I am a person who… en ru

Lately: months, years, decades — depending on where you live and what world models [ru] you operate with — there have been many events around that raise difficult questions from the fields of ethics, morality, economics, even psychiatry if you watch some TV shows.

These questions concern a person’s real, not imagined, boundaries — or their very form and structure, if you prefer. I perceive this phenomenon as the boundaries that separate acceptable and unacceptable behavior for a person.

When these boundaries are damaged (broken, bypassed), the person loses integrity, and the person suffers.

When the real boundaries of a person do not align with their imaginary ones (their mental model), the person not only suffers but also makes mistakes in planning. For example, they make promises that they cannot keep (do not confuse the situation with promises that a person does not intend to keep).

In the years of plenty, most people do not face boundary questions — there is no reason to raise them. And therefore, the boundaries of the personality are not tested. One can be guided by the existing picture of the ideal self in one's mind, rejoice in life and wonderful people around them.

However, the serene life has been interrupted, and we are able to look at people as they are, in all their diversity.

A little part of us already had conscious boundaries or quickly established them. Kudos to them, even if their life position is significantly different from mine — honesty with oneself is invaluable.

A larger group of the people, however, are in a state of permanent shock from the need and inability to reconcile their self-image with their real self.

Most people, it seems, have decided to ignore reality and stick to the ideal picture of the world, where you are all in white and do not get dirty.

We can see this in numerous interviews, discussions on online platforms, and conversations with loved ones. This position is widespread among different people and takes innumerable forms, ranging from "We’ve lived through worse; we’ll just stay put on our little homestead as always" among the older generation to "I’m leaving my country because the client does not want to transfer money to it" among IT specialists.

I don't know how many people from the last two groups are aware of these issues. For this essay, it is not so important. The important thing is that there are too many of them, in my opinion.

Such a situation not only scares me but also makes me angry. I dislike lies, especially when people lie to themselves. It is disgusting, repulsive.

Unfortunately, I definitely do not have the qualifications to teach others how to live. However I can try to describe the model that I use to solve questions about the boundaries of my personality. Maybe it will be helpful to someone.

Materiality of the world

I live in a material world. If you live in another (and it is quite possible), then what is written below may look like nonsense to you and will hardly be useful.

In my world, thoughts materialize through actions, and this is the only way for an idea to become reality.

A thought will not materialize by itself. No matter how much you imagine a beautiful table in your room, it will not appear there. You have to decide how to get it and take an action:

• buy it in a store;
• craft it in a carpentry workshop;
• steal it from a neighbor;
• ask friends to gift it to you;
• etc.

Correspondingly, everything that happens in a person's mind and does not manifest in actions has a very indirect relation to reality and to who they truly are.

One's thoughts about how good they are as a person do not make them a good person. One's thoughts about mass murders, eating children, and rape do not make one a serial killer, a cannibal, or a rapist.

Only actions can make a person one of these things.

Moreover, as reasonable people, we should strive to consider problems from all sides, including edge cases. Ideally, we should do a complete morphological analysis of each situation (I have experimented with software for it [ru]). Including analysis of edge, dangerous, and just creepy cases.

Of course, this is not always possible or necessary, but in my worldview, the ideal state of affairs is so.

As the world is material, the boundaries of a person are also defined by actions, not thoughts.

I am not what I think. I am what I do.

Every decision embodied in an action clarifies a person's identity.

I am a person who…

Since actions shape a person's identity, and our choices determine actions, a person can consciously outline and then change their personality.

For this purpose, I came up with a question long ago: I am a person who does what? I often asked myself this question in 2020. And at the end of 2021, when it came to relocation.

The whole question sounds like this: I am a person who will do what in such-and-such situation?

Untill August 2020, I did not pay much attention to this question. I knew it was important, but I could only understand how vital honest answers to it after facing relevant questions.

If one answers this question honestly and acts according to the answers, then "inner peace" may not become ideal, but it will significantly improve. Not to mention planning and other things.

It is essential to understand what an "honest answer" is.

For example, if a person thinks: "I am a person who will fight evil," but does not go to a hypothetical war because they are afraid of dying, then they have lied to themselves. In reality, they are "a person who will not risk their life to fight evil." At least with that specific evil and in that particular life situation.

When a person lies to themselves like this, then, simplifying:

• If they accidentally start acting according to their fantasies (get carried away or do it for show), they will make things worse for themselves and others. For example, they may run away from the battlefield, putting their comrades at risk, and will blame themselves for it for the rest of their life.
• If they start acting by their real self but do not get rid of fantasies, they will struggle with shame and other psychological issues.

By answering honestly, we synchronize our world model with reality [ru]. This is important in itself, but it is also the first step towards conscious management of one's personality, life, and everything else.

Honesty gives us the foundation on which we can plan future changes. For example, we can start asking questions:

• Do I want to be a person who will do this in such-and-such situation?
• What do I need to change in myself to become such a person?

In the final part of the essay, I want to address the aspect of the question I brushed aside with the phrase "such-and-such" situation.

What, exactly, is this situation? How are we to make sense of it?

In answering this question, we'll find help in the concept of causality.

Causality and responsibility

Causality is a key property of the material world. At least, it is a key statistical property of its macro part, but let's not be picky — we live in the macro world and are fully subject to the laws of causality.

Let us also remember that evolution has given us brains so that we can build models and make decisions based on this very causality.

That's why we are able to predict, understand, and be aware not only of the direct consequences of our actions but also of the subsequent ones in the chain of cause-and-effect relationships. Those that are caused by the results of our actions.

For example:

• If someone breaks a road sign and, later on, a driver using that stretch of road misses the warning and crashes, the person who broke the sign shares responsibility for the accident.
• If someone calls an ambulance for an older adult lying in the bushes, and the doctors promptly diagnose a stroke and save his life, then that life was saved, in part, by the person who made the call.
• If someone pays taxes to the state, then part of that money is spent on law enforcement agencies, and thus, they are one of the reasons for their lawful, just, heroic deeds.

No matter how many causal steps separate us from the result, we will remain one of its causes. A small, unnoticed, but a cause.

Once, I was surprised to discover that many people ignore causality: "I made a mess here, but it doesn't smell because of me." I will not discuss this group further as I do not understand them at all.

For the rest, I believe it is fair to say that we generally understand the consequences of most of our actions — this is not rocket science or even higher mathematics.

Even if we do not understand the part of the consequences or forget about them, we will be reminded by books, news, friends, relatives, and well-wishers on the internet.

Every significant event is the consequence of numerous small actions by many people.

Consequently, there is no impersonal responsibility, no collective responsibility; there are many small but significant personal responsibilities.

One can try to ignore this, one can try to deceive oneself, but one cannot erase causality from one's brain. This will only lead to a divergence between the virtual self and the real self, and all the subsequent problems.

The only way to deal with this is to accept the responsibility and decide what to do with it.

You are a person who will do with your responsibilities what?