evolved

Fandango’s Friday Flashback — October 25

Fandango11 Comments

Wouldn’t you like to expose your newer readers to some of you earlier posts that they might never have seen? Or remind your long term followers of posts that they might not remember?

Each Friday I will publish a post I wrote on this exact date in a previous year.

How about you? Why don’t you reach back into your own archives and highlight a post that you wrote on this very date in a previous year? You can repost your Friday Flashback post on your blog and pingback to this post. Or you can just write a comment below with a link to the post you selected.

If you’ve been blogging for less than a year, go ahead and choose a post that you previously published on this day (the 25th) of any month within the past year and link to that post in a comment.

This was originally posted on October 25, 2017 in response to the WordPress Daily Prompt word, “Identity.”

Secret Identity

secret identityThe concept of identity is based upon the condition of being oneself, and not another. It’s the nature of who a person is; the qualities, beliefs, etc., that distinguish or identify a person.

But wait. Does that mean that we each have only one identity? Does that imply that our identity never changes over time? I don’t think so. I know that my nature, my beliefs, and my perspectives have changed over the years. I am not stagnant. I am a work in progress.

Sure, my name has not changed since I was born. My Social Security number is the same as it was when it was first assigned to me. But I am not the same person I was when I was a child, a young adult, or even a middle-aged adult. My inner identity has evolved over time and circumstances.

And even now, my identity is different based upon who I’m with and what I’m doing. To those of you who read my posts here on WordPress, I am Fandango, blogger extraordinaire. To my family, I am the provider of food, clothing, and shelter. To my wife, I am her husband and lover. To my kids I am their father and role model (or at least I hope I am their role model).

Before I retired, my identity was wrapped up more by what I did for a living than by who I was. No one ever asked my kids “who is your father?” It was always “what does your father do.” Now that I’m retired, I’m just the old guy who lives on the corner and walks his dog to the park four times a day.

I sometimes don’t even know my own identity; it can be situational. None of us wants to be monolithic, rigid, unchanging over time. We are complex organisms. We adapt to circumstances and time, and that changes not only our identity, but even our own definition of who we are.

Who doesn’t, to one degree or another, have a bit of a secret identity? Who is a completely open book? Who wants to be?

Fandango’s Provocative Question #5

Fandango21 Comments

FPQEach week I will pose what I think is a provocative question. By provocative, I don’t mean a question that will cause annoyance or anger. Nor do I mean a question intended to arouse sexual desire or interest.

What I do mean is a question that is likely to get you to think, to be creative, and to provoke a response. Hopefully a positive response.

This week’s provocative question was actually inspired by fellow blogger Ursula at An Upturned Soul in this post in which she asked,

“These questions for “friends”… what exactly are they supposed to accomplish? Are they to get to know your “friends” better or to keep them busy while you make a run for it… to their bathroom so that you can rifle through their toothpaste and toothbrush collection?”

I responded to her question with some blather, but more relevant, she came back with this brilliant commentary:

“Blogging is a mini version of life. When you create a blog, you’re giving birth to blogging-you. Blogging-you then goes through blogging phases of development. Trying things out, learning as things are tried out. Joining groups, searching for a place in this blogging world. Getting caught up in movements, activities, trends, perhaps overdoing them or doing them until the novelty wears off. Losing interest in one thing and finding interest in another. Perhaps losing sight of why blogging-you exists, looking for a renewed sense of purpose for blogging-you and your blog. Gradually figuring out the subtler questions and their answers which are not always asked or answered openly but are always there like an undercurrent.”

So here’s this week’s provocative question (actually three questions):

“Is there a ‘blogging-you’ who is different from the real-world you? If so, how are the two ‘yous’ different? How has the ‘blogging-you’ evolved since you first started blogging?”

If you choose to participate, write a post with your response to the question. Once you are done, tag your post with #FPQ and create a pingback to this post if you are on WordPress. Or you can simply include a link to your post in the comments.

And most important, have fun.

Secret Identity

Fandango2 Comments

secret identityThe concept of identity is based upon the condition of being oneself, and not another. It’s the nature of who a person is; the qualities, beliefs, etc., that distinguish or identify a person.

But wait. Does that mean that we each have only one identity? Does that imply that our identity never changes over time? I don’t think so. I know that my nature, my beliefs, and my perspectives have changed over the years. I am not stagnant. I am a work in progress.

Sure, my name has not changed since I was born. My Social Security number is the same as it was when it was first assigned to me. But I am not the same person I was when I was a child, a young adult, or even a middle-aged adult. My inner identity has evolved over time and circumstances.

And even now, my identity is different based upon who I’m with and what I’m doing. To those of you who read my posts here on WordPress, I am Fandango, the blogger extraordinaire. To my family, I am the provider of food, clothing, and shelter. To wife, I am her husband and lover. To my kids I am their father and role model (or at least I hope I am their role model).

Before I retired, my identity was wrapped up more by what I did for a living than by who I was. No one ever asked my kids “who is your father?” It was always “what does your father do.” Now that I’m retired, I’m just the old guy who lives on the corner and walks his dog to the park four times a day.

I sometimes don’t even know my own identity; it varies based upon who I’m with and what I’m doing. None of us wants to be monolithic, rigid, unchanging over time. We are complex organisms. We adapt to circumstances and over time and that changes our identity, and even our own definition of who we are.

Who doesn’t, to one degree or another, have a secret identity? Who is a completely open book? Who wants to be?

Written for today’s one-word prompt, “identity.”