tapped into them longer and more thoroughly. They exist in nature, everyone. And for the record, I am as Buddhist or Taoist as I am American or Japanese.

I am a different me depending on which language I speak, the same way I am a different me depending on my mood. Label me if you like. Today I play folk music, tomorrow I'll be a rapper, a dancer, a painter. I'm an anarchist who plays in the system, an anti-capitalist capitalist. A peaceful punk, a sober hippie and a very normal weirdo.

No matter what label I use to describe myself, it will be misunderstood. I can only use labels to help people make shortcuts, but you've only understood a tiny parcel of who I am when you label me.

Behind all of it, I am no one and everyone. I am whoever I feel like at that given moment. I am you, and you are me.

More at I+Everything