An enigma is a person or thing that is mysterious, puzzling, or difficult to understand. The connotation for such a word is something elusive and other, which I find to be true. Nonetheless, I have begun to ponder, why is this one word weighted as though there are a select group of individuals that are special in their imperceivableness? The word [enigma], in and of itself, evokes a sense of untouchability, as though we know everyone intimately, like the back of our own hands, and then comes along an outsider, “an enigma,” who has somehow evaded comprehension.
In reality, enigmas are running rampant, shut your phone screen off and you will find one staring right back at you. Are we not all enigmas waiting to be calculated and measured appropriately? Have we not stopped to think that we will never fully understand anyone, let alone ourselves? Are we not all enigmas hoping one day to find what churns within us, and drives us forward?
The lost feeling of trying to piece together one’s self is a shared human experience. Yet so many of us live as though the pursuit is simply linear, and that there is a finish line that some have already reached, while others straggle behind. This clearly is not true. I mean, ask anyone that has gone through a midlife crisis, or anyone that thought they had it “all figured out,” only to have the rug ripped out from under them, as they woke up to realize they never really did know themselves or reach that finish line.
It is through my writing that I find myself. Unequivocally, through visible words I am better able to display what rests at the tip of my tongue and the back of my throat. That is not to say that I will ever state that I have “found” myself, as each day there is something new, something old that stirs within me, disrupting my so-called self perception. It is the enigma within myself that I embrace, knowing that there are some things I will never know.
The truth is that we can spend our entire lives either trying to express ourselves accurately or suppressing what will make us feel whole via the parts of ourselves that we do not understand. On both paths, we go to endless lengths, in the hopes that we can fulfill something that is ultimately completely intangible. Some think as though evading authenticity will bring reciprocity, when in actuality all they have done is exchanged the unknown for something known—sadness, dejection, and self hostility. The gift of today’s world is being able to lean more freely than ever into the unknown. Embrace being the enigma, someone readily aware of the fickleness of their own perception, but fervently working to uncover something that might not ever make sense. Someone striving to be the answer to themselves, even if just for a moment.