A short YouTube monologue by Dr. Aziz arguing that personal identity is largely constructed and often limiting. He recounts a client who believes she is uninteresting and explains that such self-stories are made-up cages; he invites listeners to consider what alternative identities they could choose.
What if your identity wasn't real? Now that might sound like some sort of crazy psychedelic thought, but stick with me, it's very practical. Your identity is how you see yourself. Am I smart or am I dumb? Am I ugly or am I beautiful? Am I worth talking to or not? There's a thousand things and more that are in your identity without you even knowing it. And so much of your identity is made up. It's outdated and it's not even real. So I was talking to a client the other day and she said, well, I'm not an interesting person, no one wants to talk to me. So when I was spending time with my brother in law, I was holding back because he's not going to like what I'm going to say. And this whole story about how she is and how people are going to see her and you can just see right there, it's not even real. Because from my perspective, she's intelligent, she's funny, she's beautiful. Her story of herself is completely made up and it's keeping her in a cage. And the question I have for you is, is your identity made up? And if you're gonna make one up anyway, what else could you make up about who you are and who you want to be?
