As each subsequent chapter of life passes, I find myself unable to recognize my former self, as I guilelessly blend with the circumstances and ensure that there is little substance to sustain the inner values that I like to believe exist but have yet to define.

Reflecting upon experiences and anecdotes from the past, I observe snapshots of the characters I used to portray. I sometimes find similarities, maybe a resemblance I can hold on to for reference when I eventually try to piece myself together and build something that is more than just an amalgamation of those around me and the media I so greedily consume.

What do I value? How do I define a life worth living? As much as I try to make it out to be so, there is nothing complicated about my situation. Simply I am lost.

How do I stop this habit of looking down upon myself? The person I have adapted into surely disproves of the identity I had assumed a few years ago. Would the character I enacted last year find who I am now to be compelling? Would my past counterparts look at the most current version in awe or with disdain? Would that individual even notice this one in a chance encounter?

I used to long for the stability I now enjoy, yet the ease at which it comes serves as a trigger for restlessness. Ordinary, forgettable – I live to evade those words yet at times I come to face the fact that nothing I have accomplished has qualified me to graduate onto more illustrious descriptors. How defeated it feels to consent that I am unoriginal.

Maybe this is just another stage of development. In a few years I will likely look down upon the irony and condescend. Would my adaptation in the future be able to empathize or will it merely dismiss the youthful conflict as a circumstantial side effect? Will I reiterate this recurring cycle of attempted self discovery until I one day accept that I am no closer to understanding myself than the first time I asked these questions?