identity... check

pile of faces...

pile of faces...
identity... check
so i wanted to post pictures, so now i figured out a way and we are all in trouble!
i like this site, its pretty easy to figure out when i have, ya know, an hour to do it cause im slow.
so im updating. i need to read through (i always need to do something...) that last entry to see if ive improved any from that time, which was like a month ago. there have been things i wanted to post, but i needed to switch to different ... blog jungle.
so now im in the blogger jungle, cause i like google. k? good. now that we have that cleared up lets talk about identity.
thats the topic i have been dealing with this past month. not my own identity, i think ive got a pretty firm hold on who i am and what im about these days. ive also got a firm grasp on the idea that we are constantly "reforming." so nothing is really a constant, or is it? i dont know.
lord... there is too much of all this to sort out, and my philosophy class in which i discussed these things was a long time ago.
so i wikipedia-ed it.
and it really didnt turn up too much at first. identity turned up mostly math related results. NOT what im looking for. rar. so i clicked on some other stuff and ended up with self, self-concept, etc... thats a little more like it.
so i guess we will be talking about the self, which is the idea of a unified being which is the source of an idiosyncratic consciousness. Moreover, this self is the agent responsible for the thoughts and actions of an individual to which they are ascribed. It is something which endures through time; thus, the thoughts and actions at different moments of time may pertain to the same self.
or
in psychology the self refers to the conscious, reflective personality of an individual.

i apologize in advance for the following bit of add.
disambiguation- what?!
i just learned that word... that was probably the most helpful word i have ever clicked on though. aww man, wouldnt it be amazing if everywhere you went if you got confused a little blue box would would appear that said "DISAMBIGUATION" in large block letters. when you hit the box everything would suddenly be clarified! how novel. you could only see it if you needed it though... kind of like idea of SEP (somebody elses problem) in the hitchhikers series. we will have to work on our bistromathmatics first...

and we are back on track! so we are going to be discussing HUMAN IDENTITY (please read this in a big announcer voice, thank you)
get excited.
so after spending a few work days surfing the information superhighway, gleaning all that i can about "SELF" which is not near as fun to say as HUMAN IDENTITY, but includes just as many big and scary topics.
people are weird. there. glad we got that out of the way.
people are dumb. whew!
people are complicated...
i mean its that whole thing who am? what makes me... me?
is it self?
i mean it all boils down to just asking "who am i?" over and over and over until you finally give yourself an honest answer. but will you ever get around to it? maybe, maybe not.
this is pretty sweet though, i seem to be following a natural progression from what is it all about? and why are we here? to who am i and what does it mean to me?
its nuts. guess thats ok.
identity is a some kinda intense subject. i mean, according to erikson i should have my personality pretty well in order by now... but is my personality all i am? Lord, im in trouble if thats the case. though my wiki friend says "In the healthy personality there is constant assimilation of new ideas and expulsion of old ideas throughout life." so thats good, there is hope.
luckily, i am also biologically a human, a female human... woah! stop. now some have tried to tell me that the soul is sexless (teehee... go ahead giggle at that word, it will make you feel younger)... well thats nice, but currently this soul or whatever you wanna call it is currently lodged in this feeble female body and that effects the way i see the world. other things like that, blondish red hair, blue eyes, not really thin or fat... short... those sorts things. you can change they way you look a little easier these days... for example if you go from fat to skinny, it really does impact they way people treat you oddly enough. also temperment and all those other things mother nature bestows on us whether we want it or not.

theres your worldview... *some people dont like this term, so if your one of them please ignore it, think of perception or maybe your perhaps a giant microscope where the lenses are your experiences, culture, ideas, and general temperment, dunno if that helps or not but at least i tried* ... also has a pretty big impact on who you are. i dont know about memories and all that. theres a lot of arguing to be done about memories apparently. we will discuss that at another time. for now lets assume that everything that happens to you, from the time you are aware of it, and maybe a little before, effects the way you see things. for example, if your parents are often of the absence of mind enough to forget to pick you up from swim practice, you are likely to assume you need to call them as soon as practice is over or be left out in the cold, right?
but that is an experience that has effected you... i dont mean to be leading into behaviorism or anything, i just couldnt help it. i mean we get programed in all sorts of ways.
we are american, unfortunately (or not...), and this impacts they way you will be raised, what you will want out of life, how you interact with other people. most of us were raised witn early 80s parenting styles, which is ok i guess. it has given us a value system, a social code, language, group identity... this book even sites mythes as answers to big questions (religion??), legends and heros to provide group identity...
but how much of that is actually you, and how much of that is just sort of a lense through which you look at the world. cause your perception is def a part of it. how you react to things i guess.

how much a part of you is what you do? im a lifeguard, a recptionist, a swimming instructor and a fitness lady... i mean i am not that. i certianly dont want to do it forever. some dude told me to get a real job the other day... i was like you can take that real job, sit on it and spin. assface.
not really, but i did think about it.
in america its VERY important to have a job, or a purpose that makes you money and my generation of people are doing the thing were we live at home and work crappy jobs to save money... its tuff and hard to get straight in your head.
i guess family has something to do with it, im the oldest of four.
i try to be an artist.
i try to be nice...
i try to be productive...

I. I! I? how did this suddenly become about me!? guess it was inevitable, we are essentially egocentric when it comes down to it arent we? i mean we can sympathize and sometimes empathize with other people, but eventually it comes down to being all alone inside your head.
but thats not the end of it either, cause we want to be a part of something so we keep trying. or do we? because we still will see ourselves in a different way than others see us...
i live in this time and space, so this is all thats real to me. suck. thats no good. but true.
but then apparently weve come back around to this question...
"HOW MUCH OF ME IS ME???" precisely where we started. isnt it. i dunno im too lazy to scroll up and check for real.
i really dont know..
so there are some more things about your self concept... its apparently organized... and stable... so it tends to resist change.

this quote explains the existance of assholes "Individuals strive to behave in ways that are in keeping with their self-concepts, no matter how helpful or hurtful to oneself or others."

I guess because we are ego-based creatures... the self-concept usually takes precedence over the physical body. Individuals will often sacrifice physical comfort and safety for emotional satisfaction. maslow would have a fit!

ok im done with this for now! peace.