The more I tried to figure out what I wanted to say, the less I could tell which thoughts in my head were actually mine.
A classmate and I had been asked to sit together in silence for four minutes, then each speak for four.
As soon as I closed my eyes, my mind filled up. What should I say? Should I say this? Is it good enough? What if I have nothing to say for the whole four minutes?
Then I asked myself something different: What if I didn’t have to sound like anyone? What if I didn’t have to say something good, or fill the whole four minutes? What would I actually want to say?
And suddenly, there was nothing.
It felt as if I had dropped beneath all those thoughts into an empty, quiet space. My breath felt clearer, deeper. I heard the cars outside, the hum of machines, the wind. Everything around me felt more alive.
So did I.
There was a little fear there too. My mind was used to having something to hold on to, and I could feel it reaching again.
I’ve been questioning many of the beliefs and expectations I inherited about how I should live. When those ready-made answers fall away, a new answer doesn’t immediately take their place.
Sometimes I want to go back to the world I already know, where the moves are familiar and I have years of proof that I know how to live there.
That old world still gives me something to hold on to. The space I’m in now doesn’t.
But it feels lighter too.
I don’t have to keep living by answers that came from somewhere else.
Maybe finding my own voice doesn’t start with knowing what I want to say.
Maybe it starts by staying in that empty space a little longer, until I can hear what actually wants to be said.
- Nam Le