Dealing with Our Self Identity

What kind of person do you see when you look in the mirror? Self-identification is one of the greatest challenges that every person has to face in their life. How can anyone accurately evaluate themselves? Is it even possible to carefully observe your own qualities and come to a proper judgment of yourself?

When I look in the mirror, I see myself as a loving and caring person. However, I am well aware of the fact that I overemphasize my strengths while I minimize my weaknesses when I reflect on my character. I recognize my inability to love others as I should but I seem to ignore that reality as I contemplate on all the things that outwardly make me appear as a loving person to others. The awareness of the matter of fact does not stop me from deceiving myself.

When I think about my continuous pattern of self deception, I realize that I am not the only one who has this tendency. If everyone falls into the trap of self deception, then how can we ever know who people really are when we ourselves live with a false self identity? What's striking is that the exact opposite takes place when we view others. We usually overemphasize the faults of others as we minimize and sometimes even ignore the positive qualities that others possess.

How can anyone ever begin to see themselves for who they really are? And how can anyone see others correctly? These critical questions demand answers for the reason that our perception of ourselves and our perception of others control our entire existence. What we think of ourselves and others will dictate the way we relate to ourselves and those around us.

The liberating truth is that we have a God that knows our entire being. He is the one who has crafted our very souls. God speaks to the prophet Jeremiah saying, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you...” Just as he knew Jeremiah, God knows each one of us. He knows more about us than we will ever know about ourselves. We can either dismiss this reality and continue living with the false identity of ourselves. Or we can accept the fact that we cannot know ourselves fully until we grow in the knowledge of God and as a result begin to see who we really are.