Ambiguity and I, we’ve been best friends for the past 18 years.
After all, telling people I don’t know my personality type has always been easier than trying to list out the five-or-so different acronyms I’ve gotten as my result (most of which I don’t remember, anyway). Refusing to let any essay define my story has been the easy way out of truly thinking about it.
As crazy as it sounds, I find comfort in vagueness. It’s always pushed the floodgates open, let me imagine beyond the confines of who I am: I’m a pharmaceutical researcher working on the latest treatment for Parkinson’s disease and the first Asian face on the Supreme Court; I’m dancing in an anonymous crowd and I’m reading R. F. Kuang next to my sister; I’m at my highest high and lowest low, experiencing everything at once.
The world is my oyster, a clean slate with endless possibilities.
But — snap back to reality — I can only pick one cake, have one best friend, and post one picture. Time keeps marching forward, and I can’t help but feel like I’m just stumbling along. Indeed, I’m so stuck in my alternate universe that with every step forward I take in time, my imagination seems to hold me back two.
I struggled to declare myself introvert or extrovert for the longest time out of fear that I’d be limiting myself by aligning with either. My opinion on anything and everything changes with the wind when I think about arguments that infinitely extend on both sides. There’s nothing I fear more than being bound to a single outcome, because no matter what I settle on, it just feels like an agreement to pigeonhole myself.
Now, more than ever, I’m at a point in my life where I can’t necessarily afford to spend time lounging in infinite what-ifs. It feels like I just committed to college yesterday, and tomorrow, I’ll be signing the terms and contracts of the next 40 years of my working life. What’s worse, this is just the beginning of every adult-ish choice I’ll have to continue making down the road.
I think at the core of it, my love for ambiguity stems from a love for the world — a desire to see, feel, and be it all. But that love is crippling me, the heartache of every opportunity cost overshadowing my capacity to be.
I want to feel the jammy tang of post-performance adrenaline shoot through my stomach and the melancholy hurt of parting with friends envelop me. I want to grow and live, and that want is slowly outpacing the need to remain uncertain for “what-ifs.”
No, I don’t feel ready for this next chapter of my life; I don’t think I’ll ever be. But if there’s one thing I know, it’s that I don’t want to look at a stranger in the mirror forever — and that’s enough for me to figure out who I really am.
