I identify as a #plural system— to oversimplify, I feel that there is not so much a single cohesive "me" as a, well, plurality of them.
With careful introspection I can notice myself switching between which version of me is "fronting", or observe myself to be operating in a more "blended" mode. 1/
I've been struggling with internalised prejudice about this. One moment I feel I'm "disordered" for operating as I do, the next I'm telling myself that I'm a simple fantasist who "made up" these personalities. 2/
I mean, it's kind of absurd when you think about it. Your parents pick a name for you for their own reasons, your doctor picks a gender based on what shape your genitals seem to be, and things like race and class are encoded onto you by wider society.
And we're expected to identify with all that, form it into a cohesive and simple narrative, say "yeah, that's me". 3/
Person-centred counselling holds as a goal that you get to know the real you, that you adjust your concept of self to better fit it, and throw off the things you believe simply because other people have told you them.
And sure, I see value in this. But this still assumes a singular version of "what you are like". 4/
Like, I don't have a favourite colour. I like a whole range of tones and shades, for different purposes and in different contexts. And I think that's the reason we only ask this question of kids. Because it's pretty simplistic. It's a very rudimentary way of defining our own preferences, which we're expected to grow out of.
I like different things in different ways and different contexts. I don't have a favourite colour, or movie, or band, or food. And I don't act the same in different contexts, either. 6/
In my philosophy, my plurality is just a sense-making exercise. Others seem to be able to make their experiences fit into a model where they have a single cohesive specification of "what they are like". And I can kind of bodge myself into a singleton form. But it has more predictive power when I think of myselves as multiple.
I don't have to worry about whether my versions of self are "really real" because I don't think any of this is "really real". 8/
