The Butterfly Who Woke Up From a Bad Dream - Unicorn Scholarship Essay

Chuang Tzu once dreamt he was a butterfly. He felt free and real. However, to his surprise, he woke up to realize he was indeed Chuang Tzu. This led him to the famous line of questioning: "was I Chuang Tzu dreaming I was a butterfly or am I now really a butterfly dreaming that I am Chuang Tzu?"


The first time I woke up from my dream, I realized I had been dreaming all of my life. Arbitrary gender roles embedded into my conservative religious society had shaped the way I thought of myself all along. During this time of my life, I -whoever that was- was not who I wanted to become. It was a "self-imposed" version of myself.


Twenty-one years into my ideological prison, -having gone through several traumas caused by not fitting the norm and an unbearable need to be accepted- I chose to escape it. It was not magic, much less easy. It took a migration to another country and an anthropology class to realize what I had always suspected: I did not fit in the Mexican man box. No real person ever does. And for the first time in my life, elation (not denial) came as a natural response.


Time, memory, and dreams are deeply complicated -yet fascinating- phenomena. Ever since my mind shifted in this way, I have had to wake up every day and learn how to love my body and my mind, from as many angles as there are days in a year. I have appreciated who I am and who I want to become regardless of societal standards. I have found new groups of people aiming to rethink who we are as individuals and what this means on a species scale. What's most important for me now is that I feel loved by myself in so many ways that are new to me - and I am loving being loved. 


Representation addresses the invisibilization queer bodies have in every sphere of our societies. Being oneself openly, originally, and unapologetically is bringing the political agency everyone deserves to historically vulnerabilized groups of real humans having real experiences. As a life goal, I aim to represent the underrepresented through dialogue, empathy, and personal experience.


I am not a categorical man; I do not want to make my sexual preferences a categorical personality trait. I am a human coming to terms with reality, on reality's terms. I am a butterfly dreaming my reality. I am, well, me. And I have never been happier being anything else.



[12 de julio del 2021]