Danny ChaiI find self-identity fascinating. I’m trying to finish up dcpark’s Interpersonal Communication lecture notes, and it kind of obliquely makes a provocative claim that having a consistent self-identity is so important to us that we would rather maintain a negative self-identity for the sake of consistency than have it challenged, even if it’s for the better.
I know for myself, even little changes in how I perceive myself rock my world. I like being more self-aware, but it’s no less mind-blowing. For example, after Abby was born, I realized I had a big nose. Not a long, Western-style large nose, but large in terms of the relative surface area it takes up. When Abby first came out, her nose looked enormous because, like the rest of her face, it was all smooshed from the violence of childbirth. I’ll be honest – it worried me a little bit. And when my mom came to see her, she said she looked like my uncle. This particular uncle has a large nose.
I’m not a master logician, but I realized that if Abby has a large nose, it has to come from somewhere. And Jieun doesn’t have a large nose. So I started looking more carefully in the mirror and at pictures. And the realization hit me: I have a big nose. And it totally shook my self-perception. I don’t know why I didn’t realize it before – Jieun says she had told me prior. But it just didn’t really hit me until then. I had never before thought of myself as having a big nose or been self-conscious about it – I was self-conscious about other things, but not that. But now, while I’m still not terribly worried about it, I have this awareness of it. It’s a tiny thing, but it was identity-shattering.
Recently, at the prompting of a friend who takes great glee in shattering self-perceptions, I measured my height and found that I’m only 5’7″. To be fair, my driver’s license lists me at 5’7″. But to be honest, I left it like that so I could shatter it in real life; you know, set the bar low and just kill it, like dominating a green ski run or level 1 on Dr. Mario. In conversation, I think I said I was 5’8″ and a half, maybe even 3/4 depending on my mood. Sadly, my license is accurate, not a low bar at all.
And that’s shattering. 5’8″ feels average to me. 5’7″ feels short. I am a short man. I’ve always thought of myself as average. Now I think of myself as short.
Jieun feels gypped as well, for the same reason. She thought she married a 5’8″ 1/2 guy because that’s what I told her. That I’m just 5’7″ is a sore disappointment. She thinks she’s gotten a lousy bill of goods.
I don’t feel that guilty about misrepresenting myself. When you’re a short guy with a big nose, you do what you have to do.