WHO IS THE REAL ME?

WHO ARE WE REALLY?

More and more often, it seems, I hear the same lines, sentences or affirmations from people with whom I am conversing or exchanging some ideas: “I wonder why people think that about me, why do they believe I am like this, I am not that person at all, they do not really know me, where does that come from?”                                                                                                                

I’ve heard these phrases so many times in my life and even more so recently, that It makes me wonder: DO WE REALLY KNOW WHO WE ARE? WHO IS THE REAL ME?                                                                                                                                                                       

Are we what we look like? Every few years, we look different, and sometimes depending on the day we look different. On the same day some people will look at us with sympathy and others with disgust or fear, probably projecting onto us who they are specifically that day.

Are we to most people what we project? Very often we present an image that we create in order to protect ourselves from the outside world, or maybe this comes from a need to hide or to disguise the truth? Are we sometimes trying to become this image created by our own imagination?                                                                                                                                                   

Are we the product of our education? A creation of our parents, teachers, and educators? Are we a combination of all the rules we have learned throughout our lives? And by acting like this are we then suppressing other aspects of who we really are?                                                        

Are we what we want life to give us? Behaving all the time and denying everything else in order to let our hopes, our desires and our ambitions become the drivers of our life?  Sometimes with negative consequences. 

Are we only the result of our dreams, acting too often without a responsible attitude, and being  guided only by these dreams to the detriment of reality and often hurting people around us?                                                                                                                                                                   

Are we a product of our knowledge, our life experiences, bad ones and good ones, and the headaches that develop as the result of undigested feelings and pain?

Are we what we believe in? Expressing ideas about all subjects of life and sometimes just talking without really having thought seriously about it?  And consequently, creating judgments from others?                                                                                                                                                                           

Are we perceived by others as a result of the way we behave daily? Are we being judged for our strong opinions during a group reunion, a social event, or a conversation with a few people? Are others making a final judgement of us because we are being impatient with tellers in a shop?

Most people perceive me as a Frenchman, sometimes accusing some of my actions or excusing them because of my French background. I love France and French people, but I spent only eleven years of my long life in France…So am I “French” simply because I have a French accent while speaking English?                                                                                                                       

Should I really believe that I am perceived as French because of my way of thinking, my behavior, my MOI? I really do not think so. To people I am French because of my accent. Regardless of whether they know anything else else about me.                                                          

Too often only one immediate aspect is used to make a general impression and a specific idea of who we are. Very often, too often sometimes, this impression remains the basis of who somebody believes we are, who we were, who we will be…Rarely do these attitudes towards us change.

I know we are the sum of everything mentioned above: what we look like, what we project, our education, our dreams etc.…etc.… but how many people can know all these aspects of us? Most only see one or two of these elements of our personality and too often make a final image or a judgement about us based on them.                                                                                                  

In our daily life, and in every aspect of our lives, we use some of these elements of our personality in order to function, to advance, to progress, to obtain, to succeed, to survive, to prolong some given opportunities to advance and progress.                                                         

BUT WHAT CAN WE DO TO REALLY KNOW WHO WE TRULY ARE? HOW DO WE NOT GET LOST IN THE GAME SOCIETY DEMANDS WE PLAY? HOW DO WE CONTINUE TO BE!!!!! 

FROM TIME TO TIME WE NEED TO STOP AND THINK, TO BALANCE ALL THE ELEMENTS THAT MAKE UP OUR MOI AND EVALUATE WHERE WE ARE IN THE PATH OF LIFE.

AND AS ARTISTS IT IS OF ABSOLUTE IMPORTANCE SINCE ARTISTIC CREATIVITY IS VERY OFTEN THE PRODUCT OF WHO WE ARE…                                                                

What aspect of who I am do I have to use in this specific moment, this specific creation, this specific artistic experience?? Even if sometimes and even many times, we can pass as inconsequential or real or sincere, because this aspect used in that moment of creativity has nothing to do with what people believe they know about us…                                                            

Yes, many times may we act differently and people around us become surprised and can call us unstable or unfocused, not understanding that we are still using our MOI, but a MOI they do not know. They believe we are losing control, but we are not, we are just showing an aspect of ourselves that they previously did not know, because they have a preconceived idea of who we are and know only one possibility.

Of course, we must be careful and try not to lose control in using our MOI and if people  disagree with who we are, that is normal and logical, they see different aspects of us…Not because we are playing games but because we are a juxtaposition of many, many elements…

Our subconscious is always working even if we are unaware …. Every day many of our actions are the result of our thoughts, our experience, our knowledge, our education…. That is why NOTHING can prevent us from continuing to EXIST AS A PERSON with all the elements of our personality and our MOI becoming richer and richer. And if we become a mystery for people, then too bad, we must continue to feed this infinite MOI.                                                                  

In French theater, in order to attract public attention before a rising curtain, since lights were candles, blows (knocking the floor) were hit on the floor of the backstage and then three loud blows just before the start of a performance. It was a tradition that still happens today in some theaters. 

At the beginning of Musetta’s aria in La Boheme, Puccini  musically illustrates this tradition of LES TROIS COUPS (THE THREE blows), but did he do that on purpose as a wink to the French theatrical tradition in order to show that Musetta is preparing a theater scene?? Or had he acquired this knowledge, digested it and come up with it out without even thinking? Did his subconscious worked for him? Did his hidden MOI function for him?                                           

 I could multiply this example to the infinite…

The surrealists developed this idea with what they called “ECRITURE AUTOMATIQUE"          

 “Automatic writing deflects the unconscious thought. It is the imprudence of vocabulary in order to finally release the unconscious expression through writing”

Many of our actions are the result of this liberated unconscious! But we must realize that it is part of our MOI and may be a very important side of it… And this expression of the subconscious is possible if we have accumulated knowledge through life experiences, through lessons learned from others, through studying, through an everyday live devoted to LEARNING and building our MOI.…                               

We must continue to accumulate knowledge and to acquire as much as possible, and our subconscious will regurgitate it at some point despite all the irrelevance of our time, despite the incongruity of society, despite being a button pusher.                                                                                                                          

We must continue to learn and to digest, and then we can try to obey to new rules of our world, the new ways of being an almost human being, because nobody can take possession of our subconscious.    

Creativity and talent are always the result of our MOI but in some instances,  it can be the result of the subconscious activated by some frustration created by other aspect of MOI.  

FOR AN ARTIST WHAT IS MORE REWARDING THAN HAVING A SUBCONSCIOUS GUIDING HIS OWN LIFE