A Letter To The Wallflowers The Artists Everyone In Between
[Music]
i
am an artist i see beauty
and creativity in the most ordinary
things
i actually like abstract art
i love the philosophical study of
representation
expression interpretation and aesthetics
for those of you wondering yes i know
you can’t see me
i once enjoyed being invisible so nobody
could critique me
i was lost and i struggled to find
acceptance
so i thought invisibility was my only
strength
to carry me through that
was until now
growing up i wanted to be a painter
i was taught to live by an ideal image
of masculinity that fuels aggression
domination hatred for five years
i attended a grade school with only one
class
of 30 students per grade of course
everyone eventually grew tired of each
other and i started to feel suffocated
by the gender stereotypes supported by
society
children as young as 5 are exposed to
this
toxic underground system of beliefs
that thrive on being unacknowledged
throughout my entire life my accepted
reality was that
normal girls were nurturing and
submissive and
normal boys were rowdy and into
competitive sports
as a scrawny shy boy who didn’t fit the
mold
i struggled to fit in i chose to spend
my time in the art room
and like other wall flowers i suffered
from the
painful embarrassment of sticking out
like a sore thumb
i felt scared to show my authenticity
so i subdued any interest in art for
years to come
every single person during their
childhood
experiences figuring out who they want
to be when they grow up
to fit into such a big society
i feared going out into the world and
having
my dreams crushed now
a lot of people struggle to give
themselves permission to be expressive
we desire to be successful and society
has taught us that
success and creative passion are
mutually exclusive
meaning they rarely go hand in hand
if given the opportunity between
practicality in one stream
many people choose a path out of
practicality
which is really a path chosen out of
fear
what we desire to be often seems
impossibly out of reach
especially in the bay area home
to some of the most competitive people
i have met in this life alone
growing up here i felt compelled to
venture into tech
or medicine it took me years
to realize that the world cannot and
will not define who i
am because i am the only judge of myself
now most people don’t spend their lives
thinking about their future they have a
life to live
obligations to fulfill and
they’re not concerned about who they are
in society until
unimaginable fate strikes
you lose your grandparents you lose a
child
you experience grief all of a sudden
the world you once knew is shattered and
you’re left with a missing piece of the
person
you used to be that
is the moment you realize the necessity
of human creativity
you are desperate to fill in that empty
void
creativity guides you in that grief to
pick up the pieces
and keep on moving with your life
with creativity we crawl out of our
shells
and begin to notice the common humanity
that unites us
in the seventh grade i started to grow
closer with my art teacher
it was the year my grandfather passed
away and i was suffering from the impact
of my parents grief and my own grief as
well
my art teacher became my main outlet to
release my own discouragement
discouragement to want to move on with
my life
knowing at the time i was facing larger
than life emotions that
muted me into episodes of hell
one day she offered me a leadership
opportunity
to be the art director of the student
council
she wanted to shed light on a male’s
perspective of art
and that was the moment my
world expanded
she acknowledged the side of me i had
hidden out of fear
for so long instead
of hoping that this part of me would
magically obliterate
and i would finally be accepted by the
people around me
she showed me how connected humans all
are
despite our identities
my art teachers creativity led her to
reach out to a student in need
she offered me a hand to extend her
bridge
to pull me out of that void full of fear
the fear
of not being normal enough to be
accepted by the people around me
the effect we have on others and
ourselves
is the most valuable form of currency
my fear acted as the enemy in my life
by keeping me away from pursuing my
interest in art
everyone has the power to decide
whether or not to allow the fear to
subdue them
you can either choose to spend your
entire life
listening to your inner demons and
constantly living in fear
or you can choose to live life
the way you want by following your
passions
the decisions we make in this moment are
on the basis of either
fear or passion decisions made from
either listening to the head
or following the heart
i regret not following my heart and
allowing
the fear of humiliation to stand taller
than me
anybody can be a survivor from their own
fear i
became a survivor that day because i
made the conscious choice
to allow myself to be expressive of the
artistic side
i had suppressed for so long
before i could survive i had to know
myself
i didn’t love myself enough to want to
know
who i was i was left stabbed
by everyone’s words behind my back an
odyssey
of healing i’m still enduring to this
day
so i learned that you are constantly
changing
that knowing yourself is a lifelong
process
to help you can ask yourself this
question to guide you
what do you love
you can then use your love to combat
fear because
love is the enemy of fear
if you let the fear in you are only
allowing
the world to choose your narrative and
you don’t
get to live the life you want because
you let your inner demons win
fear bleeds into your imagination and
writes this screenplay that
illustrates the potential scenarios
awaiting you
this same screenplay distorts your own
sense of the reality
creating a motion picture drama i like
to call
i can never fulfill my dreams
human creativity is liberation
manifested inside of us human creativity
is an old-fashioned value that remains a
survival need
for humanity it unshackles us
letting us go into this escape from the
problems of our superficial society
and guides our interactions with one
another
human creativity is freedom
in our society depending on our identity
that freedom can be taken away from us
these accepted stereotypes of gender
are harmful many ways but most
importantly
by impairing our abilities to love
others
and ourselves just the way we are
in truth we aren’t always doing what we
love
because we fall in that habit of
preferring practicality
over expression don’t
let your fear and what the world will
have to say about you
prevent you from doing what you love
what you want to fulfill lies beyond the
perception of others
if you allow yourself to follow what you
love
who you are shines through
it’s your life not anybody else’s
dictate
claim it like it’s yours
by yours truly matthew tran
and thank you