Become Your Dream

If you lived in NYC during the early 2000s, you would have seen street art by De La Vega, chalked onto the sidwalks throughout the city. His iconic image of goldfish jumping out of their fishbowls was usually accompanied by this simple message: "Become Your Dream." De La Vega, or James as he's more familiarly known, is an artist and political activist who lives in El Barrio, Spanish Harlem, the neighborhood where I spent much of my childhood and adolescence - in the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) government projects, which are pictured in the background of this photo.

I used to go into James' store, by the Lexington Avenue 110th street station, to check out his posters, and talk to him about art and hip hop. He was always very friendly and talkative, encouraging of my teenage artistic dreams, and very welcoming to me, even though I was a Chinita growing up in Spanish Harlem, who had problems with my family and a lot of social awkwardness, often unusure of how to navigate between living in the projects while attending a top U.S. prep school on scholarship, with some of the wealthiest, most privileged kids in the country - who I felt no degree of social similarity to. I felt trapped between the ambitions my parents had for me, and my constant feelings of doom and underachievement: there, in that space of fear and self-loathing, I cultivated an obstinate habit of escaping and hiding in a world of ideas and daydreams, incessant scribblings in neat paper spaces where I felt I had some control of who I am, what I could be - constantly affirming my self-made identity by proclaiming my own dreams in contrast to the dreams of the people around me, and the dreams that others had of me and for me. Today, I am still writing, scribbling, proclaiming my dreams - as a stream of paper-screams against the roaring fantasies of my sex work clients, hesitant love interests, former classmates, disappointed family, 2D-cyberrepresentations of my fellow activists, and whorephobic society at large. Against the pornography of expectation, I project my own dreams for myself.

As a Chinese immigrant who was born in Shanghai, learned how to speak English in the trailer parks of Colorado, before switching between ghetto public school and overprivileged private school in NYC, I felt very keenly the divides in race and class in the U.S., as well as the deep social divides between immigrant generations: family members of very different histories/nations/values living in foreigness and warped translation while inhabiting the same household. I always felt like I was stuck in between worlds, quietly but deeply uncomfortable with myself and other people, just playing pretend, skillfully imitating the games of others, but ever alienated and outside of them, nodding along, while secretly afraid and ashamed of not belonging anywhere.

James De La Vega and his artwork were important inspirations to me, though we have long since lost touch. His message: "Become Your Dream" - is still a driving principle for me. I'm proud to say at this point in my life, that I am beginning to live more authentically, and becoming the person who I've always felt like I should be, on my way towards achieving my dreams.

The key has been to stop fighting myself, stop trying to force myself into living a life that I am not suited for: whether it is in the legal profession, or mathematical pursuits in college - I am a creative and sensitive person, an idealistic activist, and an entrepreneur. To succeed, I need to focus on developing one or two of my strengths, and go with my natural inclinations, rather than constantly seeking to "overcome" my weaknesses by forcing myself to do things that I do not enjoy. However, I believe that a life is made triumphant when a person, in adulthood, conquers her worst character flaws of adolescence and really transforms herself, overcoming her worst mistakes with better cultivated habits. When a person can turn herself around, through the force of her will and self-awareness, that person then becomes her own hero; and it is at this point in life, that this person can call herself an adult.

I am seeking to be an adult, and a hero to myself. Since I have made many, many mistakes in these past 26 years of life, I really have my work cut out for me. What are my dreams? What are my obstacles? What must I do to overcome my internal pitfalls? I want to share a few of my dreams here, while maintaining some degree of privacy with regard to my personal struggles.

DREAMS

1. Artistic & Intellectual Body of Work - my writing & performance art, collected over a lifetime

---> Publish books and articles: non-fiction and fiction, critical theory & historical research, poetry & creative writing

---> Create theater projects and performance art. Master "aerial balletsque": combine circus arts with songwriting/singing, and engage in feminist political theater/comedy, while playing with BDSM suspensions outside of the bedroom, using a double-rope corde lisse and cerceau - Create a boudoir theater/dance troupe that stages surprise private fantasies in public spaces - play with all the academic theories of sexualit(ies) just to destabilize them.

---> Photography & Video: I want to create erotic art from the "female gaze." I want to work with porn stars and sex workers in different parts of the world to create photos of surprising/funny moments, revealing their complex (and also simple, common) feelings towards their own sexuality - as well as their non-sexual personalities outside of their performance work. I want to be a vehicle for people to make their own erotic art, by portraying what is compelling to them, outside of performance to others' fantasies.

2. Creating & Operating a Community Space and Artistic Venue: a shelter for homeless runaways and a theater for performance art and activism; a free school for dropouts and intellectual rogues - MY DREAM HAS ALWAYS BEEN TO CREATE A COLLECTIVE HOUSE (like the one I used to live in, in Brooklyn) that doubles as a strip club / sex party venue at night - which supports sex worker activism and the arts, operating as a social venture that raises money for other sex worker-led grassroots organizations. I'd like to create a profitable entertainment business that sets the standard for ethical sex industry business practices, provides community health resources to sex workers during the day time, helps people in the sex industry save and invest their money wisely, and helps self-selecting sex workers cultivate their own exit-strategy businesses, or attain higher training for other careers.

3. Lifelong Journey of Personal Growth, Shared with Friends - continually learn, read, travel, build stronger friendships, and become a better person; love better, nurture positivity and fulfillment in myself and others, walk the road together with family and friends. A Zen Buddhist journey, shared with my beloved mathemagician (my partner): I want to build a lifelong partnership, where we grow stronger and stronger together, in spite of all obstacles - come what may.

Obstacles

I struggle with cowardice, lack of focus, anxiety and sensitivity to negative feelings, inability to commit, perfectionism which leads to self-sabotage when dissatisfied, frequent feelings of paralysis, running away, among other character flaws that I am consciously working on.

Life as Aesthetic

Truth. Love. Justice. Beauty. Joy. -- To live a life as purely as possible in accordance with chosen principles, reflecting on where theoria meets praxis, and where it fails to do so; making every decision with these ideals in mind, and honoring people's lives above material pursuit; following the precepts of a self-designed game, with spiritual honesty above all things: choosing a few simple rules, then sticking with them, seeing where it all leads. Soaking up knowledge. Mastering the self as an instrument, and the rules of social interaction as a gameboard. Setting goals and achieving them. Enjoying the process, and embracing the consequences.