Defining ourselves

Knowing others is wisdom. Knowing yourself is enlightenment.  Lao Tzo

Human animals are maybe the only ones who get to define themselves. How we do that often explains how we see all of life. Truthfully, books or movies or whatever else we might bring into our lives including friends, it is how we define ourselves that probably most impacts our choices and all of how we live. We can define ourselves tightly or loosely. We can change the definitions as we age or fight to keep them constant. We can find definitions that can grow with us and are about more than the superficial. We can not define ourselves at all and let others do it.

Our way of defining ourselves might impact not just how we see ourselves but also how others see us.  If our definitions are objective, we will be realistic in our goals. If we have let someone else define us, we might find it difficult to even figure out our own dreams.

Naturally after just having been to a reunion of many people the same age, a reunion that took me back fifty years and more; then watching a documentary on female artists and their lives, reading blogs where I hear people defining themselves many different ways, ways I might not define them if I was putting out my own definitions, this subject of defining has been on my mind as to how I would define me.

If I define myself realistically, I will be ahead for my life. If I see myself as I want to be or how others see me, not how I am, I will make poor choices. I could make my life one long string of grievances against the 'other.' Some of us were given more natural gifts, some of us less but it's what we do with what we have been given that most impacts our living. Knowing ourselves and defining who we are in a way that works is why I especially liked the above quote by Lao Tzu which will be for the month of March on my 2012 calendar (Nirvana).

We live in a culture that is eager to define us-- fat, thin, old, young, pretty, plain, etc etc. That can be accurate or not. We start being given definitions by our parents and then our peer group. We accept or fight against those definitions all of our life. I think it takes down time with ourselves to come up with our own definitions, ones with which we can live the enlightened lives Lao Tzu was talking about.

Sometimes when I see myself, with no makeup and glasses, my hair maybe needing to be washed, I still see that little girl of 12 (top photo) who was just starting to not only define herself but become the woman she would be. I guess that's the case with us all-- we are still that child but also the adult or old person we developed into.

Beauty or handsomeness is one of those definitions for a culture. Whether we are lovely/handsome  (whether those words even have firm definitions), it's how others see us that could end up a lot of what we believe. That will vary with different cultures as what one group sees as gorgeous, even in one generation to the next, will vary.

How many though have decided they are beautiful or not based purely on the other? How many have based their worth on the others' definition of their beauty/handsomeness which as they age will naturally change and leave them with no sense of who they are short of plastic surgery which can NEVER reach what nature naturally created-- no matter how many dollars are spent. And kid yourself not, dollars are what most of that surgery is about.

What if we define ourselves by gender? We are men or we are women. We are straight or we are gay. Is that a good way to define us as human beings? We are certainly encouraged to do that in a myriad of ways, not just our sexuality but also our age. When we use those kinds of definition as well as that of beauty, it will change and be impacted by how others saw us more than even ourselves. That leads to dividing ourselves as we go to war, emotionally at the least, with the 'other'.

I honestly think that coming up with a definition of who we are that is not impacted by the 'other' is one of the perks of a long life. We're the ones lucky enough to have a lifetime to look back upon and the time now to do it if we so choose. To have a realistic view of ourselves is something I think most of us learn with the wisdom of age. It is more likely to go beyond the superficial to deeper values-- the kind that last. We can then go anywhere confident in us because it's not about someone else's view of us.

Now that doesn't mean we should not work on the culture's being realistic about its values. It doesn't mean we look the other way at discrimination based on the 'other' grabbing power. I think it's important to do that as part of not only defining ourselves but living in a culture where we can be proud of what it represents. The catch is to not let media or hype convince us we are something we are not. They as well as others are willing to do it. Nobody else should.

Sometimes I jokingly say, when I am going somewhere, that I am putting on me and that means the public me which is like this photo. That isn't really me though, not even for how I look.

Farm Boss told me, when I was talking about this concept of identity, that no photo really shows how others see us as that is full of moving action and energy. Mirrors or photos are the only way we ever really see ourselves and that's an illusion as much as anything else.