Knowing Yourself

This was brought up by one of my friends tonight, but in the context of wanting to know yourself. My question for the sake of analytical exploration / topic is this: How can you ever really know who you are?

Everyday we go through changes, every week, every year. Our own consciousness and our attitudes change constantly. One week you may be really compassionate towards someone, but then the next week something has happened and you change your outlook: you're hurt and say you become bitter or lose self-confidence. Perhaps even to where you denounce yourself with verbal self bashes aloud and / or in your head. And then perhaps it changes again a bit down the line as you start to forget the source of the pain and try move on, to where you're a little more upbeat.

So how do you know the face you look at in the mirror will always be the same? Is it by recognizing the patterns that you possibly follow in that never ending random interval cycle of periods of joy and then sadness and then joy again? Can you fully recognize that cycle, or just conclude that a simplified explaination is who you are?

I look in the mirror all the time and never know who I am, what my future is, or why my path in life has been what it has been. But perhaps that's just because of circumstance. Perhaps an answer could be figured out if you are able to maintain a constant state of mind / attitude. If you're depressed, it may be harder to know who you are because of everything else boggling through your mind; self-doubt, loneliness, and so on, while when your more confident, perhaps it makes it easier because you have a less "clouded" outlook. Or maybe the outlook of a depressed person is less "clouded".

I certainly used to think it gave me a more realistic (a.k.a. dreary) view of the world. Part of that school of thought still remains.

What defines our character is how we handle certain situations, certain problems. Perhaps that is how you can come to know who you are, by how you handle things, good and bad. You come to understand (if you get that far) both sides of your attitude - your faults and your charms - instead of just one like a depressed person or an overly optimistic person.

So that brings me to a tentative "yes you can know yourself" answer. The when and how is another matter. It's subjective to the individual, assuming everyone gets to a point where they really know themselves and are not just presuming to know who they are -- after all, others may see things differently about you than you do.

If you can, will isolating yourself make it easier? Or would that lonely road just prolong it, unless you become so enwraped in say a depression that that is all you ever experience or feel anymore. No joy. No happiness. Then you could perhaps say you know who you are. Because you've finally chosen your place, for one, whether it be consciously or subconsciously.

Would company aid in it? Wouldn't having fun with friends or feeling loved by a special somebody perhaps speed up the process. Or would it be no different than the previous example: To where its just based on where you finally choose to be: Alone, Out there, Paired Up, whatever?

It would seem that it doesn't really matter. And it sorta warps the conclusion of the previous question "Can you know yourself?", essentially by pointing out how it depends of circumstance, and on choice. And there are other fundamental questions about it: How do you know you're conclusion is right? As stated before, how do you know it's not just an assumption and actually a legitamite conclusion?

You can know who you are, but who you are is going to vary depending on how obstacles and your choices in life lead you, so how do you really know who you are, bottom line, no matter what happens, if what defines who you are keeps changing?