ONE OF THE ABSOLUTE essentials for leading a happy life is to be yourself. Annoyingly, no one ever tells you how to do this, and there are no handy websites where you can download templates for being completely individual. Fortunately, there are support groups for people trying to be themselves. These don’t actually meet, but there is a helpline manned 24 hours a day by an answering machine.
It’s not always good to be yourself. The deeply unpleasant, aggressive idiots that you sometimes meet in life are also being themselves. It would be hugely helpful if they could try hard to be someone else – preferably someone nicer and less prone to dropping litter.
Life starts without self-consciousness, and other people are no more than badly designed versions of you. Then comes adolescence, when you suddenly realise the first 13 years of your life have been preparing you to be a total dork. For the next 17 years, what other people think of you is more important than what you think of yourself. This wears off when you realise that other people haven’t been thinking about you at all.
Being yourself has fashion implications. Everyone has a favourite piece of clothing that they wear despite the deeply held wishes of someone close to them. People who are completely themselves have a look that no one else on the planet shares. Many people think they’re expressing their individuality through their hairstyle. But when you look at photos of yourself 30 years later, you appear to be modelling classic cuts of the 70s.
If you’re looking to be yourself, you should remember that you are what you eat. Sandwiches don’t have to have cheese in them, and a beetroot and mashed potato filling is absolutely fine. Just don’t expect anybody to sit on the same bench while you’re eating them.
Your sex life is often an interesting manifestation of you as a person. That’s why the best partners are two people who can both be themselves in bed together. However, if you’re being yourself and the other person is bored, irritated, or extremely angry, this is not ideal.
In scientific terms, it’s technically impossible to be yourself. Subatomic particles change under observation, and so do we. Depending on who or what we are interacting with, we change to be something slightly different. We all have multiple personalities; we just buff up the one that works best at the time.
Only shy people are truly themselves because they don’t interact. It doesn’t make sense to say you’re a shy person underneath. Truly shy people don’t have underneaths; they wear their underneath overneath without any kind of protective covering.
© GUY BROWNING IS THE AUTHOR OF ‘NEVER PUSH WHEN IT SAYS PULL’ AND CREATOR OF ‘TORTOISE IN LOVE’ (DVD) – USED BY PERMISSION.
