Beyond Appearances

Image is mine

The beauty of life is learning, unlearning, and relearning. Nothing is absolute, and that's why life is dynamic.

Growing up, there were lots of things we learned from our environment, lots of habits and attitudes that we picked up, and as we grew older, we knew better that we needed to drop some of them because either they were no longer useful or they had become toxic. Some of these habits include stereotyping and profiling.

Before now, I had always thought people who smoke are bad people. I have also seen people with dreadlocks, tattoos, and facial piercings as bad and morally bankrupt. But as I grew older, I began to understand that these things could classify as fashion statements and that the so-called terrible people do not have labels.

Sometimes, we might even get carried away and let our guard down because a psychopath will appear so decent that when they attack, we won't even see it coming.

Other times we are ruining a good relationship before it even starts simply because the person appeared a certain way and we chose to judge a book by its cover.

I remember almost losing out on being roommates with someone I knew from way back. We weren't friends, but I had accommodation issues in school, so she offered to take me in. But then, still on the same accommodation issues, I had had disagreements with a girl who happened to be her friend. Due to that disagreement, I saw this girl going to spoil my chances.

It was this said person who I was defending my self against that went on to try and tarnish my reputation by asking the girl who wants to accommodate me how she hopes to cope with my nasty attitude.

Thankfully the girl didn't listen, and she still accommodated me. Later on, after becoming roommates she went on to tell me how I'm greatly misunderstood and how it's wrong to profile people.

I wasn't really surprised with the revelation because I get such treatment a lot from people. It's quite unfortunate that people mistake being outspoken as being rude and loud.

A lot of times when people from my social media page see me in real life, they get really confused, and some even confess how my appearance is different from my opinions on social media.

I remember meeting up with a lady one time to give her some of my baked goods so she could assist with marketing them. She saw me physically and was shocked. I could see the surprise reaction written all over her face, and then I helped her bring out the words as she didn't know how to.

I asked her if she expected to see a different person, and she nodded yes while laughing. I kept quiet waiting for her to freely express herself. Still laughing, she told me how she expected to see someone crazy hair do and fashion style. She confessed how she never expected me to be so composed and well mannered. In that moment I smiled and told her, "never judge a book by its cover" and she responded indeed.

If I get a dollar for everytime people had assumed the worse of me, I'd be a rich girl. I know you might want to wonder why don't I change the impression. Well, I don't intend to because I like to give people the chance to assume the worse so that when they eventually get to know the truth, it sticks and then they would be the one trying to change the wrong impression others have of me.