“Path to Discovering Myself”

When we talk about concept the “self”, it is not always easy to come up

with a definite answer. The meaning of the “self” is always met with confusion, as there

are many different answers due to the uniqueness of human nature. The “self” could

mean as “I” or “me, or something about “me”. Or we could refer to the Bible, as Genesis

1:27 (King James Bible, 1769/2008) states that God created us or man through his

likeness and image. The “self” remains a mysterious and difficult topic to explain, and

yet we know and talk so much about ourselves.

There are three things I learned from the reading. I learned much about

the different meanings of the concept of “self” and “identity”, to the point that it made me

ponder about my identity and how much I know about myself. First, I learned that the

self is not necessarily mean I, me or you. The self is a mental construct, that includes

“me”, our thoughts, actions, behaviors. Next, the self is also a social construct. The self

is molded by one’s experiences, culture or way of living. These “molds” create a huge

impact that affect and bring change to each one of us, which makes us unique from

each other. And lastly, I learned that the “self” causes us to do “actions”. The “self”

influences our actions, in order portray what we feel and think to others. This explains

why the “self” influences each person’s personality and traits as it makes us feel the

things we do as “natural”.

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 If there are learnings, then there are unanswered thoughts left. After the

reading, there are three thoughts that I thought was unclear. First, it did not give a

concrete or universal meaning of “self”. Only theories and philosopher’s inputs were

given which is understandable as the topic of the “self” is very hard to comprehend.

Next, the article stated that self and identity were used as synonym sand yet the have

similar but different meanings. The reading does not really focus on the differences

between the two, but only focusing on theories that discuss their nature, such being

mental or a social construct. And lastly, the article stated that the self has a stable

essence and it predicts the behavior of a person. But I relate that the “self” is also a

social product, and that the experiences and conditions can form one’s behavior. How

can we predict a person’s behavior through this “essence” if that person experiences

many life- changing events that changes the behavior multiple times?

There are three things that I used to think, that changed after reading this

article. First, I used to think that when talk about concept of “self”, it means simply as I

or “you”. I did not anticipate that the topic of “self” would be a complex and quite

confusing topic to talk about. Second, I used to think that the self is simply a mental

product. After reading the article, not only is the self a mental concept, but it also is a

social product. I learned that our experiences in life molds us to how we define our

“self”. And lastly, I used to think that we have simply one identity. However, the article

elaborated that we have multiple identities depending on where we are and what we are

doing.

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 I have three questions that I formulated after reading this article. George

Mead states that the self is a “subject” and an “object” at the same time. (Mead,1947)

How can we relate this to the fact that the self is a mental concept? Next, how can the

essence of stability predict one’s behavior? It is it through one’s prior behavior or

experiences? And lastly, discovering one’s self is every difficult for most people. How

can we use this knowledge to further define ourselves as a person?

In conclusion, the “self” and “identity” is a very difficult topic to talk about as

it does not give a concrete answer to what it is. It is specifically hard to find a definition

as we, the human race is very complex and each one of us is unique. However, the

“self” is how we define ourselves as a person no matter how many questions that go

unanswered due to its mysterious nature. The lessons we have learned from this article

may give us the path on how we can discover our true selves. We may not know the

true meaning of “self”, but we can define ourselves as who we are, through our

characteristics, traits and values.