Are you what you think you are?

I think so but I’d better contemplate a little more. Great thinking question! This is why I come here.

I am. A vibrating field of consciousness.

I’m an immortal tall left handed Canadian.

The truth is, I am Iron Man,

How would i know if i weren’t?

@ragingloli I thought you were batman.

I’m Janet, damnit.

I’m much better than I think I am. Unfortunately, I’ll realize that too late.

the penguin hit it. The only possible truthful answer is yes.

Run a desk cart!

Uh, am tinkin…am tinkin…ahhm tinkin…

Maybe 80%. The other 20% is taken up by aspirations: Personal evolution, improvements, setbacks, repairs; the constant attempt at becoming a better person as new stimuli and role model images appear in my consciousness.

Of course I am. It is all I can be to me. To others, I may be different things, or perhaps the same. But that’s not for me to know.

Yes

no
that is not who we are, that’s just who we think we are.
what/who we are lies beyond the thoughts of a limited ego.
and we are not the body…it is born and it will die.
...when the mind is still and free of thought
there are no separations, there are no divisions…
the light of your eternal soul is what remains.
This is who we are.
Tat Tvam Asi…Thou art that

Yes, I would say so. I am a very genuine sort, know myself well, am pretty damn self aware, not prone to fickle flights of mood and emotion which many women are. Sure, I’m human, I bleed, I cry at sad movies, animal cruelty, and other things that bring up deep empathy and compassion but I am pleased I am not the stereotypical overly emotional, histrionic female. One of the hardest things I am coping with right now is having to modify my thoughts and feelings as I am surrounded by emotionally, personality wise and politically incompatible types. I am very adept at neutral or non-responses while remaining true to myself. haha

As soon as I say “I am such and such”—in other words, when I select from among all the features of the phenomenal world which ones constitute “me””— then I have necessarily excluded all the rest, making them “not me”. Any answer I come up with to the question “Who am I?” draws some kind of conceptual line inside of which is “me”, outside of which is “other”. In fact, while we entertain the fantasy that we each decide where that line gets drawn, this is decided at least as much by social negotiation as by personal initiative.

While this “me-making” thought process serves an important social function, it’s true only in the sense that we all agree to act as if it were true (as lawyers call such things, a “useful fiction”). Aside from that social convention, no such self/other boundary line exists.

So, on one level, yes, I am who I think I am (or, more exactly, who my social circle and I have worked me out to be). But if I look for a more real sort of boundary that divides me off from everything else, it’s nowhere to be found. It all commingles.

@thorninmud ”...on one level, yes, I am who I think I am…”

Great answer altogether. Try approaching it from the specifics of the OP. I’m using your great answer to illustrate a misconception in some other answers.

The question is not “Are you WHO you think you are”?

The question is actually “Are you WHAT you think you are”?

Subtle difference that I think @Jak took note of in his/her answer. I’d be interested in hearing your perspective from the “what” angle too @thorninmud.

It’s always hard to evaluate yourself. Traits that would seem assholish in others are justified in ourselves. I take solace in the words of one of the western world’s greatest philosophers.

“I am what I am and that’s all that I am.” – Popeye the Sailor

@Jaxk Isn’t that ” I yam, what I yam”? lol

I think f what others see and say about you rings true, then that is a pretty good gage of others , perhaps, seeing you more clearly and so it is safe to assume the vision is fairly accurate if the feedback meshes with ones own self image. I am very astute at seeing the truth or untruth in others perceptions of me.

@RealEyesRealizeRealLies Well, the distinction between “who” and “what” amounts to a distinction between subject and object. Most of our reflexive answers to the question “Who am I?”—which is really asking about the nature of subjectivity—are actually drawn from the realm of phenomena, i.e. objectivity. The body is an object. Thought is an object. Emotion is an object. Memories are objects. Genomes and brains are objects. If I assume any or all of these to be the “real me”, then I’ve conflated subject with object. This would be the case with any phenomena I identify as my self.

But it’s also a mistake to think that a “true self” would be entirely separate from the world of forms, some kind of pure subjectivity, pure “who”. Subject only exists relative to object, and vice versa. Our whole realm of experience is this inseparable union of subject and object, “who” and “what” giving rise to each other.

I too am a card carrying Dualist… May I assume you are as well @thorninmud?

Question… What is a who?

@RealEyesRealizeRealLies No, not a dualist.

“What is a who?” The only legitimate answer to that question is “No idea”.

It would seem to me that “No idea” comes closer to defining objects that cannot think.

I would think a Who is partially defined by the capacity to express “An Idea”.

But who do I know..? I’m just a NoWhat.

I am what I think I am, but not only what I think I am.