Reply
Tue 23 Oct, 2007 02:28 pm
The concept of "just be yourself" is brought up a lot in youth: in highschool.
It seems like most kids settle on the fact that being yourself is not changing, or continually doing what you have done...to achieve the effect of not being "fake"-- another word that seems to come up often in highschool life...
This is all similar to the idea that Aristotle shared:
"You are what you repeatedly do..."
Well exactly how true is that?
To me, it makes sense that Aristotle spoke of who you are in relation to what others think you are... not who you think you are. And thats fine, because in the end, thats all that matters-- your actions...
but then, my elaboration on Aristotle's saying implies that we can always choose who we are..., and it's more of what we have recently repeatedly done that is what we are...
So then, to ourselves, not to others, What the hell does it mean to be yourself?!
Are we meant to have free will over who we all "are"?
Nature vs Nurture?
What are your thoughts on all this?
I suspect the question needs to be worded differently. How can you be anyone but yourself?
In addition, how how can you be anywhere but here and now?
True. I'm always here; sometimes the rest of you go away.
One could argue, you could be anyone but yourself, by acting as someone else?
I won't argue with that because I do not have a self.
JLNobody
That would depend on how one defines having a self, would it not?
The childhood saying of 'just be yourself' has always been a saying based in deception.
People, when they experiment with different expressions of personality ARE being themselves. The self that everyone sees as 'natural' is a practiced and comfortable self. To grow, and to develop differing aspects of ones personality, one needs to step outside of their comfort zones and experiment. If they persist enough, it becomes 'natural'.
This is a very intrigueing (sp)subject.
I wish I had something intelligent to add.
Vikorr, being unnatural is as impossible as not being 'yourself." No matter what I do, it IS me. There is no me (subject-agent) that DOES things (object-predicate). "I" AM what "I" DO, no matter what it is I do. THAT is the reason for ethical behavior.
Virtue is its own reward because it IS the person doing it. And evil is, for the same reason, its own punishment.
A "phony" action IS the phoniness of the actor, not an authentic person doing false things. But that is to say that phoniness describes him only while he is behaving phony.* There is no "essential" being or actor (egoself) who behaves authentically sometimes and inauthentically at other times. One is what one experiences and does, and in that sense one is many persons, or, always changing.
* Pardon my grammar but "phonily" sounds horrible.
Quote:Vikorr, being unnatural is as impossible as not being 'yourself." No matter what I do, it IS me.
Hi JL, that is what I said :
Quote:People, when they experiment with different expressions of personality ARE being themselves
so everything is an act...
we are our thoughts, conveyed through our actions...
being yourself implies acting well, regardless of what that means...
Sound right?
Sound sane?
Farmerman always is himself.
Yeah-- that's true-- he just asserts it and bingo-it is a fact.
kcp133, there is only doing, no doer, e.g., there is thinking, no thinker. Grammar forces us to break up phenomenal reality into action-actor (thinking-thinker).
As I said elsewhere when there is rain, there is "raining", but we are wrong to say "IT is" raining. Nevertheless the wrong way is the conventional way, therefore while it is not "right" it sounds "sane."
My usage does not sound sane, so "I speak" in the conventional mode.
Spendius, what happened to Descartes? The waitress asked him if he would like a glass of water and after he answered, "I think not" he suddenly disappeared.
Quote:kcp133, there is only doing, no doer, e.g., there is thinking, no thinker.
I find it amazing that you can articulate with such lucidity and still hold this positionÂ…of course, that may be simply because I don't know as much as you, or it may be that you came to a conclusion that is amusingly wrong.
Quote:As I said elsewhere when there is rain, there is "raining", but we are wrong to say "IT is" raining.
That's not correct - "It" is the atmosphere and is correct. You can point at the sky as say "It is blue", so you can also say "It is raining".
O.K. if you insist, and you will. So will most people.
Considering the word "It" doesn't necessarily imply sentience, I can't see your objection to using it, as it is grammatically correct.
It appears to me that you are very set in your beliefs, and they are apparently so complex that it is impossible to explain simply...or at least, going by the ongoing lack of explanation (or meaninglessly vague explanations), that appears to be the case.
Then again, perhaps you have written it over and over again in other threads, and are sick of repeating yourself?
Adolescence is a time of life when each individual is chanting the mantra of individuality.
I am a person who.... I am a person who.... I am a person who likes... I am a person who dislikes....
I am a person who thinks Sesame Street is childish, but likes the taste of jelly beans. I am a person who goes to pieces--and I don't like being that person. I am a person who thinks Nerds are creepy...but that nerdy guy in my History class is smiling at me....
Most people outgrow the need for intense, perpetual self examination because they have discovered exactly (or almost exactly) who they are.
They can rely on their own consistancy.
True Noddy true.
Vikorr, yes--very insightful of you--I have made these points so many times that I feel dumb repeating them. But when I change my altera I must start over again or mislead them about my orientation. Basically it reflects "mystical" thought (Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism--as I understand them--in general), but it finds agreement with many western philosophers.
One thing I have reported before was Nietzsche's comment that grammar is the metaphysics of everyday life/the masses/the unphilosophical (I forget which).
Our addiction to the grammatical split between subject and predicate (subject-object) is proper grammar but bad philosophy.
Stumble It!
Tweet This
Bookmark on Delicious
Share on Facebook
Share on MySpace