Be yourself/ know yourself: split from WTF GIRLS please help

If you aren't sure what "yourself" is, then you have bigger issues than asking out girls/women. I suggest spending time in a psychologist's office figuring out why you don't know who you are before you even bother trying to ask anyone out if you don't already know the answer to that question.

 

I don't know too many people who know themselves. No one has integrity or values nowadays. No takes the time to reflect on and examine their lives. The idea of "finding yourself" is taking for granted and people think they know themselves simply because they are themselves.

 

:rofl:

Does that sound as dumb to you as it does to me?

 

Neither, Im simply saying that sounds like a bunch of crap.

"people think they know themselves simply because they are themselves."

What a bunch of nonsense.

 

I completely disagree.

You think it's nonsense because you seem to fall under that category.

 

I can't figger it out either. Must be one of them there tautologies.

 

Actually it is quite true. People who lack introspection really don't 'know' themselves, and some or much behavior can be automatic or conditioned. Some people lack impulse control, and they really don't know or realize that component of their behavior. I wouldn't have believed if my wife (who has degrees in psychology) hadn't shown me examples first hand.

 

What does it mean to know yourself? I am curiously interested in what you guys mean. I know myself, I know my core values, I know how I was raised and what seperates my values from others. I don't wake up one day and turn on the TV and think "Hmmmm, now how would I react to that?" I already know.... Ironically, because I am myself!! :rofl:

 

The analysis of the sentence 'People think they know themselves simply because they are themselves.' would eject an unnecessary quasi-philosophical discussion.

 

Yea, I am not trying to refute it, but understand what he meant by it. :-). Robert Mak, you are both going to graduate before you get to ask her out if you keep going on like this, you know that right? lol

 

Well, I'll agree with you on the flaky part. Seriously, if you believe what other people tell you about yourself, regardless if it's true or not, that's just plain weird. The whole "I need to go find myself" stuff is Oprah-style psychobabble in my opinion. If someone is so delusional that they can't even recognize their own personality traits, they do need a psychologist...or psychiatrist. Don't you know what you like, or don't like, or if you're a morning person, or night-owl, or prefer to be left alone or like to hang out in crowds, or are usually a happy person, or more often sullen and sulky? How the heck do you NOT know this about yourself? And, why would you take someone elses opinion about your personality as more important than your own?

 

But do you know before you react how you will feel tomorrow about your reaction today? That'd be the short & sweet acid test of knowing yourself in my book. It doesn't mean you can't have morning after regrets, just that you don't have unanticipated morning after regrets.

There's a good deal more to it than that, but the rest goes hand in hand with it. For example, you shouldn't hold opinions that lead to mutually exclusive conclusions, or at least be aware of the ones that do. If you do have such opinions that are ultimately mutually exclusive, you're eventually going to make a decision based on one opinion and only later find out it violates the other opinion.

 

I see your point, but I never said that your personality can't change. Surely I have changed since I was a teenager. I wouldn't go so far as to say that I would change from day to day, maybe every 3-4 years my attitude towards certain aspects of life changes.

My point was, at any one moment you should have a good feeling as to how you feel towards certain things, your outlook on life, and your personality. By being yourself for however many years you have lived, you know how you feel around lots of other people, as Moonbear pointed out as a good example.

I think that Astronuc also made a good point. By introspection we can perhaps change how we feel about certain things, but I don't think I would call it finally finding out my 'true' opinion or something. Would you?

 

I don't have a clue what you're trying to get at here. What does your parents telling other people what they think you want to do when you grow up, or the fact that everyone naturally changes their mind as they learn about other options that fit their personality and desires better, have to do with knowing who you are yourself? And how is rebelling against your parents an indicator that you don't know what you want? If anything, it's an indicator that you do know, and are finally old enough to act upon your own desires, not be forced to do your parents' bidding. The conflict is usually because your parents' views on your personality and what you should or shouldn't be doing are not consistent with your own views. If you didn't know who you are and just went along with what everyone else told you, there wouldn't be any conflict.

 

I like this one. But it's not as simple as it sounds.

Ugh...these ships and currents always make me melancholic.

Anyways, if your ship went in a straight line, you'd always know where you'd end up. And that ain't always the best thing, is it?

 

I most certainly would. I can't think of a good example of this because I usually see these things coming long before the problem arises. I consider all my other opinions on various related matters before forming new opinions. Many people do not.

But I'll happily steal someone else's example. "Regarding biodiesel, when I approach the same sorts of people who all but hung me from a tree [threatened my life] for being an environmentalist, and ask if they would rather give their money to oil sheiks or Oregon farmers, guess what the answer is every time?" Those people clearly had not thought their opinions about environmentalists through very well, had they? Had he phrased the question another way, he would have gotten a very different answer. What did they think their opinion was of biodiesel? What was their true opinion of biodiesel? They had all the facts, they just hadn't thought it through.

There's examples like that everywhere. People react without thinking all the time (in fact, most of the time). People undeniably exhibit contradictory behavior regularly. But the more you rectify your opinions against each other, the less likely you are to to exhibit contradictory behavior, even when you act without thinking. When you do notice yourself engaging in contradictory behavior (most people don't even notice it when they do), you can figure out the reason pretty quickly if you "know yourself", know why you do things. Then you have the option of changing that behavior or just accepting it.

But if you aren't "self aware" (a more current version of "knowing yourself"), you don't even have that option.

 

Careful moonbear, according to jason we might both not know ourselves based on our replies!

Jason: Do you always make it a habbit to speak for other when you talk? You make ignorant generalizations left and right about people.