It’s
a very difficult thing to know yourself. You can know things
about you that other people don’t know, you can have an
understanding of how other people see you. You can convince
yourself that you’re doing things for this reason and that and that
those motivations are as pure as the driven or as muddied as, I
dunno, the Mississippi or something. But that’s not you,
that’s a collection of parts of your own personal history, of
external perspectives and an excuse you’ve applied to appear more
palatable to the world outside your head. It’s not what you
are, it might be a clue as to why, but that’s different.
No
one knows who you really are except you. It’s perhaps a sad
truth, but a truth never the less, and truth is very much the crux of
the thing. You have to be incredibly, painfully, unerringly
honest with yourself about everything you’ve done, are doing and
intend to do. Not always a pleasant thing – very rarely in
fact – but without that honesty, and a consistency that goes along
with it, you aren’t really you, you’re a reaction to everything,
and everybody, else. Around about now I expect you’re
wondering where this has come from, you’re thinking, ‘hang on, a
few days ago I was reading about celebrity endorsement, a piece
written in – unless I’m mistaken – a somewhat tongue in cheek
tone, and now this?’ Well, when you’re writing something
that is going to display rather a lot of your inner self to complete
strangers, even in the name of entertainment, you start to get
rather interested in who the Hell you actually are.
Say
you’re acquainted with someone who is horribly immoral, who lies
and twists things so that they get what they want – as an example
let’s say they get violent when drunk or use people for their own
gain. Your relationship with that person isn’t who you are,
but it does reflect on how people see you. They’re completely
different things, but the fact that you are willing to associate with
such a person does speak volumes of a facet of your character. Maybe
you don’t care as long as you aren’t personally negatively
affected, maybe it makes you feel like a better person by comparison,
maybe you simply feel the need for the company, believing that the
numbers of your group are inferior enough as it is. But you
should – at the very least – have queried your own logic. I
have more respect for the man who knowingly deceives for his own
gain, who admits as much when caught out, than I do for the man who
has created a fantasy for himself in which he isn’t the villain, in
which he has acted purely, in which others have tarnished his image
unfairly. Or her. If you’re going to be a shit, fine,
be a shit. But don’t you dare try to tell the world that you’re
misunderstood, because you’ve been understood very well, you just
don’t like what you see in the mirror. If you’re not
comfortable with the consequence, don’t do the action. If you
think you’re not the sort of person who’d do something like that,
don’t convince yourself that you’re not responsible after the
fact. And if you did do it, and you know full well why, then
feel no shame in admitting it. It’s always been you, and no
matter what everyone else thinks to the contrary, it’s still you.
It’s not like you can escape that.
Ok,
blah blah, I know, and partly this is an exploration of my own desire
for, and admiration of, consistency and constant, perpetual honesty.
What can I say, I’m horribly self involved. The clue is
that you’re reading a personal blog, such is my narcissism.
I was recently questioned as to what I valued consistency in, what it
was I thought should be constant in a person. I’ve always
known that universal truth was important to me, and that I personally
extend that into some parts of the individual, but the consistency
part is harder to nail down. Consistent consistency is probably
in there somewhere, that someone who knows what or who they are
maintains that persona and remains one thing. This flies in the
face of the earlier example, where knowing a bad person doesn’t
make you bad, because I believe this to be both true and nonsense. I
think it matters how and why you justify that decision, rather than
what the decision actually ends up being. You can argue that
it’s not important, and maybe to you it’s not, but the only way
to be happy dissecting your you, and to have others come along for
the ride is to know. Even if you can’t explain how you do.
Basically
can you all just try to be a bit more honest about why you do stuff.
To yourself will do, because from that it will become clear to
others. You’re selfish, and that’s ok. You’re vain
and shallow and arrogant. You’re self loathing, you’re
manipulative and unsure, you’re confident, you’re submissive and
certain. Words used to describe your motivations are loaded
with connotations both negative and positive, and none of them matter
as long as you know, as long as you accept which is which and admit
if asked. People say they don’t care what other people think,
but the outward perception of your inner self isn’t irrelevant,
because other people do exist, meaning that you only really exist –
socially, in an interactive way – because of those other bastards,
and that interaction only has worth if it is as open and honest as it
can be on both sides. That’s the consistency I seek, I guess,
the constant reality that I want to project and to receive from
others. The real difficulty is in explaining all this lucidly,
as I have illustrated by explaining it all poorly. No, scratch
that, the real difficulty is in explaining it lucidly and making it
all funny at the same time, which should, at this point in the post,
be painfully clear. What do you think you think about it?
Of
course, it’s worth bearing in mind that all this comes from a man
who had a Sherbet Dib Dab for dinner. And don’t worry, the
next one will be about something silly, like the belief that everyone
should be allowed a gun or the idea that anything really matters.
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