The Age-Old Question

This isn’t just a list. Read on. I have a point

1. My godfather grew up in Chile.

2. I have an Indian hand-made candle holder on my desk depicting a lotus on a turtle’s back.

3. At the age of ten, when all the other girls in my class wanted to be Rachel from S Club 7, I wanted to be a psychiatrist.

4. My first word was ‘moon’.

5. My electric guitar is called Seyton and would probably appeal to this guy:

It occurred to me today how we weave our self-perception. These statements are all correct, and all relatively distinct to me, but only two of them are what I have cashed as things which are me. They are part of ‘what makes up Fiona’, whereas the other three, though true, are basically facts.

In other words, if you took those two things away I feel it would change me fundamentally. The other three are linked to my life, my preferences, maybe even the image others use to build me… but for me they’re basically just facts.

There are countless distinct facts about all of us, but we wither subconsciously or consciously highlight some and overlook others perhaps to bring us closer to who we want to be.

As a parallel comparison, we are all at some times in our life giddy, insecure, pensive, principled or generous. But while one person might pick out pensive and generous, another might think of herself as giddy and principled, or another as pensive and insecure.

This isn’t a very well structured argument but I hope you can see where I’m going with it. Yes we are all individual, but we mould ourselves. I think that’s fascinating and exciting.

It makes me wonder… where is the line between self-affirmation, and self-denial?