Two of Me

I want to tell you a story. It is mine. But parts of it might be yours too.

Earlier this year, I was one of the participants in Cohort One of the Voice of Change Initiative, VOCI. It ran from January to March. Most of the sessions were reflective. I learned a lot. But one session stayed with me in a way the others did not.

Brian Ingwe, the founder of VOCI, facilitated that day. The pillar was principled leadership. We were looking at the Johari Window. We studied it. We journalled about ourselves. Then came a simple activity. Turn to your nearest neighbour. Tell them something about themselves that you think you know, but they do not.

I sat one seat in front of a remarkable lady. Her name is Purity. She is my senior. On my left was Purity. On my right was the wall. I had no other neighbour. She was the one.

We were not strangers. But we had never really talked. Not in any meaningful, personal way. So I did not know what was coming.

The first thing she said was that I am handsome. I laughed. Then I blushed. I had not blushed in a long time. When someone tells you that you are handsome or beautiful, you do not forget it. Right?

It was the second thing that caught me off guard. She said I was a great leader. That I had confidence. She named people we both knew and said I could stand before people and speak just as they did. But I had chosen to believe I was an introvert. I had settled into that belief. And I had stayed there.

I did not see that coming. Not that day. Not from that conversation.

I shared something with her too. But her words stayed with me. The introvert part especially. It went somewhere deep. Then a memory surfaced.

Class 1, 2 and 3. Lower primary. I was the class prefect. Manila charts covered our classroom walls. Geographical features. Days of the week. Months of the year. Words and their opposites. Plurals.

Every morning, and any time there was no teacher in class, I walked around the room with a pointer. I said the words. The whole class repeated after me. I did it with confidence. With trust in myself. As though I was not a pupil at the same level as everyone else. That was the culture of the lower classes in our school. And it came naturally to me.

So I asked myself one question. Where did that boy go?

Because today, I sit on a valid point rather than say it. I avoid social groups. I genuinely fear calling out someone's name loudly in public. Sometimes I hate it. Same person. Same body. Different identity.

I had to sit with that. I had to ask where the shift happened. Where this new, dominant version of me came from.

When I looked closely, I found it.

We moved. That meant a new school and new people. Old friendships that had carried trust, on both sides, were suddenly gone. There was a period of adjustment. Family dynamics at the time added weight to everything else.

Life reorganised itself quietly. Somewhere in that reorganisation, the boy with the pointer and the voice sat down. A quieter, more guarded version of me stood up and took over.

That day after the VOCI session, I saw both of them clearly for the first time. Two identities. One person. And for the first time, I could name what shaped the one now in charge. The experiences. The people. The transitions.

Then I asked something harder. Was the first version of me still inside? Had he been trying to grow all this time? Had I been sitting on him without realising?

The answer was yes.

I had inherited an identity. And it had sat on who I actually am at the core.

I am still in the process. Still letting that version of me grow. Still facing the one that took over. It is not quick. But it is real. And it is moving me toward an identity I have examined and accepted. One I have chosen. Not one I simply absorbed.