Who are You? Who am I?

A fellow blogger, Amanda, over at Steeling Spoons wrote a post asking what is genuine and what is superficial.  The first thing that her post made me think of was Avenue Q.  For those who don’t know, Avenue Q is a musical that is essentially Sesame Street for adults (I mean that, don’t take your kids!).  The show has an entire song about how everyone is racist called “Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist.”  One of my favorite lines from the song is:

“If we all could just admit, that we were racist a little bit. And everyone stopped being so P.C. Maybe We could live in harmony!”

So, by now, if you are still reading you are probably asking what this has to do with what is genuine and what is superficial, well, you should go read the post I linked to!  Amanda talks about agreeing or disagreeing with people on the subject of our current president and how topics like that can make you sound racist even if you don’t believe in the sentiments that you are agreeing or disagreeing with.

The question that this lead me to ask is two-fold.  First, is it actually possible for a person to be completely genuine all the time?  Second, what does that really mean?  Is  your genuine self the same for everyone?  Are you the same person when you are spending tim with your family as you are when you are with your friends?  Are you the same person in real life as who you are in your blog?  Is it possible to be different in different situations and still be genuine?  These are certainly loaded questions and I don’t know that I really have the answers.

I know that the way that I carry myself at home is different than at work.  I know that I have different mannerisms when I go out with friends versus when I go out with my parents or people from work.  However, does the fact that I behave differently make me less genuine?  I don’t generally hold back on offering my opinions, sometimes I wonder if that is a bad thing.  I have a lot of opinions, sometimes they are not really based on any form of fact and sometimes they ruffle people’s feathers.  There certainly have been times where speaking my thoughts have dug me into holes.

On the other hand, can you actually be the genuine you and carry yourself differently in different situations?  I think so.  I think that it is possible to be true to yourself in whatever situation you are in.  Maybe holding back a comment or publicly agreeing with someone even when you don’t really could still show who you really are.  Are there times when it is better to not go against the grain?  I would assume so.  The question then is: can yo do this without giving up who you are?

I think I just worked around in a couple really big circles, but it happens I guess.  I didn’t really set out to prove anything, just to ponder.  I also wrote most of this while sitting in a tech rehearsal for our next show at the theatre, so that might contribute to the lack of cohesiveness of my thought patterns. Thoughts are always welcome!


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