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   %CHANGE PERSONAL IDENTITY BEHAVIOR FRIENDS IMAGE 900728

     The insecure person does not feel safe with their own
sense  of  identity,   and is filled with  fear  upon  any
thought  of change in their identity.  The  confusion  and
uncertainty  of  that which is familiar feels more  secure
than  possible changes which might involve an  improvement
in relationships and health.

     There  are  often  no clear  boundaries  between  our
behaviors and our identity.  At one level we tend to think
of  our behaviors as being the behaviors of an  unchanging
person  with  a clear identity which does not change.   We
feel  some  sense  of  security  in  a  stable  unchanging
identity.   It  is  the unchanging person who  engages  in
various behaviors.  There seems to be security in personal
constancy.

     When  we  have  difficulties  in  dealing  with   our
dilemmas  we  often  seek to cope  with  the  difficulties
without  any change in our sense of identity.  We want the
difficulties  to  be eliminated  without  any  fundamental
change in the root of our being who we are; yet, often the
difficulties  are  rooted  in our  most  basic  attitudes,
assumptions, beliefs, convictions, associations,  friends,
values,   ideals,  etc.  Our most basic  difficulties  are
rooted in who we are;  our sense of personal identity.  We
can   rarely   deal  creatively  with   our   most   basic
difficulties  without there being some fundamental  change
in our sense of identity.

     Our  sense of identity is intimately associated  with
our  most  intimate friends and associates;  and with  the
people who form our own personal community. We cannot deal
creatively  with our most fundamental difficulties without
some changes in our sense of identity and so without  some
changes  in  our  relationships  with  our  most  intimate
friends  and  associates.   We may need to change  how  we
relate to our most intimate friends and associates. We may
need  to change who we associate with most intimately  and
frequently.  Such changes will usually entail some  change
in  our  sense  of identity.  Only  dead  people  have  an
unchanging identity.

                                                                                                                               
                         (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in      
                    (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy)  
                                                                                                                               
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