Most of us go around thinking we know who we are. If we didn’t, we would probably feel very insecure and not know what to do. Who are we, anyway? Maybe it sounds like a stupid question; but pause and reflect a few moments with me.
In my work with people over the last three decades, I am often helping people: heal from past wounds/trauma, learn how their habitual thinking is not helping them, manage their emotions, clarify their values, take the right steps to progress, find some meaning in life, and/or figure out who they really are. I have found that most of us do not know who we truly are.
When I helped one woman realize she was not her thoughts, it freed her up and opened up possibilities for her. She then talked with her family members and when they realized they were not their thoughts, it changed how they saw themselves. When I helped another woman realize she was not a negative belief she had about herself since 6 years old, she felt so much lighter and freer. One man equated himself to the high management position he held at his employment. When he was fired, he hit bottom, had to regroup, open up, and figure out who he really was. When another man was asked who he was, and he got clear that he was not his role in life (husband, supervisor, manager), he realized that deep down, he believed he was his obligations. The minute he said that, he realized he had some deep work to do.
If we think we are one single thing, we sell ourselves short. If we think we are our emotions, we discount our rational side. If we think we are our body, we are devaluing everything psychological or internal. One person started to write about and learn who he was, but he could only think of adjectives, and he knew he was not an adjective, so he was stymied for a while.
Mark Matousek developed a program he calls Writing Your Way to Freedom. In the program, a person writes answers to questions every day - questions like: Am I living in line with my top values? or What would be important to stop doing? or What of importance have I learned today? Toward the end of the program, the questions are more like, “Who Am I?” Another aspect of the program is that a person goes back and reads what they wrote a few days prior, then reflects and writes more about that. It is an eye-opening process, and we can learn deep truths about ourselves if we fully engage in this type of approach.
There was a time in my life when I was sure I knew what I was doing and who I was. It was a simple, straight-forward belief. I took on the role, the title of, my profession. And, while it was true (on a surface level), it was not the whole truth and it limited my thinking, possibilities, and therefore, my life.
Part of what drives us humans to know who we are and define and label it, is the fear or dread of uncertainty. I’ve written about this before on Substack. It is so basic, an underlying strong drive for certainty. As far as we know, humans are the only animal or being on this planet that has such a strong drive for certainty. We want guarantees, warranties, promises, insurance, assurances, that things will be the same, or at least predictable, based on the past. Other fairly advanced animals, like porpoises, gorillas, whales, elephants, do not appear to be so driven to certainty. They deal what is, when they have to deal with it. They are more attuned to nature and live by instinct, intuition, and associative learning - and live in the moment they find themselves.
On the journey to figure out who we are, it is interesting to reflect on Albert Einstein’s views about humanity’s delusion that we are separate beings. When we think about what we need to live, it becomes obvious we are not truly independent. We need sunshine, we need water that cycles from the oceans, we need food that grows in the soil, we need family and connection, we need oxygen that trees and plants give us. We are not truly independent of, or on, this planet.
On the journey to figure out who we are, it can be helpful to think from different viewpoints, on different levels. For instance, every living cell in our body uses nutrients and creates energy, so we are energy. We change every year and science tells us that about every cell in our body dies and is replaced each 7 to 10 years. If we use human vision, we appear to be an organism encased in the organ we call skin. If we view ourselves with a strong enough microscope, we are more vacant space than we are mass. Biologists have found that we are made up of more non-human than human cells if we include all the viruses and microbes under our skin, especially in our digestive system. Our environments and experiences are impactful on who we become, so we are not just half mom and half dad. We are not adjectives, not the roles in which we find ourselves, not what someone else called us. So, the question emerges, who are you?
If you do not want to go through Mark Matousek’s full program, one way to start to understand who you are is to engage in therapeutic reflection and work with an experienced psychologist. Another way some people find helpful is to set aside time daily to write about who you think and feel you are. After many days of this exercise, if you can get over 20 entries about who you think you are (and not rely on adjectives or roles, or nicknames), you may be close to figuring it out. Are you basically good, or bad? Are you the same person you were 10 years ago, or even last year? Do you have a soul, or are you your soul? Are you limited to what you can see or think? Best of luck and fortune figuring out who you truly are underneath the trappings, and ideas, and feelings, and adjectives, and roles. It is an eye-opening journey.