Authentic self and the other

It's taken me well over three decades to reach a point in my life in which I can create my own self representation in a public arena and not be overly concerned with the kind of reception I might get. I have had to learn that who we are and how others view us might be two sides of the same coin or might just be two different coins altogether.

We live in a society in which categories are the expected boundaries out of which social identities are constructed. What that means is we have a tendency to read each other's sense of self through the categorization that we form of them based on our sense perception of them. Without these categories we are not able to form interpersonal ties with our fellow human being. In other words, I forge relationships with others based on the opinions I form of them, and the opinion I form of a person will depend largely on my sense perception of him/her based on the categories that I consider relevant. These categories can vary from politics and cultural issues to more mundane ideas such as choice of music and social circles. In many ways, we evaluate others based on our standards and we then categorize them according to their ability to live up to that standard.

And yet, I also realize that this sense perception of that particular person is a representation of his/her sense of self as shown to me at one space of time. I cannot assume that my sense perception of this person at the time we met and spoke informs me of who he/she truly is. In other words, I must admit that I have not in any way understood the person’s “authentic self”, to quote Gary Zukav. That being the case I am mindful that others too might just be constructing a sense perception of me based on their value judgments. Whether or not I live up to that value judgment is not within my control for they will have read these value judgments into my actions and decide that I am person with X personality, Y attitude and Z issues. And based on these X, Y and Z character analysis, they will then decide whether I have met their criterion of a person they would like to be seen with and keep company with.

Hence, at the end of the day, there is only so much one can do to ensure that one is, as Arthur Miller writes, “well liked”. I would like to think that as the decades unfold my ability to be sensitive to my own inner voice will outshine my need to be sensitive to other people’s sense perception of me.