Ryu's Blog

Why do people care about personal identity so much? We like to define ourselves in certain ways, want to be associated with certain qualities or belong in certain categories. But does identity exists? Is my self really a consistent self? Every experience I have and actions I take change me in some ways. It’s not too absurd to think of myself in different time as a different being connected only by some shared memories, experience, and similarities in thoughts, appearance, and personalities. Appearance changes, thinking changes, personalities change, even memories tend to alter through time. So is there anything in me that will remain unchanged? If I’m never the same person, what defines me then? If I wake up tomorrow and decide to be a different person and act in a completely different way, am I still me?   We usually afraid or don’t like the thoughts that our close friends or loved ones change. Perhaps it is because these are people who share similar interests, values, or activities with us, and we’re afraid that changes will alter this similarity and put a distance to the closeness. Maybe our closest or best friends are just people we’re confident that even if we know we’re going to change, the changes are unlikely to be substantial enough to alter our shared interests or similarities. That may be also why we want to maintain come kind of consistency within ourselves. If my self at present and in the future are different selves, I probably wouldn’t want to change too much as that may create the strangeness among these beings (or in friendship terms, to maintain the close friendship for my present and future selves). The greatest loneliness may come from losing these closest friends of ours.   I guess I’m not making sense anymore, but doesn’t matter, just some weird thoughts that came to me.