I change. I am not yet sure who I am, so I change. Different personas for different places, different personalities for different people. I slide from one to the other as fluidly as water flowing down a river. 

At night, as I drift away to the land of dreams, surrounded by the dark, I am a person of sadness, loneliness and sometimes fear. Any past regret, big or small, new or old, haunts me. My insecurities rise from under the bed, the monster that plagues every child. Then, finally, I am lost to blissful sleep, full of dreams I never remember. As the sun rises, I am frantic. The incessant beeping of the alarm makes my heart race as I nearly fall out of bed every morning. I rush to get ready, scurrying around the house. All set, I step out the door and I walk to the bus stop, often lost in thoughts of what needs to be accomplished that day. As I board the bus, I yet again change. I change to be a bit more outgoing, greeting my neighborhood friends on the bus. I make conversation until the bus reaches the school and I brace myself to transform once more.

As I enter my first period classroom I become a student, focused and hardworking. My brain becomes a sponge, trying to absorb every last bit of information.From class to class my personas have slight variances. In math and history, I need silence as I put out laser focus on memorizing all necessary concepts. English makes me more thoughtful, mindful of each word said. In chemistry and biology, I am eager and my brain feels like it will explode as new ideas connect in so many ways. I am the loudest during choir, pushing every bit of air into a billowing sound. My happiest persona comes out during lunch. I can talk to my friends and debate the most random topics. Soon enough, the bell rings and I head once more to the bus, now talking over how their day went and in return telling them about mine.

All too soon I am home and I must face the biggest obstacles of the day-homework. My ideal homework persona is focused, hard to distract and organized; those are the best days, in which I am productive and finish all my assignments before dinner. Too often, I change to be irritable, easily distracted, and stressed. My persona with my family is one of the most different from my school appearance. I become lively, even outgoing as I, perhaps a bit mercilessly, tease and tickle my siblings, joking with them all the while. Then the night draws nearer and I turn again to fear and insecurities.

 At the heart of it all, no matter whom I appear to be, I am always a timid girl who wants to be included, constantly afraid of the opposite, yet scared to push herself on to others.

Changing may be a sign of insecurity. Worries that the people surrounding us will not like who we really are is a concern for many people, so we disguise it. Perhaps it is to impress others around us, make them like us and want to be our friend. Or maybe it is loathing of who we think we so we bury ourselves as deep as we can. Or maybe we just want a fresh start, in a new place, to be someone different, and wish to try and reinvent ourselves, going so far to change some of our core personality traits. Maybe it is a character flaw we see in ourselves that we want so badly to be rid of. It could be that we are feeling sad, embarrassed or self-conscious and we do not want to let others see what we view as our own weakness. I find this to be perhaps the second biggest reason I feel the need to change. 

However, the reason that applies most to me is to please other people, to want to conform to what others see in me so they will not be disappointed in me. Failing to live up to your expectations of me, failing to fulfill your perception of me as a good person. Failure to meet what is expected of me leads to my greatest fear; being rejected and excluded, pushed aside like an unwanted toy. Humans are creatures of social interactions and being shoved aside and forgotten crosses the need for other people.

What can we do? The perspective from those around us of our character are just as, maybe even more than, influential as our own thoughts of who we are. Does our own perception of who we are matter as much when everyone else says differently? After all everything is just a matter of perception. Is our identity any different? Still, I change.