Naked Me

If you had asked me who I was a year ago, I would not have known.

I still have not one answer.

I am a mix of cultures.

American by blood, Japanese at heart.

One home I have not; To choose between America and Japan? Impossible.

My friends are scattered across the globe. 

Though I wish for stability and friends that live in the same radius, that is not the case, and never will it be.

For I was born into the life of a third-culture kid.

I have lost myself among the endless moves

I cannot count the times I’ve got up and gone

New school, new home, new people, new places

New me.

Because as hard as I try be authentic, to be naked me, I always change

I sink back farther and farther into myself, blending in with my new found surroundings

Because I want to be liked, loved

I want to have friends

I want to have someone to hug everyday, someone I can just be myself with

But to find those “someone’s,” I have to make friends,

and I have to change me.

So I pile layers and layers of walls up onto myself, burying naked me.

The real me.  

But I have only learned recently, that being myself is everything.

Transparent, Open, Unafraid, Naked. 

I have become tired of not knowing if I will fit in or if I will be rejected, and everything in my life has made me stronger.

I am beautiful, despite what others think.

My back is scarred by constant picking and scratching at my every little blemish. 

Desperately clinging on to the only aspect of my life that I could control throughout the moves, I picked my skin.

But it doesn’t change the fact that I. am. beautiful.

I can now voice my opinion and know that even if every human being turns on me like a pack of wolves, I am still God’s beloved child.

He created me wondrously and in his own image. 

Is that not a reason to be joyful and to accept myself?

Above all, I have realized that to be fully naked and transparent is to come last in everything.

I don’t need to flaunt who I am and what I have to the world because I am God’s, and he has already rewarded me with more than enough recognition. 

I may never have a home, and I may never know where I belong, 

but wherever God leads me next, I know that I can finally be naked me.