Nov 23 2008
Seeking Identity
Does anyone truly know who she is? I think of this every time I see someone’s blog on Today.com, and most have the tab, whether on the side or at the top, saying “All About Me.” It took me a few days of navigating around my page to find this tab and actually put something in it, but even when I did, I was struck by how little I really knew about myself, by how little I could put there.
Most bloggers, at least those whose blogs I have visited, put info about their professional careers…what they do for a living, how many dogs they have, kids, spouses, favorite hobbies. But is that who we really are, or what we are? Are we only made up of our relationships, of what we like to do in our spare time (or whether we have any spare time at all)? Aren’t we more than that?
I’d like to think we are, or at least I have the desperate hope that I am (I am the center of my own universe, after all). But if I am, how do I discover–or uncover–this person? It is impossible to see myself as others see me. Even if they are willing to tell me the truth of what they see, there is no way for me to accept it (good or bad) without qualification, for I have my own filters through which to see myself and others, and those filters color everything.
I think my writing is one way I venture into the “Who am I?” question, for I place qualities I believe I hold within my characters, watching those qualities move the characters in different ways. If the characters act the way I believe I would act, I know that quality is one I likely share. Writing fiction also gives me the chance to try out other choices, choices I wonder about, choices I might have made a long time ago, which may have significantly altered my life now.
But is it my choices that make me who I am, or are they, like my relationships, my hobbies, my profession, merely the result of the authentic ME coming out? It’s funny, but even though I tended to be a rather tractable young woman, I’ve made so many choices that step completely outside the list of possibilities other people gave me as choices. I’ve chosen so many times to do things others didn’t want me to do, and I keep doing it.
Perhaps I am merely being rebellious, but I don’t think so. I feel more as if I am listening, doing what I can drown out the voices of others–others who are sometimes VERY insistent–so that I can hear the leanings of my soul and follow that path. And for the most part, I am content to follow the path rather blindly, not knowing where any particular choice might lead, but trusting that I will be okay.
And when I make a choice out of obligation–and that happens at times–I sometimes find my heart wraps itself around the choice pretty quickly. If it doesn’t, an I feel myself bending elsewhere, I change eventually, following a new path that feels better.
Perhaps there is no reason to figure out WHO I am, as long as I follow the yearnings, feed my soul, and willingly follow the path of my dreams. Perhaps that is who I am.
