"I don't fit into your box, so quit trying to stuff me in there."

A CHILD IS BORN

“Don’t put me into YOUR box. It’s yours, not mine. I won’t fit. And if you try to stuff me in there, I’ll be miserable and so will you.

“I don’t want your religion box. I don’t want your expectation box. I don’t want your society box. I don’t want your culture box. I don’t want your economic box. I don’t want your lifestyle box. And I most certainly don’t want–and won’t fit into–your normal box.

“There is no such thing as normal. You thinking there is such a thing as normal, is your mental illness.

“Acceptance is submission, and submission is always mental, emotional and spiritual torture. Why are you torturing me? Don’t you love me? Why won’t you let me be who I am?

“You say it’s because you love me and that’s the reason you stuff my head and fill my life full of your ideas, full of your needs, wants and desires, full of your perspective, opinions, beliefs and values and expectations. You stuff me so full, there’s no room for ME. And then you wonder why I rebel.

“If YOU weren’t mentally-ill, you would be ecstatic at my rebellion and my non-normalcy and non-conformity. But no, you want me to acquiesce, submit, surrender, give-up and give-in. Ain’t gonna happen. I will be your greatest disappointment. My very mission in life is to disappoint normal, and it will be YOUR greatest blessing (though you won’t realize it until YOU stop being normal and start being true to yourself).”

“So instead of cramming me into your box–or any box–just teach me how to maneuver in and around a numbed-down, dumbed-down society, and I’ll show you what exceptionalism is, and while being exceptional, maybe I can free a soul or two.

“Hopefully this ‘normal’ disease isn’t terminal, though I’m beginning to have my doubts.”