Perceptions of the Self
Browsing through Tumblr, I came across an article about a man who became a meme. He wrote the article expressing his thoughts on how people interpret not only art and writing, but how people interpret people. Specifically, he said, “But the things people love about you aren’t necessarily the things you want to be loved for.” He also said that, “At some point, you have to accept that other people’s perceptions of you are as valid as (and probably a lot more objective than) your own.”
These two quotes are, evidently, what stuck with me the most. What struck me about them, after some thought, is how opposite current culture is to those quotes. I hear, all the time, things like “be yourself.” I hear, all the time, things like “don’t let others determine who you are, be who you want be, do what you want to do, nobody can tell you what to do except you.” Maybe it’s the people I hang out with, maybe it’s my family and whoever else I’ve interacted with that have created this cultural impression for me, but that’s how I see the current state of people’s mindsets; at least, within my generation (I’m millennial, if you can’t tell). As someone who’s fiercely stubborn and independent to a fault, I don’t disagree with these sort of beliefs, but the article is making me reconsider some of their core foundations.
It sounds... lonely.
The person we want to be and the person we are, are very rarely the same. You can still be who you want to be, and do what you want to do, but people’s perceptions of you shape who you are as much as your choices shape yourself. Possessing the sort of wisdom and self-awareness to feel comfortable in my own skin is not a byproduct of character creation, it’s a byproduct of knowing yourself and being yourself comfortably, so thoroughly, that you don’t need to be anyone else. Maybe that shouldn’t be such a revelation, but it was for me, and I think other people need to hear it too.
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I try so hard, every day, to determine and fix my flaws. I’m self-critical to a dangerous degree, always beating myself up, always scolding myself for my failures and perceived missteps. Lots of my jokes are self-deprecating. I don’t know what my family and friends see in me, what makes me funny, or trustworthy, or calm, or steady, or talkative. And I’m absolutely miserable.
I have this image in my head of the “ideal me.” Ideal traits and personality. My hair could be straighter. I could have been more communicative with my family to avoid an issue. I could have done something to help the friend who I noticed seemed to be struggling. I could have, should have, would have. Coulda woulda shoulda. It’s a self-destructive game to be playing, and one I think all of us play when we really shouldn’t engage. To connect this back with the article, which instigated this entire thing: people’s perceptions of you are as valid as your own, and perhaps theirs are even more objective, and the ones you should believe. That isn’t to say everyone’s perception of you is accurate, or that you should mold yourself to be who people expect you to be. But I do think we need to be more aware of it. Not block people out completely, the moment they say something about our traits that they perceive. Or at least, I need to be.
It’s as terrifying as it is liberating to think that who I am doesn’t have to be who I dream of, an unreachable ideal that I won’t ever achieve because of how unrealistic it is. It’s terrifying, but also freeing, to think that the good things that people see in me are as real as the bad things I see in myself.
Tl;dr: people interpret people in different ways, and those perceptions influence who we are a lot more than I consciously realized.
Here’s the article if you want to peak at it yourself, and come to your own interpretation: https://humanparts.medium.com/i-am-a-meme-now-and-so-are-you-3bae8ecf9971