I have a list. It has names on it, but not many. It is a good list, or a bad list depending on how you look at it. The thing is, you’ll never know if your name is on it. It is my list.

As I type this, there are six people on the list. That is the most that have ever been on it. There was a time when there were only three, but four was the usual for years, and then five. No one has ever known who is on the list. It is my list of the people whose opinion of me and what I am doing is important. There are only six in the whole world.

I was talking with a woman once who said to me, “I have a list…”, and went on to explain what I have shared with you.

“It is very liberating, don’t you know?” I did not, but felt an explanation was coming so kept silent. “If I have to please only those people on my list by my life choices or behavior, I am free to be myself and not what others might want me to be. It is very liberating.”

I was about to ask who was on her list, but before I could, she anticipated the question and saved me embarrassment by saying, “It is my list. No one knows who is on it. It is for me only, and it is dynamic, never stagnant. Sometimes, it changes day-to-day, sometimes within the day, but it stays about the same.”

“How is it liberating?” I asked.

She smiled, knowing I was not understanding, “Have you ever tried to please someone who clearly did not like you?” I nodded my head to confess I had. “Did you feel small when you realized that they weren’t going to like you no matter what you did?” Another nod. “Why surrender to them the power to hurt you?” She asked.

“Why should you care what they think? It is much easier to just be you and if they like you, fine, and if they don’t, why care?”

She went on, “What you are in effect doing is keeping the power to hurt you among those on your list, and only those. You empower them to change your mind, your behavior, even how you look because you trust them. It is very liberating.”

I have eight children. Simple math should reveal to you that there are some of my children not on my list. It is not that I do not love them, or anyone else not on the list, for I surely do, but it’s that they have grown to adults with their own ways and ideas that do not mesh with mine. It doesn’t mean their ways are wrong, they are not right for me. I have chosen to give the power to hurt me, or change me, to only six.

I am who I am, you are who you are, and we are all different. Some like me some do not. I hope I fall into the “like me” category, but if I do not, that’s fine. I am free to be me. It is very liberating.

David Wilson Atwood is a local writer whose human interest columns offer a unique perspective. He may be contacted, and his other works viewed at www.starchasers.us, or david@starchasers.us.