[I found the photo above on Nystrom and Associates' Facebook page.]
In my new job as a class dean, I've met with many students who've done things they're not proud of. Some of them lie to me, saying they didn't do whatever it is I'm asking them about. Some seem to believe that "I wish I hadn't done it" and "I didn't do it" mean the same thing. They don't.
Once it's clear that they committed the action we're discussing, some have tried to defend themselves by telling me the following:
- This isn't who I am.
- This isn't what I stand for.
- This isn't what I believe.
I totally agree that a person's character isn't made up of any one thing he/she/they've said or done. We are not only our mistakes, missteps, and misdemeanors (or felonies, etc). It's totally true that our lowest moments don't define us, but neither do our proudest accomplishments. Instead, we are the sum of our actions and words.
We are not, in fact, who we want to be because our wanting doesn't mean anything to anyone else. To the children who say to me, "This isn't what I stand for," I say, "When you did it, it was exactly what you were standing for." To have this horrible action not be what you stand for, you have to take a stand for something else.
I'm coming to think that in many ways, what we believe doesn't really matter. If I am completely filled with hateful thoughts but act and speak (and vote) to further kindness and love, then I'm still kindness and love. [Is this true? I've given that line a lot of thought and honestly can't decide.] The children who use these defenses seem to think it works the other way around. They are arguing that if they think of themselves as good people, but they say and do horrible things, they are still good people. I'm sure this is not so.
Fortunately, there's not a human on the planet who is beyond hope. These teenagers of whom I speak have a lot of years left to stand up for goodness, to speak up for kindness, to act in the spirit of their best selves, to become beacons of love. I short, we can all become who we want to be, who we think we are as long as we know that wanting and thinking aren't enough.
Are you who you think you are? Do you live by your values and stand up for/speak up for what you believe? Please share any thoughts/advice in the comments.
I think what we believe about ourselves does matter. “I am not a racist, but I went along with the prank because I gave in to social pressure”. “I am not a thief and had never stolen before, but couldn’t back down from a dare”. The label at the time could be “I am a racist” or “I am a thief”, but it’s also an opportunity to rewind and picture a better outcome.
I see that your way of thinking about it is gentler than my way. I’ll have to think about it. In trying to embrace more of a both-things-can-be-true approach, I ended up with my idea that at the moment I went along with a prank or didn’t back down from a dare, I was being racist or I was a thief. Neither of those things means that I have to keep doing bad things, but they are part of my history. We’re complicated creatures who don’t always act in line with our values, but we’re also complicated creatures who can own our bad moves and start doing better.
1. Continuing thoughtful, provocative, thankfully short, writings.
2. “You are not who you think you are”—yet another manifestation of the problems of the verb “to be” in its many forms. Not just for crisp writing, but to avoid some thinking traps. Also a few problems with a semi-static conception of identity. Light’s dual nature as particle/photon and wave is a simple 2-stage beginning of appreciation.
3. “We are the sum of our actions and words.” There are various kinds of addition. Plus and minus cancel if equal. or sum the absolute value, or cyclical (I forget the math/engineering term) where after a limit that digit or counter resets to zero and begins counting again. Or a person might be modeled by an infinity of characteristics, many not even thought of until, perhaps, the opportunity arises, akin to expression for a gene. Infinity + n = infinigy. Plato thought we have at besst a showdy conceeption of ourselve, others, reality.
Lots of interesting thoughts here.
1. Thanks.
2. Yes, I use rule 204 on the Conventions of Composition with my students to explain that to-be verbs are the weakest verbs. That said, I tried to emphasize that thinking doesn’t make something true as much as enacting it.
3. I like the idea of a reset. While I think we are the sum of our actions, I also think the scale tips towards the recent. I’m way more what I’ve done in the past ten years than I am what I did when I was fifteen to twenty-five years old. I wasn’t trying to cause hopelessness in people who’ve done bad things but to encourage people to start doing good things instead.
I vote that actions matter a lot more than thoughts, and we are usually responsible for what we do. I’ve never heard of protesters asking others to change their thoughts, just their actions. And even when we can’t control all our unkind thoughts, we can keep them to ourselves!
We should all try harder to behave as the people we want to be. Let’s call it the Wizard of Oz lesson–if you don’t have a brain/heart/courage, you need to try twice as hard to make smart/kind/brave decisions.
I wish I could put hearts next to comments. I totally agree and like the WoO suggestion. One doesn’t need a heart to act with heart. Thanks!