Pagdududa

I’m insecure about a lot of things.

Sometimes I don’t feel Asian enough around other Asians, but I don’t feel Filipino enough around family and other Filipinos. Sometimes when I meet Hispanic people they expect me to know a good amount of Spanish because of the influence on Tagalog. But I don’t even know enough Tagalog to speak Tagalog. And when I’m around white Americans I try to not be too much of a stereotype. I want to be proud of how I pronounce my last name, but I’ve gotten enough confused looks that I know I have to go easy on the accent with certain people.

And those are just my ethnicity identity related concerns.

I’m also afraid that I’m not successful enough at this point in my life. I feel like at 27, I should be able to afford to at least rent my own place, but I can’t. My family worked so hard and have sacrificed so much to give me the life that I have. In Filipino culture, and many other Asian cultures, you pay back those who raised you when you start to make your own money. My family never put a huge pressure on me to do this, but it doesn’t change the fact that I’d love to buy my grandpa his dream car and my grandma her dream kitchen, and my mom her dream house. But I can’t even afford my own apartment.

Sometimes I feel like I should be working harder or sacrificing more to attain success, but would that really even amount to anything?

Sometimes I feel like my art isn’t improving enough or that I should be a better artist with all the years I’ve been drawing. Maybe I should do more figure drawing, or draw from life more, or practice drawing hands and feet, or improve my design sensibility, or actually learn how to make good damn backgrounds… But it’s all just so much? Can I ever really learn all I want to learn?

I wonder if I’m doing enough to help my friends and family. I’m not great at keeping in touch and checking in on people I haven’t seen or heard from in a while. Should I be texting or calling them more often? I don’t even know if I’m helping the people closest to me enough. Can I make my grandparents life easier with what I have now? My mom won’t accept money when I try to help her out, and it’s probably because she knows I don’t make much and still have student loans. Am I being a good role model to my baby cousin? Can I do something to make his fast approaching puberty years easier on him? Does he know that I’m there for him if he ever wants to talk? Are there people I know who are suffering alone because I never made it clear enough that I’m always here to talk?

My family has never been a super emotional heart-to-heart family, but I always knew they loved me and cared about me. But do they know how I feel about them? Should I tell them more or would this sudden vulnerability and mushyness be unwelcome and weird?

There’s so much I could be doing right now in my life, but I’m not—eating better, exercising, practicing art in a more disciplined way, learning new/more skills… I don’t even know where to start or what will help.

My looks have been the one thing that haven’t bothered me as much throughout my life, but every once in a while I’ll wonder if the bumps on my skin are off-putting (it’s called keratosis pilaris and is apparently pretty common), or if my face is too round, or shape not “womanly” enough. And of course I went through that phase in high school where I thought I might be fat, but I’m over it now. I wasn’t even really chunky. I was just comparing myself to others.

All of this is to say, I don’t know what your perception of me was before reading this and how much it’s changed after reading this, but you really don’t know what people are going through internally unless they tell you. I’ve written all of this feeling like I’m at a pretty good place. But even so, I still have concerns and worries. There are some people out there being crushed under the weight of their concerns and problems and hiding it. That puts a lot of stress on a person and can make them lash out at undeserving people. It doesn’t excuse rudeness, but hopefully it makes you rethink how you react to it. Don’t get me wrong, there are some truly awful people out there who you might want to fight fire with fire with, but hold off until you know if they’re just having a bad day or if they’re just actually scum.

In general, be nice. It’s not that hard.