Self Identification Quotes

“Living by other people's definitions and perceptions shrinks us to shells of ourselves, rather than complex people embodying multiple identities.”
― Janet Mock, Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More

“We must engage our sense of self to sensibly deal with environmental stresses in the ever-changing world. Without a strong sense of self and an equally robust ego, I might have expired long ago. Because I possess a brain that is capable of self-recognition and self-regulation, I reserve the opportunity to edit personal behavior. If I can exercise the necessary self-discipline, I can reposition an individualistic and egotistical sense of self-identity. A sense of self can lock us into self-destructive behavioral patterns. If we exhibit an inflexible sense of self, we are predisposed to act in a rigidly prescribed manner. Some of our personal decisions might not support our long-term best interest. The Neanderthals failed to adapt to environmental changes and paid the ultimate price with extermination of their species. I too face the challenge of either adapting to environmental stresses or expiring. My prior characterization of self-identity did not serve me well since it brought me to the brink of self-immolation. Accordingly, I must revise whom I think I am in order to adapt to the challenges of a rapidly changing environment by assessing who I was, determining who I want to become, and developing a disciplined approach to make the transition from what I was to who I seek to become.”
― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

“We determine who we are during all acts of survival. Self-identity is an ongoing process of self-exploration and development of strength of character. Human pain is unavoidable. A person finds their immaculate core floating amongst the rubble of ruined dreams and imploded fantasies. With strength of mind and time tested character, a prudent person begins recasting a person’s quixotic outlook upon life into mature philosophy that will gird them against all the heartaches and tragedies of an earthly life.”
― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

“Self-identify your gender? Why not self-identify your species, too? I'm a dog now.”
― Oliver Markus Malloy, Inside The Mind of an Introvert: Comics, Deep Thoughts and Quotable Quotes

“We each pine to express our uniqueness. Is it absurd to take ourselves seriously, and resolutely search out a means to discover and express the story that plaits a modicum of coherent reality out of our existence? Is it ridiculous to garner joy from walking in the woods, spending dashes of time intermingling with family and friends, and by working unerringly at our jobs? Is it right to take solace in minor moments of wonder woven together similar to strands of wool in a familiar sweater? Can I wring joy from the snug encounters of daily living by participating in an interlinked web of community of life? Can I foster goodwill by saturating my heart in time-tested faith?”
― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

“If we know who we are and have gone through a process of self-identification in accordance with the creator’s plan, we will no longer undervalue ourselves or be afraid”
― Sunday Adelaja

“Fear of failure impedes adequate self-identification”
― Sunday Adelaja

“Who we are is an ongoing process of forging a personalized self-concept. Our childhood upbringing and our personal history as an adult formulates our identity. Identity spawns from the dewdrop of our crystalized experiences. Identify is partially formed by the places that claim us including places we resided and places we traveled. Identity is often closely associated with a person’s nationality, race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, occupation, age, and their abilities and special disabilities.”
― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

“Every person gauges his or her own personality. Self-evaluation includes reviewing a person’s conception of a self from a wide variety of viewpoints including if said person is an insider or an outsider, religious or nonreligious, partisan or nonpartisan, and vegetarian or meat eater. Self-assessment of who we are usually takes into consideration many principles including when compared to other persons, what specific personality factors a person exhibits. Combinations of personality factors establish every person’s recognizable temperament, which assist people achieve a recognizable personality and a sense of self-identity.”
― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

“Some prejudices and fallacies of the human mind are understandable on a theoretical basis, but practically impossible to implement. As matters now stand, I have little choice but to recognize myself as possessing a personal state of conscious awareness and presupposing that my active state of mental awareness constitutes a personal identity. Acknowledgement of my ignorance begins with the opening admission that the concept of a self delineates the most that I will ever understand in life. Although it might be a spectacular illusion to perceive the self as the unchanging nucleus at the center of my being, from a human evolutionary standpoint and to develop and carryout strategies necessary for personal survival it is a useful illusion. Belief in a self allows a person to integrate streams of information and resolve conflicts between competing values and goals. Absence of a self-identity and devoid of the specific goal of seeking personal self-realization, would not only jeopardize human survival on a daily bases, but it would render life utterly meaningless, making a person’s ontological existence a triviality. Lacking a philosophical status of fundamental ontological event, human life would be a windowless absurdity. A person must perceive oneself as an actual entity in physical Minkowski space, not merely as a philosophical concept in order to engage in the necessary activities to perpetuate personal existence and import meaning to personal efforts. Accordingly, I elect to perceive the self as an actual entity, not as a mere abstraction, composed of a single, definite set of well-defined ontological criteria. Self-perception guides future behavioral choices, frame intellectual inquires, and the evolution of the self represents the ultimate level of personal achievement in pursuit of my goal of attaining self-realization.”
― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

“Self-questioning and self-identification go hand in hand. It is surprising how little life changes. Most of the days that we spend working, playing, praying, loving, and eating are predictably uneventful. They produce no dramatic events, do not engender acts of high resolve, do not require examination of our morals, or necessitate the questioning of our ethical guideposts. We do not test ourselves daily. In fact, we spend most of our daylight hours attempting to avoid highflying situations that we cannot control. Fear of encountering ugly little surprises hinders a careful person from undertaking an adventure that entails the potentiality of surviving a crisis that will prompt them to grow and in doing so act to define the evolution of the self. Actions, not our words, reveal personal character.”
― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

“Regardless of the physical world that a person finds himself or herself mired in, everyone can attempt to control the angle of their psychological reference point through constructive self-evaluation and by conscientiously refining their heightened cognitive viewpoint in order to revise and upgrade their mental autobiography. Apprehending our self and assessing our place in the world is an inherent activity of all human beings. Each one of us must make our own way and determine how to fit into a world that is constantly changing. Each of us posits our perception of a self and makes conjectures regarding how the world functions.”
― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

“Reading is a form of self-identification that works, paradoxically, by encouraging us to identify with others, an abstract process that changes us in the most concrete of ways.”
― David L. Ulin, The Lost Art of Reading: Why Books Matter in a Distracted Time

“hunger lust drives many personalities to stand out from the crowd. Members of the new generation seek celebrity status regardless of the cost. We have each engaged in or witnessed someone else’s feeble attempts to define their personal strand of uniqueness derived through acquisitions, nationalism, body piercings, serving as rabid fans of various conglomeration’s sports teams, or by participating in other cult-like activities. Fervently engaging in these or similar misguided identity markers is laughable. Our real identity marker comes from engagement in a succession of character building experiences that integrate the conscious and unconscious mind into a coherent whole. A person defines the contours of their life through a series of life affirming actions, many of which choices initially seem disjointed from any functional significance beyond meeting the needs of our immediate family and mollifying our own selfishness. Akin to silent film actors of yesteryear, we must each play some worthwhile role in the symposium of life which staccato orchestra of spring beauty embraces every nook and cranny of planet Earth.”
― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

“The history of cruelty inflicted in the name of morals has convinced me that the increase of identification might achieve what moralizing cannot: beautiful actions.”
― Arne Næss