Finding Myself — And Questioning What I Once Believed

I am grateful for everything life has to offer.

But if I look back, I often ask myself —
how did I begin to feel so close to animals?

During my time studying architecture, I found myself naturally drawn to them.

I would feed stray dogs.
I adopted stray cats.
I spent time rescuing and feeding not just cats and dogs, but also birds and even cows.

It gave me a sense of peace.

At that time, I thought that meant I loved animals.

But today, I see it a little differently.

Maybe I wasn’t doing it purely for them.
Maybe I was doing it because it gave me comfort, happiness, and a sense of purpose.

Because at the very same time…

I was also someone who loved eating chicken.

I didn’t hesitate to go to a chicken shop and ask for fresh meat —
which meant a live chicken would be killed.

I couldn’t watch it fully. I would turn my face away at the moment it happened.

But I still stood there.
I still paid for it.
I still consumed it.

And now, when I think about those moments, it feels heavy.

It sits somewhere deep, in a place that’s hard to ignore.

No one in my family is vegetarian or vegan.

Meat was cooked almost every day at home. It was normal. It was part of life. Something we never questioned.

But looking back now… it hurts in a way I didn’t expect.

Because for the first time, I tried to see it differently.

I tried to place myself in their position.

To imagine what it might feel like — to be alive, to feel fear, to not understand what is happening… and to have no control over it.

And that thought alone is difficult to sit with.

What troubles me even more is realizing that it’s not just about that one moment.

For many animals, the experience begins much earlier.

From the very beginning of their lives, they exist within a system where their purpose is already decided — not as living beings, but as something to be used.

And somewhere along the way, we stopped seeing them as individuals.

We started seeing them as products.

And that leads me to a question I keep coming back to:

When we can care so deeply for a dog or a cat…
why do we struggle to see other animals the same way?

When we smile watching a puppy drink milk from its mother…
why don’t we feel the same when a calf does the same with a cow?

What changes?

Is it the animal…
or is it our perception?

I don’t say this from a place of judgment.

Because I was that person too.

I lived both sides — caring, and not questioning.

But awareness changes something within you.

It makes you pause.
It makes you reflect.
It makes you choose differently.

A quiet thought

Maybe compassion was never meant to be selective.

Maybe it was meant to be seen… everywhere.