A former service member describes years of suppressing his identity in the military, forbidden from growing a beard or wearing a nose ring, yet kept re-enlisting. His shift came when he stopped analyzing what was wrong and asked what he actually wanted: freedom and play, not just survival within the system.
I used to be in the military. I hated being in the military. Couldn't grow my beard, couldn't wear my nose ring, couldn't braid my hair, couldn't be myself. I would make content, put it online. Commander said, you got to take that down. I said, I didn't even say no. No, you can't say that. Commander doesn't like it. Take it down. Couldn't post what I want to post. Couldn't live out. Hated it. And for a long time, I would find other people who hated being in the military. I found other people who got it and who understood, and we would talk about how much we hated being in the military. Whole while we was talking about how much we hated being in the military, guess what we kept doing? Going on deployments, going on TDYs, extending, re-enlisting. We kept being in the military. One of the best things I ever did was say, well, shit, what do I want? What do I want? Um, I don't want to work, I want to play.
