When I look at old photographs of myself, I am no longer interested only in how I looked back then. What occupies me far more is the question of who I was inwardly at that point in my life. What did I genuinely want? What did I do simply because it was expected of me? Which decisions came from me, and which came from the wish to fit in somewhere? In some photographs, I recognise myself immediately. In others, I see someone whose life is familiar to me and who nevertheless seems surprisingly distant. Not because many years lie between us, but because I can see now how easily we can move away from ourselves without going anywhere at all. We do not wake up one morning and suddenly realise that we have lost ourselves. Most of the time, it happens quietly. A small concession here, an ignored feeling there, a wish we dismiss as unreasonable, a role we become increasingly good at fulfilling. And at some point, we may know the life we are living very well while barely knowing the person inside it.
For a long time, I associated losing oneself with major life crises. With breakdowns, radical changes or the feeling of no longer knowing who you are at all. Today, I see it as something far less dramatic. I can lose myself while everything outwardly continues to function. I do what needs to be done, meet people, keep appointments, laugh, make plans and answer the question of how I am without having to think for very long. That is precisely what can hide the distance from myself so well. A functioning life does not have to feel wrong. It may even feel comfortable because it has become familiar. Only in small places does a sense of unease begin to appear. Things I once looked forward to barely touch me any more. I say yes and only hours later realise that something in me had meant no. I have free time and suddenly do not know what I want to do with it as long as no one expects anything from me.
For me, this loss often begins where my own perception carries less and less weight. Not because I consciously choose against myself, but because other voices are often quicker and clearer. What is needed? What would be reasonable? What does this person expect from me? How should I respond so that the situation remains calm? Such questions are part of living with other people. We cannot make every decision solely on the basis of our own needs. But I have experienced how the balance can shift. If I look outward first often enough, the inner response eventually becomes quieter. Then I may know remarkably well how I come across to others, what role I fulfil and what is expected of me, while the simple question ‘What do I actually feel myself?’ has become strangely difficult.
This happens especially subtly in relationships. We get to know one another and naturally adjust to each other. We show consideration, change habits and find ways of living that work for both of us. I do not see that as losing oneself, but as part of closeness. For me, it only becomes problematic when adaptation turns into a condition of belonging. When I increasingly hold back certain sides of myself because I fear they might cause difficulty. When I examine my needs before I even allow myself to recognise them as mine. When I stop mentioning something because I already know how the other person might respond. Taken on their own, such decisions can seem entirely harmless. But many small acts of self-correction can eventually mean that another person is meeting a version of me that may be easy to live with, but is no longer fully me.
Roles can carry us a long way from ourselves in much the same way. The dependable one, the strong one, the understanding one, the independent one, the person who always finds a solution. Such roles rarely arise without reason. They bring recognition, create a sense of stability and can work very well for a long time. I know the desire to remain faithful to an image others have of me and that I have eventually adopted myself. It becomes difficult when a role leaves no room for what has changed. Then the strong person is not allowed to be tired, the helper is not allowed to need help and the calm one is not allowed to show anger. Over time, a role can become so familiar that I no longer experience it as something I am playing but as my identity. Only when it becomes too restrictive do I begin to notice how much of me has remained outside that image.
I have also realised that we can lose ourselves not only in other people, but in goals and ideas as well. I can work towards something for years and eventually forget why I began. A goal then develops a momentum of its own. Because I have already invested so much, I carry on. Because other people associate me with it, I keep moving in the same direction. Because achieving it once mattered to me, I stop asking whether it still means anything to me today. Even personal development can become a way of moving further away from myself. I work at becoming calmer, more conscious, more successful or more spiritual and barely notice that beneath all these attempts at improvement stands a person whom I am constantly telling is still not quite right.
This is where I recognise a connection with I – Your Best Liar. While writing the book, I kept returning to how rarely we lose ourselves through stories that are obviously false. More often, it happens through sentences that sound perfectly reasonable. ‘It’s not that important.’ ‘I can live with it.’ ‘That’s just who I am.’ ‘Now isn’t the right time.’ ‘Other people need me more at the moment.’ Any of these sentences can be true in a particular situation. But any of them can also become a way of repeatedly pushing something of my own into the background. For me, self-manipulation therefore does not mean only deceiving myself about the truth. It can also mean qualifying my own truth so often that it barely carries any weight in my own life.
For a long time, I would have thought that finding my way back to myself had to begin with a major decision. Today, that feels almost too dramatic. I have found in my own experience that returning often begins in much smaller places. In the moment when I notice that something bothers me and do not immediately argue myself out of it. When I acknowledge that I miss something even though I do not yet know what should follow from that. When I admit that a wish I once had is no longer the wish I have today. Such moments do not transform an entire life at once. But they restore a connection. Something within me is once again allowed to be noticed without first having to explain or justify itself.
That is why I think differently about the word ‘lost’ today. I no longer imagine that somewhere inside me there is a perfect, unchanging self that I simply need to find again. I change too. What suited me once does not necessarily suit me now. Perhaps it is less about bringing back an earlier version of myself and more about coming back into contact with the person who is here now. And when I notice that my life has become very loud with expectations, responsibilities and ideas of who I should be, I sometimes stop asking myself how I can find my way back to myself. I ask something simpler: where did I most recently notice what was true within me and still walk past it?