Do you think people are what they want to become?

Well, since we are who we are and would find it hard to be who we aren’t, I think your question is not very clear.

Gaga certainly had the voice and the interest to become a singer; the rest has required vision, long-range planning, lots of money and huge amounts of time needed to get dressed, tressed and propped on her shoes. It is certainly, on her part, a very conscious effort.

Gaga, before becoming Gaga, was an artificial time machine with the personality of a snapping turtle.

Beware!

Each person is whoever they are at the moment in time. I am not who I was, and I imagine I will be different in the future. But all my manifestations are the same person, right?

So who I am grows but is the same person.

I am who I am and I may become something I cannot imagine.

I don’t think everyone fulfills their potential as a person. Lady Gaga probably has but most people go through life only half influencing their circumstances, meaning they are only half of what the ought to be.

I am what you see and that is what you get. I try with all my might not to be prentious. As for as Lady Gaga’... she was a freak befor fame and a freak after and for the life of me how could anyone with the brain of a gnat think this woman has any talent?

“Our lives are not determined by what happens to us but by how we react to what happens, not by what life brings to us, but by the attitude we bring to life. A positive attitude causes a chain reaction of positive thoughts, events, and outcomes. It is a catalyst, a spark that creates extraordinary results.” -unknown.

“Watch your thoughts for they become words. Choose your words for they become actions. Understand your actions, for they become habits. Study your habits, for they will become your character. Develop your character, for it becomes your destiny.” -unknown

“If you see a difference between where you are and where you want to be – consciously change your thoughts, words, and actions to match your grandest vision.”
– Neal Donald Walsch

Let’s start by considering what I’m going to call the “story-you”. When you think about who are, this is the you that comes to mind. This “you” exists as the central figure in a story contained in your memory and constantly updated in light of new experience. The purpose of this narrative is to give some meaning and coherence to a chain of experience; the story needs someone to whom all this stuff happens, so it creates this story-you. When @zenvelo remarks that even though stuff changes all the time, he’s still the “same person”, that’s the illusion created by the story.

The “what you want to become” is the future projection of the arc of the story. It’s what we imagine would make a good continuation of the story. In that sense, it too forms part of the story-you. If and when subsequent experience fails to follow the projected arc, then the story will be written in a way that makes sense of the deviation.

But the story-you is only a character in a story. There is no such you outside of the story. Outside of the story, there is only pure experience. If you insist on having a “real” you, it would be none other than this pure experience. This pure experience can’t be divided into “the stuff that’s being experienced” and “the one who is doing the experiencing”. That division happens in the story, not in the “experience-you”. The experience-you is this moment itself. Everything else is just story.

Thorn—what a relief to it is to know that the people who are being bombed, raped, starved, and consumed by diseases at this moment are all just figments of my narrative imagination—in reality it is just “pure experience”, just matter and energy rearranging themselves the particular ways that are peculiarly associated with complex organisms, not individuals suffering. I don’t even have to go to the trouble of saying, “not my problem”, because suffering is “just story”, so there is no problem, and no “I” either, for that matter. Endorphin levels are rising at this location. Ahhh.

Sub—Not so. When all experience is your experience, complacency is less of an option, not more.

edit

What @thorninmud said is a proper answer to this question and he is very, very kind to offer it. I did not offer a true answer because I don’t think it is possible to offer a true answer and have it understood. The true answer is something people have to figure out for themselves. I offered a silly answer (which, was also a true answer) in order to point this out.

The thing is that most of us have a difficult time experiencing the world directly, without the constant chatter going on in our minds telling us what the experience is about and what it means (what @thorninmud calls stories). For most people, it takes a lot of practice to experience the world directly. You have to learn how to get the hell out of your mind and into your body.

I have found that wanting to become something is dangerous for me. That’s because I am particularly unable to maintain a sense of worth if I fail. If I fail to maintain my sense of self worth, I can get depressed and even suicidal. Cool story, huh?

So I don’t have a sense of becoming—or rather, I try not to spend much effort giving any credence to any of these stories. I let them flow by like flotsam on a river.

And yet, here I am, telling a story. A story about how not to give into the impulse to tell stories all the time. Thing is, I love stories. I love making meaning. It’s my favorite game of all. But I know it’s a game and I know there’s nothing inevitable about any story or any meaning. Whatever helps me at the time. Whatever I can get myself to believe at the time.

I know that’s terribly unsatisfying for people who see life as a game with winners and losers. Where gaining status really matters. People can’t stand the meaning of life being arbitrary. They want us all to agree on who is right and who is wrong. And there is some order to society that happens when people agree on these things.

But here’s the thing. Why would you buy into a set of rules that make you wrong?

I don’t think we are born who were are. We create ourselves with our own personal wills and abilities. And then, we become ourselves. But who are we along the way? Well still ourselves, but in a process of climbing the hill.

This is a tough one to answer, but I’ll try with a few brief but wise words here. There is a difference between being who we really are, and behaving in that manner vs behaving in a way in which we want to be perceived by others (I’ve said this many times on here). We all want to be perceived by others in some ways I’m sure, but some take this too far, and lose track of who they really are in the process.

It is very dangerous to be too dependent on others for building up our self-esteem, since those same people can just as easily take that away from you. We all change in some ways, at least most of us, so the only thing that makes us who we are is who we are in the present.

Paradox, I think people can’t escape themselves.

If they pretend to be something they’re not, for instance, that’s who they are. Fake..

We are works in progress. Who we are is an interplay between who we were, the circumstances under which we act, and the decisions that we make. This holds true even at a genetic level. There are genes that will only be expressed under certain circumstances. If we were ever able to clone ourselves, it is more than likely that the life of the cloned person will be very different from the original.

@minnie19 You can only be yourself in the ‘now’ (that I call it), since we’re always changing in at least some capacity, with time. Your assumption of calling a person a ‘fake’ is highly subjective. Just because many choose to put up facades it still doesn’t change who they really are at their core. Also, there may be various reasons why people choose to put up fronts, and I think that it is safe to say that most of us are guilty of this to some capacity.

I do have to ask you though, just what is your definition of a ‘fake’ person? I think that you are, inadvertently, agreeing with my own premise that there is a difference between living in a way in which we want to be perceived by others vs living in the way we want to without too much concern of other’s thoughts (within reasonable limits). Does putting up a front or facades change who/what we really are, or just mask it?

Fake person? Hmm. The philosopher Sartre had a different take on it. He said that anyone who believes that who they are is fixed and that they have to act a certain way is living in bad faith.

@Paradox25 I agree but I think people start to get a sense of who they truly are at a certain time of their lives. I think people create themselves. Of course they are themselves from the time they were born, but as a more sharp identity wise, it comes later on. Timing can vary from person to person.

I’m saying, that, if someone is pretending all their lives because they’re too concerned about how society and their friends will react to their attitudes and actions, then that person is simply themselves, which is called fake in my book. But they are still themselves since being fake is a part of them. Everybody wants to be liked. But that doesn’t mean to pretend 24/7 and don’t stand up for what you stand for. I personally met people who were very unhappy, but pretended to be very cheery and girly, just to fit in to a certain friend group. I also met people who act a certain way around their boss, but they are still themselves. They aren’t uncomfortable with their carefulness while talking to their bosses for instance.

We need to put up with a lot if we want to live in a community for example… But we are still ourselves if we aren’t given any strict rules or boundaries. Nobody can just let go and not care about what people think, and just act rubbish, like put their foot on the table at a restaurant for example. I don’t think it can be “who they are” (to fart everyday at 4 pm to annoy your teacher). That would just be weird and unusual in general.

Most people never meet their full potential.Circumstances do not allow many people to fulfill their own dreams or expectations. Other people are simply not focused.

This is a really deep, very great question. There are so many levels on which this could be answered and I could write a book! But I don’t have time to write a book! That being so, I direct you to one of the greatest inspirational thinkers I have had in my life. He has written extensively on the subject and I think very well and truly. He is one of the people I can credit most with influencing my life for the better. His name is Carl Rogers. Here is a very good summary of his work. I read his book __On Becoming a Person__ in high school and I will never forget it.