Will the Real Me please stand up?

I have often heard people say they know their friends through and through. They boast that they can write a book on their friends. They have been through so much together; they went to the same high school and studied in the same college. They even take their vacations together and if one person starts a sentence the other can accurately complete it. Though this presumed knowledge of the other is good to hear and great to express with a seeming honesty and doubtful consequences, nothing can be far from the truth. No two persons can presume to know the other person that well. It will be more accurate to say that our limited knowledge that we have of anyone, if any, is only accurate to the point that the other person concedes that the knowledge is accurate. This is not to say that it is the truth. Life has taught us that no one knows what the other person thinks unless the person tells us his thoughts. Hence, it is a fallacy to say that we know what someone is thinking or that we know someone that well as to complete his sentence. May be this could be true in some cases but not in all.

Even identical twins cannot presume to know and feel what each of them is thinking or feeling. The fact that you went through the same school and live in the same house and eat in the same restaurant does not, ipso facto, give you an absolute knowledge of the other person. So what then do we know about anyone? Great question, I must admit, but the answer is far from being simple. We only know so much as the other person wants us to know. Ever heard someone say, ‘I thought I knew him?’ There you are! You only presumed that you knew him and he allowed you to stay in your ignorance.

So who am I? Now we are getting somewhere. The truth is that most of the time I don’t know who I am. I am in a process of knowing myself to the point of telling someone who I really am. I do this through reflections, prayers and being open to my environment and to others. I take risks in relationships and in life in general. John Powell, S.J. made a very important point here, “Unless my mind and heart are hopelessly barricaded, all these things that define me as a person are forever changing. If I am anything as a person, it is what I think, judge, feel, value, honor, esteem, love, hate, fear, desire, hope for, believe in and committed to.” This is a great insight to who I am. But what has made me this way? My culture, my family, my religion, my friends, and all that I consider my support system. Not to forget the tiny thing in my head called my brain, that thinking part of me that at times makes me see what is not there. It is the way I perceive reality, the way I feel and the way I allow things to affect my being. I am also influenced by my education, the different brainwashing and programming that I have subjected myself to. All these give orientation and make up the constitution I call me. Unless I invite someone to share it all with me; unless I give someone the road map to my territory, no one has an idea who I am and how the real me feels. Again the words of wisdom from John Powell is apt to conclude this piece: “My person is not a little hard core inside of me, a little fully formed statue that is real and authentic, permanent and fixed. My person rather implies a dynamic process. In other words, if you knew me yesterday, please do not think that I am the same person that you are meeting today. I have experienced more of life, I have encountered new depths in those I love, I have suffered and prayed, and I am different. Please do not give me a “batting average,” fixed and irrevocable, because I am “in there” constantly, taking my swings at the opportunities of daily living. Approach me, then, with a sense of wonder, study my face and hands and voice for the signs of change; for it is certain that I have changed. But even if you recognize this, I may be somewhat afraid to tell you who I am.”