One evening, while mindlessly scrolling through reels, I noticed something unusual. Almost every video I loved — videos about books, authors, writing, and literature — had been liked by the same account. It had no profile picture. No recognizable username. Nothing that could tell me who was behind it. At first, I ignored it. But the more I scrolled, the more I saw it. There it was again beneath a reel about writing your first novel. Again beneath a video discussing literary symbolism. Again beneath a quote from a classic book I adored. Whoever this person was, they had incredible taste. Slowly, I became curious. Not in a dramatic way. Just enough to wonder. Who was this stranger who seemed to love all the same things I did? Who was this person who understood exactly the kind of stories, books, and ideas that fascinated me? Every time I found another reel I loved, I would see their like beneath it, as if we were two readers wandering through the same library without ever meeting. And somehow, I admired them. I admired their taste. Their interests. The way they always seemed to find the most extraordinary pieces of literature. Then one day, after far too much curiosity, I finally discovered who they were. The mysterious account. The stranger with perfect taste. The person I had been trying to figure out. It was me. An old account I had recently reactivated. An account I had completely forgotten about. Months ago, I had watched all those reels and liked them. Since I usually used a different account with a profile picture, I never realized the account appearing beneath those videos belonged to me. For days, I had been impressed by a stranger. Only to discover that the stranger was myself. And strangely enough, that realization stayed with me. Because when I thought the account belonged to someone else, I saw them differently. I saw someone thoughtful. Someone passionate about stories. Someone whose love for literature was obvious. Someone interesting. The moment I learned it was me, nothing had changed. The likes were the same. The interests were the same. The person was the same. Only my perspective had changed.

Sometimes, we are so busy looking at ourselves through our flaws that we forget how we appear to the rest of the world.

Sometimes, if we could meet ourselves as strangers, we might be surprised by how much we admire the person standing in front of us.

After all, the most impressive person I met that week turned out to be me.