Who am I? (part 1)

There was a response from Dass to my previous post. I thought of replying to him through the comments. But when I started moving into this profound question “What is my true charater?”, I thought it is worth writing it as a separate post.

Dass says that he has the answer for my question “what is the true charater?”. He adds that the true character is ‘how we behave when nobody watches us’. This is what we have been taught right from our childhood.

But, my quest is beyond just finding a simple answer to this profound question. In fact it is not a question at all. It is a trigger to a deep thought process. The more you go deeper into this question, the more you will begin to understand that you can not understand everything!

Character is a collection of personal values and beliefs. You are characterized by what you stand for, what you believe in, what you value. I am not talking about the pretensions and hypocrisies that we portray for the sake of others. I am talking about our own deep routed values. But my view is that, even these values change with respect to different times; different situations; with different people. People could even have some contradicting values with certain values overriding others, depending on situations.

When I was in primary school, I was a very pious person. When I was in the high school, I was a staunch atheist. I never believed in God then. When I was in the college, I was a rational spiritualist (whatever it means to you!). Today, I believe in God but not in Godsm! Now, what is my true character? A theist? Or an atheist?

Some days I am in tune with God in front of a simple picture, and some other days I look at the same picture as a piece of paper. Some times, I do not miss going to temple on Saturdays; some days I do not even think about going to temple for weeks together. Some times I rigorously take upon certain practices which appeal to me (such as reading “Sundara Kandam” every morning…). At times I tend to question those who religiously take such practices. Am I religious? Or rational?

Some days when somebody comes to me begging, I feel deeply compassionate and help him. At times, I do not feel like even giving a rupee and I reason out with an argument that by helping we only encourage them to beg. Am I compassionate? Or a practical?

Some days I tend to get angry for small things. At times, even bigger mistakes do not invoke any anger in me. What is my temperament? Short tempered? Or Balanced? Some times I tend not to forget even small injustice done to me. At the same time, I forgive even those who had played havoc in my life. What is my true character? Forgiving? Or revengeful?

I am inspired by those who are successful and derive a great deal of motivation to programme my life towards ‘achieving’ great things. But, at the same time I believe that there is nothing to be ‘achieved’; the journey inwards seems more meaningful than outward accomplishment. Who am I? A materialist? Or spiritual?

My view is that there is no single “character” for any of us. Every one is good and bad, compassionate and practical, materialistic and spiritual, to some extent. Our character keeps changing every day, with every situation, with every person, with every experience.

The only rule that I follow is, ‘be guided by your inner self, every moment’. There may be contradictions. So be it. The trouble starts only when I force a “character” against my inner self, for the sake of others. I believe, I need to be true to myself first, before attempting to be true to others. So, those who know me, only “perceive” me as what I am to them at that point in time. But is their ‘perception’ my character?

Nobody knows who really I am! How can they, when I myself am yet to find it out?