Secret Identity

Written by my sister:

 

The concept of identity, whether it’s your identity as a doll collector, your identity at school or work, or your identity at its deepest level is something we’ve all struggled with at one point or another. I think that, for most of us, we’ve wrestled with our identities more than once in our lives, even if we’re young. What I’ve learned is that you have to define your identity not by how others perceive you but by who you truly are.

 

When I think about identity, I think a lot about my sister Shelly (the main contributor to A Thousand Splendid Dolls). Shelly was always a lot more concerned than I was about identity. She was a lot more conscious of how she perceived herself compared to her perception of others and how others might see her. As she got older, she actually tried to create an identity for herself. This led, as some of you may know, to the five year doll hiatus we took between being “kids” (I was 19!) and adult collectors.

 

Shelly wanted to change the way people saw her and how she saw herself. She experimented with listening to different music and wearing make-up, trying new clothes. Most notably, she stopped collecting dolls. But--her interest in dolls never actually went away.

 

The thing is, we don’t really choose to be interested in dolls. I think what we like in life often chooses us instead. Our interest in collecting dolls was always there, even when we tried to pretend that it wasn’t. The choice we all have to make, however, is whether or not we act on our genuine interests and inborn talents or not.

 

My senior year of high school, I spent a lot of time with foreign language. I took a Spanish class, a French class, and a study period where I actually got to play teacher’s helper to younger Spanish students. But do you know what the true highlight of my week was? Every Thursday, I would sit with the special needs students at lunch. I would have done it more often, but my other friends pressured me to sit with them four days a week. The two Spanish teachers in the school both treated me like someone who would go into their field of work one day. So did the special ed teacher and the aide that worked in the classroom. Guess which two adults were right about my future? I think in my heart of hearts, a small part of me knew, “I’m going to end up working with special needs students when Spanish doesn’t pan out.”

 

Fast forward about five years: I had a disastrous time student teaching. My mentor kept telling me I was better suited to working one-to-one. She kept making my dream to teach Spanish sound ridiculous, like it wasn’t ever going to happen. I kept thinking, “But YOU teach Spanish, it’s not like I’m telling you I want to be an astronaut or something!” Needless to say, she wasn’t very kind or inspiring. If anything, her doubts in me made me determined to prove her wrong, not give up.

 

Nearly three years later, I had another shot at teaching Spanish, this time as a real teacher, not one in practice. It was a short term position, only two months, just to cover a maternity leave. Needless to say, it was practically the longest two months of my life! In this situation, I had lots of good, supportive colleagues/mentors and it still didn’t work. By the end of that school year, I accepted something--teaching Spanish wasn’t my path in life. The voice in the back of my brain suggested I consider being an aide. I was afraid to listen to that voice at the wrong time for the wrong reason (the reason being that I loved the school and wanted to stay). Fortunately, however being a substitute teacher at the time, I got to dabble in a little of everything.

 

The best career advice I can give to anyone? When I was trying to teach Spanish, I felt like my teacher persona was this alter ego I put on with my work clothes. By the second day of working with special needs kids, I no longer felt like I was performing a part in a play. I felt like I was being MYSELF--my real, true self. It was incredibly liberating. That is how you should feel at your job, like you can be the same person at work that you REALLY are. Additionally, I suddenly found that my new career path had brought out the best version of my true self.

 

I have now been an aide in a special needs classroom for nearly four school years. Those two months teaching Spanish felt like an eternity and I constantly desired for it to be over. The four years in my classroom, however, have felt like nothing. And I would never want that precious time to end. I am very blessed and I have no regrets. I even feel grateful for the journey that took me there--meeting the people I got to meet, working where I work, and that endless joy of embracing my true self. I don’t think a week has ever gone by in the last four years without me thinking, “I am SO glad I’m doing this instead of Spanish.” I remember the struggle to realize who I really was, and I’m thankful for it.

 

I think this is very similar to what Shelly experienced in terms of finding out who she really was. I remember going to flea markets during those doll-less years. We’d see dolls occasionally and I could see so much in her face. I could see the interest, the hidden longing. I could see her mentally identifying what types of dolls she was seeing. Above all, I could see the regret. She regretted that we weren’t playing with or buying dolls anymore and was sure to be thinking, “If only I saw this two years ago. We could have had so much fun.” Part of how I know she was thinking that? I was thinking the exact same thing!

 

And getting back into dolls? It brought her the great joy that finding the right place to work brought me. She was reunited with a piece of herself she’d buried and tried to forget. Also, the constant gratitude for finding herself again was the same as mine. Dolls have always been important to both of us. We both always had a strong, innate interest in them. This was amplified by all the hours we spent enjoying dolls together--both in childhood and as adults. Our time away from dolls made us see just how much the hobby means to us. I wouldn’t change the doll hiatus any more than I would change my time as a Spanish teacher. Sometimes you have to find out who you are by finding out who you are not. In the words of Jason Mraz--”I had to learn what I’ve got, and what I’m not and who I am.”

 

But even after one has embraced that he or she is and always will be a doll collector at heart, the quest to find one’s identity is still not over. Today in the world of social media, so many factors influence our identities and our self perception. In fact, this isn’t exclusive to doll collecting--I think social media influences everyone’s perception of his or her identity regardless of their personal interests. But let’s stick with doll collecting as an example--

 

First, even if you aren’t posting on social media yourself, odds are you are exposed to other people’s thoughts and ideas--and ways to collect--just by surfing the internet. Some people get lured into another person’s aesthetics or personal taste by seeing their pictures on Instagram or watching their YouTube videos. Some people will see a collection like ours--which took two sisters over twenty years to build--when they are just starting to collect and get discouraged. I don’t know how many times Shelly will get a YouTube comment like “I’ll never have as many dolls as you.” They get discouraged by someone else’s collection or way of collecting and think that they’ll never be able to compare.

 

Sometimes, someone will idolize someone else’s account so much that they try to mimic that other person--either by formatting, type of dolls they are collecting, what they do with their dolls, style of picture or video, or all of the above. When this happens, people miss out on thinking for themselves and doing things because it makes them happy. They wind up thinking that happiness equates to being like somebody else instead of what they actually like. I’m not saying that there is anything wrong with saying “I like how so-and-so takes pictures” or “Hmmm. I never liked Liv dolls before but she makes them look fun” and taking inspiration on things that you actually like.

 

Likewise, people feel afraid to collect certain dolls because other collectors spend so much time putting them down and saying they aren’t worth the money. Unfortunately, a lot of negative comments and views tend to circulate a lot faster than posts saying positive things. Even if you aren’t posting your own collection on social media, it is easy to see someone’s review of a doll line and feel turned off from trying something out.

 

Second, people tend to get concerned about internet popularity--number of views, subscribers, number of likes, etc. This can cause people to feel defeated, because they’ll never achieve the desired stats, or inferior because they constantly compare themselves to others. They can also stop posting what they really love and post things based on what is trendy and will get them the most attention. All of this can make you forget what you love about sharing YOUR personal collection.

 

Another major way that social media impacts a doll collector’s identity is the amount of criticism other doll collectors give doll collectors. For example, when we posted Shelly’s Monster High first edition re-release dolls on her first Flickr account, a lot of collectors were putting them down and saying they weren’t the same as the actual originals. Now, Shelly and I didn’t actually believe this just because a few people said so. However, it did make us a bit mad and made us think of that when we saw the dolls for a while. In fact, I think this was one of the last straws in terms of why Shelly got fed up and deleted that Flickr.

 

The criticism and negative comments can also make a doll collector feel bad about sharing his or her collection with other people. For example, if people constantly criticize your photography style or video format, I’d imagine you wouldn’t be as eager to upload new content. Likewise, if someone says they don’t enjoy your descriptions or the type of dolls you like to photograph most, it will make you feel bad about yourself and your collection.

 

This is all human nature. I think that between myself and Shelly we have fallen victim to every one of these these ways social media can affect your identity as a doll collector (or as a person) over the years. How do we avoid this trap? I think the key is to take a step back and really think about what makes YOU happy. What types of dolls do you enjoy buying? What do you like to do with them? What do you love about doll collecting? The bottom line, both in real life and in doll collecting is to stay authentic to yourself. Never let anyone’s idea of who you should be affect how you see yourself. And if you see that you’re trying to be someone that you really aren’t? It’s pretty easy to fix. Just do whatever it is that makes you happy, whether it’s collecting dolls or finding a job that sets you free.

 

Our real identity is always there inside us, even if we try to ignore it for a while. We can’t change it. We can, however, choose to act on it and listen to our hearts. Embrace who you really are and set yourself free.

Done