Blog #13

After reading “I am not a Story” by Galen Strawson, I have to be honest and say that I think my beliefs relate more to Julie Beck’s essay, “Life’s Stories”. I believe that using narrative to storytell to others is a way of expressing personality. As a listener of a narrative, one can learn from the lessons others have learned and take those experiences and apply them into their own life. Strawson seems to disagree with my theory because he does not believe that people’s lives can make stories. Rather, he would argue that moments of the past will not affect the present or the future. There were multiple moments in this essay where I noticed I disagreed with his beliefs. Within the first few paragraphs, he says that moments of his past will not affect his future. I disagree with this statement because if you learn something from your past, you are going to use that lesson to correct something in the future. For example, if you put your arm on a stove, and burn yourself, usually people will learn not to put their arm on the stove again. I feel that this concept applies to other bigger experiences in life. Although it goes against Galen’s beliefs, I believe that we are constantly learning, and we use that knowledge to further our future into a safer, healthier, and more fun environment. Galen also writes that he doesn’t think narrative itself affects how we see the world, rather, how we are raised affects our personality. Although I think I am pro-narrative, I do understand where Galen is coming from on this point. I think that how we are raised does affect our opinions on certain topics in life, but unlike Galen, I do believe that the stories we hear when we are young does affect our personality now. Galen also writes that he lives in the moment and rarely thinks of his past. I’m not sure I can say I agree with this because I am always looking back at what I did wrong in the past and how I can fix it for the future. Of course, it is important to recognize that we should not dwell in our mistakes in the past, but we should understand our mistakes for what they are, and move in a positive direction from there in the future. One last concept Galen included that I thought was very interesting, was he added different quotes about having different personalities. This is something I do agree with Galen on. Just from being myself, I know that I act differently at work vs at school vs with my friends vs with my family. It just depends on the people I’m with and the environment I’m in. I need to act appropriately in different situations and some may be more relaxed than others. Galen named this phenomenon as having multiple personalities. I believe that we are arranging each one of our traits into one personality and we are always developing our personality. Overall, I don’t think I have ever been held back from a life story. I think that hearing stories from others, especially others from different generations, gives us another outlook on life that we may never get the chance to experience and in a way I feel that it can humble me. I think it is truthful to see one’s self as having many selves because each person will definitely act differently in different environments. I would be concerned if someone acted the same way in front of their friends and a potential employer, for example.