The Hardest Question to Answer

Some questions should be harder to answer than others.

For instance, when someone asks us who we are, there are a lot of ways we could answer.

For many people, the easiest thing to do is to state what we do for a living. 

But our work hardly summarizes who we are.

The challenge of describing ourselves to someone else is complicated because each of us are complex, multi-faceted beings.

At any given moment, we are processing how we see ourselves, how we present ourselves to others and how we think others see us.

Our self concept is arguably the most important part of this equation because it drives what we do. Our actions reveal a lot about how we see ourselves.

How we present ourselves to others can be risky because this is where we’re most tempted to focus on status and whether we view ourselves as better or less than others.

We have little control over how others see us but if we care too deeply about their approval, we can end up living according to their expectations.

Paul Rosenberg has some sound advice on how to approach difficult questions like this:

“None of us are monochromatic beings, fit for a single descriptive phrase or even a dozen descriptive phrases. The very act of accepting such a thing limits us and cannot do otherwise.”

It’s important to make time to think about such things, in order to better understand exactly who we are and what we stand for. 

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