Thoughts on what it means to authentically see one's self
Thoughts on what it means to authentically see one's self
Some thoughts on those fleeting moments that are hard to even notice, much less talk about
A while back I finished the book Wellness by Nathan Hill, and it’s a really great read — one of my favorite books from 2023. But there’s a passing line toward the very end of the book that is sort of central to the whole plot of the novel, but also not fully developed — like it’s a bit of an afterthought, given everything else that’s just happened in the preceding 574 pages. Without giving away any big spoilers, Hill writes:
Twenty years separated that moment from this one, twenty years in which Jack had become an entirely new person — an artist, an intellectual, a teacher, a husband, a father — and yet, in other ways, he suspected he had not really changed at all. If, on his deathbed, some counselor asked Jack to pick a moment from his life that was his most “true,” he might pick that moment out here, in the pasture, the morning he sat with Evelyn painting landscapes in the dawn light.
This idea really struck me as one worth exploring in more detail — what is that moment (or collection of moments), as you look back on your life, when you most clearly, fully identify with your “truest” self? What are the moments in which you were most you?
I feel like this notion of “true self” so often gets eclipsed by our politics. Pride month is about celebrating your “truest, most authentic self.” Young people are encouraged to fully embrace the idea that they can be seen how they want to be seen — as though there’s a queer identity hiding within that just needs to be let out and once it’s out one finds a confidence and an authenticity that was heretofore missing. Social media is built entirely on this idea of constructing an outer self that you can represent to the world as “you.”
And I mean.. sure. I guess, maybe. Growing older and finding yourself is certainly a process that all of us go through, and what makes up that process is different for everyone. But that’s not really what I’m talking about here. I think the passage above in Wellness and the concept I’m trying to get at through this post is a much more mundane exercise in soul-searching — What’s a time when you feel like you connected with yourself? Maybe it didn’t make sense in the moment; but now, looking back, there’s some form of clarity associated with that particular experience.
I can think of maybe a handful of moments in my life that stand out like that. They’re all brief flashes — nothing dramatic, no big drama or narrative to go with them. They’re just flashes of time that, for lack of a better word, felt transcendent. They stick in my mind because I was able to pull myself out of my circumstance for that brief moment and have an encounter where I couldn’t help but think — yes, this. This makes sense to me, and I belong here.
If I was to really spend time going down memory lane, I suppose I could think of maybe a half dozen moments like that? Tops?
I remember a particular moment when I was in high school. I was 16 or maybe 17. I was driving home from a date (I guess it was a date? I could never think of myself as someone who dates). I had the biggest crush on this girl I went to school with (her name was Summer). She and I had been to see a movie .. I want to say it was either Hope Floats or maybe Jerry Maguire. It was definitely a late-90s Date Movie. Summer lived on a farm that was a solid 30 or 45 minutes from my house, so getting back from her place always involved a late night drive through back roads. It was close to midnight and it was hot and there was a full moon and my windows were down, and I had just left Summer’s house and we had hugged a long hug standing in her parents’ kitchen and maybe we were going to kiss in that moment but we didn’t kiss because I just .. couldn’t make a move or wasn’t ready or didn’t know what I didn’t know and therefore couldn’t/didn’t. We didn’t say anything of substance to each other, and I don’t even know that she felt anything at all, but I was overcome for maybe the first time in my life with that electric what-is-this-what-comes-next tension, and then the moment had passed and nothing came of it. And as I drove home replaying those few seconds over in my mind I was weirdly not filled with regret over having not made a move because the moment just felt perfect in itself and I was happy and that drive through open farm country under the full moon just felt exactly right. Obviously now, looking back, the fact that I was gay probably had something to do with my lack of initiative in that moment.. but I didn’t know that then, and I was convinced that this was just me, myself, and how I was — toeing up to the line of a first kiss, backing away because that’s what felt more correct. It felt true and a little sad and also right.
I’ll briefly describe one other moment I can think of that also resonates. It was Halloween 2014, and I was in New York visiting Sam (he was in his first year of law school at NYU). Neither of us had any “plan” for Halloween but in a moment of severe over-packing for this little weekend trip, I had had stuffed a couple of Batman and Robin costumes in my suitcase. Sam was stressed and tired and frankly a little self-conscious, and did not want to dress up in costume for Halloween and parade through Greenwich village with all the Halloween parade folks. I .. didn’t much want to do that, either, but I also didn’t not want to, and so I kinda talked him into dressing up and said well let’s just go see what it’s like out there. And we left Sam’s dorm and joined the parade in our Batman and Robin costumes, and we had a wonderful time, and we raced through the streets of Gotham City in our capes and tights, and Sam absolutely loved it and I chased after him and we sang the na-na-na-nah-na-na-nah BAT-MAN song and in that moment I was trailing behind Sam, and making him happy brought me a flash of joy and satisfaction I hadn’t experienced before and I thought that it was perfect and wonderful and true. So.. different experience than the one with Summer, I guess, but this sticks in my mind as a perfect memory because Sam was happy and that was so much to me and also exactly enough.
I don’t think these moments really mean anything in a narrative sense. They’re too short and too fleeting. But they stick somehow, and that’s what I find so remarkable. I like to stay active as best I can, and sometimes when I go for a run I feel like I’m triggering the same kind of experience in a low-key, artificial way. There’s a transcendent flash that just rings true when I’m out there on the running trail by myself. I’m running in order to catch that moment where I’m really me, and there’s a peace or clarity to be gained. For other people I can see how other particular types of activities would get at the same thing. Performing on stage. Traveling to new places. Having sex. Seeing a sunrise. Anytime the ego just drops away for a moment and we feel like we see ourselves, it’s a natural high that I feel like we want to chase after again and again. There’s a great poem by the Irish poet David Whyte that gets at this idea, I think —
Just Beyond Yourself
Just beyond yourself. It's where you need to be. Half a step into self-forgetting, and the rest restored by what you'll meet. There is a road always beckoning. When you see the two sides of it closing together at that far horizon And deep in the foundations of your own heart at exactly the same time, that's how you know It's the road you have to follow. That's how you know it's where you have to go. That's how you know. Just beyond yourself, It's where you need to be.
At any rate.. I think it’s a useful exercise to try and catalog some of these moments and see what can be learned from them. This was a pretty rambly post. Authentic, true moments of the self. It’s kind of a fuzzy woowoo concept, I admit. But I think it’s also important. David Brooks talks about the importance of really knowing a person, and Asking the Big Questions is a big part of that process. Reflecting and posing those questions to ourselves helps inform what we think. I’m not exactly ready to walk up to friends in a bar and say, “So tell me about the moments in your life when you were most yourself,” but … I’d kind of like to do exactly that, if it were socially acceptable?? I guess this is what late nights and wine are for, so … here’s to more of that.