The Fluidity of Identity

I've come to notice that I'm floating down a river.

Identity is a fluid thing. That is what I've noticed over the past five years or so. I am not the same person I was back then nor will I be the same person in another five years.

One can think of the concept akin to floating down a river in a one-man vessel. You only have control over your own immediate area and are able to dictate where you end up in life's flow to a certain degree. There are of course limitations and it is by these limitations that we can guage who we are and where we are along life's path.

Life, like many sports, is a game of injustice. The exact thing we want seldom happens and even less often happens to those who deserve it the most. Take the recent bombing and shootings in Norway as an example. Do people not associated (or innocents) with anything to do with it deserve to die? To have someone take away from them the only life they have? Hell no. But it happens. It seems to happen all of the time. Bad things have happened to me. Bad things have happened to others. What I've found is that you need to take what good you can find and immerse yourself in it. To enjoy your life to the fullest despite any injustice you might perceive around you.

Identity is the thing that links us all and seperates us at the same time. Everyone's got a different story. Everyone has a different subset of human experiences; thoughts, feelings, and perceptions. My own subset of the three and countless millions others. The one thing we all have in common is the one thing that makes us all inherently different. But that's the beauty of it too. No one of us is the same. When you meet someone new, it's always new. There can be no repeats, no outdated or old life experiences.

Some may feel disarmed at thinking of identity as a fluid concept. I'm not one of them. I want continuous opportunities to grow and evolve; to improve myself in countless ways I cannnot even begin to think of. There's an excitement to it all too: No one knows what's around the next corner or a little further on down the stream around that bend. Ultimately, we will go where the current takes us. However, we can decide how we will get there and what other ships we will run into.

On that note, I'll reiterate my original realization: I've come to realize that I'm floating down a river.