Relocation as self reinvention

I lost and found myself in the twisted strokes of the starry night.

My fascination with the works of Vincent van Gogh is one of the earliest things I can remember about myself. But why would a child be so mesmerized by a painters work? Was it the colours, the flowers and the fields? Was it that “good art” can be identified and appreciated by anyone regardless of their knowledge on art? Or was it simply nurtured familiarity because I grew up seeing them on the walls of our apartment?

Part of “who we are” is innate and part of it is learned. Then one affects the other like the relationship between climate and weather. I don’t know what percentage of that fascination was innate and what percentage was learned, but somewhere in his paint strokes lied the answer to my wondering and wanderings.

van Gogh’s strokes are thick, distinct and hasty. As if he harried to catch whatever fantastical current his eyes seemed to see. Each stroke is its own little entity, some dull some brighter, some bigger some smaller, seemingly unimportant if you zoom in and focus on just one.But when you step back you see how each individual stroke is a puzzle piece, a link in a chain, that creates the whole.

Not unlike, the events of a persons life. Every thing done to us or by us, every encounter, every bit of information, every image we have seen, every environment we have found ourselves in, every bliss, every shock, every pain, physical or mental, every tear and laugh. Each might be a passing forgettable moment or the biggest trauma of our lifetime and everything in between. Everything ads to the constant and on going amalgamation of what makes us ourselves.

We are build by conscious and subconscious pieces. Some we chose, or were chosen for us with our well being in mind. Some we didn’t choose or were accidents of fate. Some of the pieces helped support other pieces but ended up being dead rotting corpses we were used to carry around. Some of them we hold onto dearly, because all the rest are pieces we wished we didn’t have. In the end, how much in tune we are with ourselves depends on the relationship between who we are and the pieces that consist us.

I struggled with seasonal allergies for years. From childhood to adulthood, half of the year, I couldn’t breathe and my eyes were constantly red and teary. I tried every medication available, became addicted to it, to the point that it wouldn’t work. Then finally winter would come and I’d be free for a few months, until next spring when my body would be ready for the medication to work for a while, until it wouldn’t.

My body was constantly fighting, but it wasn’t a real disability like my grandmothers blindness or my aunts MS, so I considered the constant irritability, the stress, the itchiness as normal. My normalcy was restlessness, so when all the other pieces of my life puzzle started coming in, I didn’t notice that abandonment caused depression, loneliness caused disassociation and learning disability caused low self worth. The pieces did after all come in matching colours.

If that was normal why did I feel wrong? It wasn’t something specific, a person, a situation, a friend or a job. I felt wrong. All the pieces of me, all my strokes if you will, created something that looked like you had put together a piece of IKEA furniture the wrong way because you lost the manual. It’s still a cupboard, but it’s wonky and the doors won’t close.

All my little strokes painted something I couldn’t recognize. A chaotic image that bounced around within the canvas, never landing anywhere, each screaming and kicking wanting to go back to the paint tube or even scrubbed away with a washcloth. This wasn’t the beautiful image my mother had promised me I am capable of creating. I realized that somewhere down the line I had lost myself in colourblindness and disarray.

Then when every new stroke of colour felt like an invasion to my canvas, I halted. I took a step back, I took a good look at myself and realized that If I don’t put the strokes in order, I will eventually have to throw the entire thing away. With a harrowing cry of suppressed self love, I decided I can and will create a masterpiece.

I took the first step which was to take me out of my environment completely. The further away, I thought, the better. Moving into another European country didn’t even cross my mind. I had a dear friend in Canada who had told me there will always be a room for me if I decided to immigrate and as if deciding on a trip to my nearest grocery store, I just moved from Greece to Canada.

Some parts of us must be innate, because my fearlessness when jumping into adventure is noteworthy. From then on it has been quite the journey. Immigrating is a process and a half but in the meantime I was making new friends, learning how other cities work, changing habitation, fending for myself, reconnecting with family members and so much more. But the most important adventure has been that of finding myself.

When I first came here in Canada and met new people I quickly realized that when those people ask me about me, they have no reference of me and my environment. I could, if I wanted to, give whatever description I wanted. And that’s what I did. But what I was actually doing was reintroduce myself to myself. I started the process of putting the strokes in the order that would cater to my vision of the painting I wanted to be.

I wasn’t lying or pretending, because the strokes are there forever. The pieces that made me who I am will always be the same since we can’t change the past. But I was now rearranging everything to build with agency and intention.

It was a long process and as of the time of me writing this article, it's been almost 8 years. I didn’t have agency in everything I did and I didn’t have intention throughout without pauses. It’s been a bumpy ride with lots of wins and lots of tears. But I am now in a place where I can see an image shaping on my canvas.

Is relocation the only way? Absolutely not. But it was the only way for me. It was a quick decision but a painful one, as I was leaving behind some of the most important people of my life. I had to see myself evolve in a different environment, release myself from the social rules and standards I knew and let myself change and grow in the unknown.

These days I’m taking one more step forward in my journey. That of conquering self worth. I now work on myself as thoroughly and as well planned as I do with every artwork I create. In all the chaos and the wanderings, we all tend to fall into this pitfall of not valuing our best traits. One of mine is being able to start a project, pour my best into it and finish it. Just like I did with my false sense of normalcy in the past, this too I took for granted. But I now see how this is a positive trait I should value and give credit to myself for.

There is no worse way of self sabotage than taking for granted and not facilitate your good traits. Trying to become a master of something, stand out and acquire other peoples acceptance through it, cannot and should not be the first step to anyone's journey. Look into yourself with the same empathy and compassion you look at others, and celebrate traits you already have but are used to downplay and ignore. Elevate those aspects of your self, embrace them and whatever is to come will come.

And something will come. For as longs as you are around, things happen. Some of those you cannot control, but some of those you can. Accept the first and focus on the second. Why be a bystander in your own story, when your actions can change the script?

It’s not an easy process. Part of the reason I took up writing was to push myself towards the road I dream to be on, by putting it into words. The painting of who I am is becoming clearer and clearer, but that doesn’t mean it will always stay the same. It might change, mistakes will be made and my motivation might suffer again. But my biggest success so far is that I now have a vision, of what my masterpiece might look like. Doesn’t it work with art like that anyways? The better and more experienced artist you become, you start to be able to see clearer what you’re going for, before you start.

To build with intention and faith in ones abilities, is for now my grandest achievement.