Existence And Definitions

My existence is a series of questions that I attempt to answer everyday, and the answers never really impress me.

I start with the obvious. “What am I?” - that one is easy enough. I am a man, a human being, an assortment of organs linked together by myriad vessels in a body that runs like clockwork. I am a being that is recognized by fellow beings as one of their own, part of a herd, member of the not-so-exclusive club of Humanity.

At least, that’s the physical interpretation of my existence. I am okay with that, it is clear and clean-cut, and it’s hard to argue against. It is what I perceive myself as, and it is close enough to what I perceive others as. So, it’s all right.

Then you move on to “Who am I?”, and that’s where the problems start; how do you know who you are? Do you define yourself, again, by your physical existence? No, because then you’d lose your individuality, that you fought for so valiantly by popping out of that birth canal, and you just become another human being. Is that what you want? Probably not. So, it’s not just the physical existence.

Is it what you do, then? Am I defined by the things that I do in my life? Aren’t those things that everyone does, to some extent? So, to define oneself, do we just mix and match a number of actions, and what adds up is what a person is? Perhaps.

I suppose one of the most deplorable things about the exponential growth in communication technology is that we’re now constantly aware of how tiny we are in the grand scale of things. You’re just one person among billions, one soul among so many more, and what makes you so different then? Once we thought that the things we did were unique and personal, but then you start learning that everyone does it to some extent, and that your actions were merely a reflection of an evolving human nature. Your soul is just a fraction, part of a larger mosaic, and it keeps looking like the little parts repeat themselves every so often.

You are a drop in an ocean. A reed in the marsh. A letter, repeated ad infinitum on a massive white paper, yellowing at the edges.

You are...you.

And I am...me. I am...not you.

Is that what it is? Am I defined through what I am not? Through who I am not?

Is that what makes me unique?

Sometimes, I feel like a character who’s been abandoned by its writer halfway through the story, and the bastard never even thought to leave me a pen to finish the job.