Identity could be interpreted via 3 levels.
- Level 1 is who you really are/being;
- Level 2 is what you do; and
- Level 3 is what you have (a label or concept).
Layer 1 is who you authentically are.
Layer 2 and 3 is who you want to be perceived as.
If there is no alignment between all 3, you won’t be happy.
If there is alignment between all 3, you will be happy.
Identity is how you perceive yourself in your head.
This is Level 1.
When we think of identity, we default to:
What we do or what we have.
Our job, or career, our likes, our interests, or politics, our sexuality our gender.
- Possessions;
- Athletics;
- Boundaries;
- Self-esteem;
- Occupations;
- Social relationships;
- Familial relationships;
- Quasi-occupations;
- Avocations;
- Affiliations;
- Abilities/disabilities;
- Salient attributes;
- Spirituality;
- Physical;
- Etc…
These are all concepts, distilled.
A photo of a car is not ACTUALLY a car.
A verbal description of a dog is not ACTUALLY a dog.
I can tell you how to ride a bike, but unless you actually ride a bike, it’s really hard to grasp them.
Likewise, I can tell you about a product, service or solutions benefits, but unless you actually experience those benefits, it’s really hard to grasp them.
Let’s try an experiment and a quick demonstration…
I want you to be present to your current experience.
What are your current:?
- Beliefs;
- Thoughts;
- Emotions;
- Decisions;
- Actions;
- Body sensations;
- Feelings;
- Attitudes;
- States of mind;
- Point of view;
- Memories;
- Etc…
Good.
The square represents right now.
Now describe your current experience.
You can’t!
What I have asked you to do is literally impossible.
The gap, between you apprehending your experience and describing your experience, means that time has passed (even if only milliseconds), and the experience is no longer present, has gone and is in the past.
The only thing that is possible to describe is a memory, even if it’s a fresh memory only a millisecond old!
It could be:
- Record;
- Symbol;
- Concept;
- Principle;
- Bias;
- Explanation;
- Rule;
- Etc…
In addition, what you are actually apprehending and describing is only 2,000 bits of information per second out of the 400,000,000,000 bits of information the brain receives.
What all this means is we experience something.
This memory acts to makes experience into helpful patterns so consistent with what you know.
For example, if you saw a ghost, our rules would say we were on drugs.
Couldn’t be able to remember anything and die.
The square and the circle represent memory of an experience, and the circle (memory) controls the square (experience).
Okay, now we understand concepts, let’s go further with the experiment…
Pick an object you can see, for example, a table.
Do you see the object?
Of course, you do.
Your eyes see it right over there.
Now, describe where the object is in relation to you.
You may say “the table is 3 metered in front of me.”
But where are you?
To know where the object is in relation to you, you must know where you are.
That is the definition of relation.
“You are here, and the table is over there.”
Good.
But where are you?
Point to yourself!
So where do you actually experience seeing that table?
Point to it!
Touch it!
“It’s over/out there, silly!”
I’m not asking you to describe the table:
- How it smells;
- How it looks;
- How it sound;
- How it tastes;
- How it feels;
- Your memories of it;
- Etc.
This means you are now experiencing the table as an experience, not a concept.
You said the table is over/out there (remember you pointed to it out there) and you are in here.
But there is a problem!
But how can you experience the table over/out there, if you pointed to yourself “in here” in the same manner?
In other words, you can’t be “in here,” and the table can’t be “over/out there” if you pointed to both in the same manner.
It’s inconsistent.
Either the table is “in here” with you, or you are “over/out there” with the table.
If you are in “in here,” it’s impossible for you to experience the table “over/out there.”
But obviously, there is something “in here”: it’s your body or what you call “me, myself or I.”
An identity.
Maybe you are not who you think you are!
So, who are you?
What is your identity?
Maybe your identity is the space in which the table, the rest of the things you experience in life and yourself occur?
Who you are is the experiencer of experience and concepts.
Outside the square represents the source of experience or context experience and memory occurs.
So you or your identity is not your body, your concepts, your experiences, it is the space which experience and concepts occur.