🤓Shallow Philosophizing

Dig in yo thoughts, twin (I'm not editing this, I'm not thinking this through, I will ramble and you will LIKE IT.

I'm no philosopher, but sometimes I watch enough smart people think about stuff that I too, delude myself into believing I can think about stuff. Admittedly, this means regurgitating and repackaging nonsensical idiocy in flowery language and selling you on its value. Make no mistake, there's only dirt in the riverbed.

Who are you?

Like really, who are you? Do you know? Can you know? Do you even want to know? Okay that's dramatic, of course you want to know, I'm not one of those cringy freaks insisting that the core of humanity is some evil cesspit of abyssal wrath that will taint you eternally. Abyssus Abyssum Invocat or whatever. No, I mean, can you reliably know who you are in any real way? Could you conceivably find a set of definitions that, when presented to you, makes you think: Yes. That? That's me.

I doubt it.

I mean let's be real for a second, moron-to-moron. If you permit me to view this autisticly for a second, most of the factors that make up who you are, align more with analog slides than any discrete value. Your gender identity? Some percentage of male, some percentage of female, some percentage of a third, more sinister, thing. Sexuality? Sorry buddy, no matter how straight you think you are, you can't know for sure you won't fall in love with the next dude you see. Hell, most people have no idea what their own voice sounds like, people with blue-gray eyes constantly insist their eyes are "actually green, if you look at them in the sun!" Fundamentally (I'm happy) there are internal and external qualities to your being that are unquantifiable.

Ok, Zetty, I hear you say. "What about all those other things you just... KNOW?" Brilliant point, astute reader, now shut the fuck up. There are indeed multiple things that you just KNOW. I can't describe the feeling of love, but I know when I'm in love. I can't tell you exactly what I'm thinking at any given moment such that you too, know my thoughts, but they are nonetheless there (copium). I would argue, however, that the issue of self is not so clear cut. The issue, is simple: You change. All the fucking time. And the worlds many fluctuations will redefine your terms long before you settle on them.

10 years ago, when little old me was beginning to search for the words that fit me, I came to a realization - There were none. Not in the woke liberal agenda way, no, I more or less conform to "white straight cis man," but in the way that the words feel... unnecessary. I think there's a special joy in forsaking definition for freedom. We've ran amok, not necessarily wrongly, creating words and labels and definitions for something that feels fundamentally impossible to define: Who you are. Sure, its helpful to have the vocabulary necessary to tell others who you are, but... should you need to? Why do they need to know? Yes, yes, the brain makes shortcuts by labeling the world but god, would it kill us to take the time to judge character? Does the mental overhead of forgoing labels really justify deciding who someone is from a single word, when they probably don't fucking know who they are themselves? Are you so eager to drown in the rat race of modern life that you can't take the fucking time to know your friends?

I think you can know exactly who you are to other people, but not to yourself, and that is soul crushing. We spend countless hours defining and cultivating a persona so we can adequately judge ourselves for others and then proudly proclaim we've "found ourselves".

I'm rambling, I get it. In fact I'm pretty sure I lost my thread entirely some sentences ago, but I'd like to circle back to something fundamental: What decides who you are? What criteria are supposedly so fundamental they inform your entirety? Does your body matter? Its just a flesh suit over a bone mech after all. Your specific brand of mental instability surely informs how you act, but do they matter to who you ARE? Are your flaws cracks on the window or the sculpting hands of an artist, creating from your mess of a life, a masterpiece that is undoubtedly you? Would you even know?

If things were different, if mommy and daddy loved each other, if that girl you liked, liked you back: Would YOU be DIFFERENT, or are YOU still YOU? I can't help but wonder if the question even holds merit, but so many people try to "find themselves" that it surely speaks to something intrinsic in us. And that's sensible, right? I mean, not knowing who you are should be fundamentally terrifying! You could be anyone! And that's bad, right? I mean what if you're AWFUL, like a... a youtuber, or something! That would have to change, right?! But in possibility lies potential, after all, you could be ANYONE, and that potential only disappears when you decide to define yourself.

Be free. Be you. And don't fucking think about it so much. I mean, who even are you?