Self - I, me, another?

Here are some scribblings from the shallows of the Vicar brain regarding my dealings with someone struggling with who they are. Our conversations are bringing me into a place where I am challenged to think about those two age old questions, "Who am I and why am I here?" Do I define myself by my otherness or by my sameness ("I'm a . . . " or "I'm not a . . ")? Do I reduce it to the Cartesian statement, "I think therefore I am," and be happy at that?

Who I am appears to be made firm through the reflection of self in something or someone else. I cannot be me in isolation and yet all too often the 'me' I am is defined by others and it is here we find the big problem. In the situation before my friend there is the overarching question, "Who am I?" screaming from the rooftops.

I may be who I am, but that I is shaped by my familial situation, my schooling, the cultures that have embraced, and been embraced by, me. The expectation of following in the family traditions in terms of schooling, career, lifestyles are as marked and potent regardless of where you find yourself. Many will think of public school, a career in the Army, Medicine, Church or City and the like and a 'good' marriage bringing the continuance of the pattern in the genrations to come. But, the patterns are as strong and well defined in every stratum of our society. State school, minimal qualifications, blue-collar job, social housing and all the trappings are as much a tradition and shape many people into thinking they know who they are.

What shapes us and helps define who we are is a knowledge of what we really believe, what moves us, the places where we are passionate and the places where we can find peace and an internal stillness. Belief is a big part, not just in a creator or someone to ask for things or seek forgiveness from but in self and others too.

As I have discussed I have come to the opinion that being oneself is very much an issue of sameness rather than individuality. That said, as we compile a photofit made up of those who have moved us or been admired by us because we wish to find the same in us. So it is that 'I', as an individual, become a person made up of the attributes and characteristics of others. Our otherness is the result of our sameness and herein lies the rub!

If we base 'I' on just one person or people group there is the problem that we might become a parody or imitator of our focus and this results in the faux characters and their pastiche, almost parody, lives that we encounter. This, taken to it's extremes ends up with those people who live like their heroes, dressing, speaking and acting like them such that they become absurd.

If we base 'I' on many people we find ourselves faced with the danger of appearing to be a grasshopper, self-contradictory and rather haphazard person. If the things that we take upon ourselves or seek to emulate are coherent then we too will be coherent.

Now one of the problems is that as people are developing the 'I' that they are going to be there are people feeding in information, images, attitudes and views that lead the embryonic 'I' becoming malformed and confused. This can be clearly demonstrated in areas of morality, gender, politics, societal and social values and in the area of belief.

Not being the same as others does not always confer individuality any more than sameness does because we are one of many (and yet still different!) for we are dealing with more than a mere numerical consideration (although many still try to place such value on numbers on the basis that they confer a rightness. "Look how many people do . . . "). The problem comes from the fact that we have led our young people into a world of complementary states (black, white and grey?). Being 'us', taking upon ourselves an understand of who we are is the realisation that even when within a clearly defined group we are individuals. Who we are is us and no one else. We may be the same as others and yet will still be different and thus, I find, we may be different from others and yet find within that state, that we are also the same!

Sameness and difference are held in tension and who we are is, for all of us, a continuously evolving state. What we do and how we do it is underpinned by our ability, and obligation, to do it and this is where opportunity and the demands of society and a God come in. the person with whom I am engaged find themselves able to engage in something and yet prohibited from doing it because of their beliefs. Society is screaming 'Whatever floats your boat, get on and do it!" whilst God is apparently looking over His glasses and, Dumbledore like, calling upon them to, "do what is right rather than what is easy!" This bring us into the area of prescription and description (see, did listen to the lectures and even read the books!).

As a Christian we create an 'I' which is made in the image of God (F,S & HS) and of heroes of the faith and in our lives we might describe what we have before us, but prescription designs what we take up and act upon and we do this by living 'rightly' (we'll call this, 'ethically') with an eye on the 'rightness and desires' of our society (which we'll call 'morality'). The problem is that increasingly we find our society's morality becoming looser and more vague. Pleasure, self and 'rights' come to the fore and service, sacrifice, 'being right' fall into the background and neglect. The call of the faith group, of a God who seeks justice, mercy, humility, respect for others and self contrasts and collides greatly with this and the issue of self and individuality versus sameness is a battlefield.

Responsibility is diminished, for it is NEVER 'my' fault, it is how I am made, how my parents brought me up, what I learned at school and so on. But this is of course wrong. For instance a starving man may steal to feed himself (makes a good musical too!) but the fact is that he chose to steal. The argument that he was hungry does not change the fact that at some stage the man decided to engage in the act of stealing. That he was hungry does not cause the stealing to become something else, does it?

Every day we find ourselves faced with choices, even when we don't choose to recognise them as such. The alarm goes off and we make the choice - roll over or get up? Later at the train station we look at the crowded train and decide to push our way on but we could decide to wait for an emptier train or merely pop over the café and throw a sicky! (now some will say that we have no choice because we have to go to work, but although that pressure is upon us, we still have a coice before us). Throughout the day we are faced with choices (we sometimes call this prioritising) and then it all begins again within other frames of reference - lunch, after work, home, evenings, weekends, etc.

Where we find our conversation coming to rest is that, in the task of constructing self, whilst we garner material from our life thus far, we also add material from many other places and the requirement to live as we believe we are called to live in secular or religious ways (or more accurately for many - both) and the sameness that we possess is actually a very different 'same' from the next person.

Everything we do is the result of choice and to plead that we have no choice is merely to embark along, and embrace, another choice.

We need to love the 'I' that we live with and where we can't we need to address that. We need to live with respect, justice, mercy and humility and this means living with, for and because of God. We need to accept that we are never prisoners of other forces or our own desires, ambitions and the like. If they influence us, challenge our thinking and call us to act in ways that stand opposed to the call of God or act against the good of our society, then we need to realise that we have another choice to make - and this, busy crossroads, is where the guilt, the striving for self and the demands of God meet.

What's your choice today?

Pax

ps. Sorry this is so long, found this to be a helpful scratchpad for me, let's hope it doesn't damage too many heads out there!