Who Am I: Redux - Page 2

Originally posted by: return_to_hades

Who am I - I am a girl, I am an Indian, I am a Konkani, I am a Gujarati, I am a Bombayite, I am a Maharashtrian, I am an American, I am an NRI, I am an ABCD, I am an IBCA, I am a Hindu, I am a Brahmin, I am a hick, I am a peasant, I am a Wisconsinte, I am a Madisonian, I am a student, I am an employee, I am a sister, I am a daughter, I am a friend, I am a liberal, I am a Democrat, I am funny,I am too serious and so an and so forth.

You're all those things - each one of those is like a layer on your individuality, making you more and more complex. As life progresses, more and more layers are added on to the original layers and help you define yourself further. Taking out any of these layers would mean losing a part of you.

We can define ourselves through many things - our personalities, what we do, our experiences, our culture, language, who we love, our sorrows, our desires, our losses, our dreams, etc etc etc. For the most part, we should define ourselves for who we are and who we perceive ourselves to be. I read somewhere that to exist means to be an individual before God - to abandon the cold comforts of belonging. Having said that, I also think in some ways we need society's mirror to remind us who we are. Those around us also help us define us as well - their perceptions do matter to some extent.

Originally posted by: *Woh Ajnabee*

For the most part, we should define ourselves for who we are and who we perceive ourselves to be.

Sounds circular, keeping in mind we are trying to define just that.

"Who we are" is ever shifting with time. The question is, is there any one single period in our life that encapsulates who we are as a whole? No, because there is still more to come and we won't know who we would become. For example, you don't know who you would be in your 50s and neither would I. We could be completely different persons from who we are now, as dictated by our surroundings and by our circumstances. There could be a global shortage of food, a global break out of an infectiousness disease, global warming, a third world war, a civil war, something that could completely alter who we perceive ourselves to be, today. Good people turn bad, bad people turn good, beautiful to ugly and vice versa, and so on.

The only accurate way that we could employ in order to summarize a person's life is when that person's life ends. We will then integrate all the events that surrounded that person but the problem is we wouldn't be able to do justice because that person is much more than an integration of events. That person's thoughts, memories, feelings, emotions are not documented anywhere. For instance, I don't know who the heck is my great great grandfather. Nobody knows. That information is lost forever. I might know his name and I might sketch what kind of a person he is but that's about it. What I know doesn't sum up that person. What my great grandfather knew about himself doesn't sum up that person. Because, there was no way he could have viewed his life in it's totality from time zero of his life till it ended.

Simply put, I can't be the subject and the object at the same time. I need another observer to tell me who I am after the observer is done watching my film. But then, once my film ends, I wouldn't be there to listen to what that observer has to say.

Why are people so lost at DM?

No one ever wondered about who they are before K showed up here😆

Originally posted by: Gauri_3

Why are people so lost at DM?

No one ever wondered about who they are before K showed up here😆

Its all K's doing 😆 He 'll go poof and take everyone along 😆

I'm honestly not that lost. Nor is my quest really as complicated as K's. A few years back in time I was 100% confident that I had reached the final rung of Maslow's hierarchy. I was pretty sure that I was not too far from a mortal nirvana, a mental rapture of sorts in my mind. I'm not cut out for the eternal nirvana or any real raptures. Just more of a personal Zen. However, it seems to my mind that I have fallen a few rungs in the hierarchy. Part of me is inclined to blame IF for not being the grounds for tranquil civil beings, but then part of me believes we make our own personal heaven and hell. So even if this sounds extremely lost and complicated that I one needs rocket science for dummies and a GPS system that transcends time and space.

In the simplest terms - its just a very ordinary quest for personal Zen. And sometimes I think I might have found nirvana at five really, I am Sam, Sam I am, Do you Like Green Eggs & Ham? Honestly, can there ever be anything more to life than a Dr. Seuss book?

Theres a difference between wondering and a quest .I dont think I am on any quest so it must be the former. I would be satisfied if I succeed in applying my mind without several distractions to the task at hand which can be as mundane but distressing enough as trying to locate my things when I need them ! At times my things simply disappear when i need them and make me waste so many precious moments searching for them . It can be so annoying !

Originally posted by: Mister.K.

On the other hand, if we are attributing importance to ourselves because we are "intelligent" then we need to ask ourselves what is "intelligence" and why did it decide to enter our bodies and not all bodies that are out there?

To me, that's a better question - what is this intelligence, this consciousness that made conscious choices to enter certain body types?

Just my two cents, what if the consciousness never entered any body type but rather it's the other way ! The body got constructed around a part or aspect of consciousness . Something like say a pot of water floating in the ocean. The water is the same both inside and outside the pot , but the pot is the ego/ material body that gives the sense of separation. Once the pot breaks the water inside gets merged with the water in the ocean.

But then why create the various pots in the first place? Could it be to get a different focus of perception ?😕

Originally posted by: return_to_hades

I'm honestly not that lost. Nor is my quest really as complicated as K's.

Hey, I was just pulling K's leg there.

I have yet to read Dr. Seuss!

Originally posted by: angie.4u

Its all K's doing 😆 He 'll go poof and take everyone along 😆

Yup, everything is his fault😆

@ taking everyone along --- he will take only those along who agree with him all the time. That put you and me out of the group that gets to go:



Both of us will be the ones saying, "OI! It's no smoking in here!"😆 The third one with a beard and hairy arms, I think, is K himself. He stayed back while making everyone else go POOF😆 Most prob'ly, he will stay back to convert us both to whoamier before going POOF himself😆

Originally posted by: angie.4u

Just my two cents, what if the consciousness never entered any body type but rather it's the other way ! The body got constructed around a part or aspect of consciousness . Something like say a pot of water floating in the ocean. The water is the same both inside and outside the pot , but the pot is the ego/ material body that gives the sense of separation. Once the pot breaks the water inside gets merged with the water in the ocean.

But then why create the various pots in the first place? Could it be to get a different focus of perception ?😕

Well, I'd like to ask K that why the f**k a quantum fluctuation in f**king quantum vacuum is so f**king hung up on f**king consciousness!!!

Or may be this is what Empti would like to ask him except he'd write "fack" instead of "f**k"😆