I saw a status today that said something along the lines of there are three types of people, the ones who define themselves: 1) by what they have 2) what they do and 3) who they are.
This was my response:
I would argue that there are actually four types of people. The 4th type, which especially plagues our generation, and specifically women (but men increasingly have this problem) are the people who define themselves and others by their bodies. In a society where what you see is what you get, what the eye beholds is the totality of all reality, where existence is precluded and limited to the physical, then the natural consequence would be a people who have been raised to identify with their physical existence. The travesty of the situation is that identifying with our bodies creates tremendous insecurity, not to mention vanity. Because the physical necessarily and inevitably deteriorates, and accordingly, our sense of self erodes with it.
When a woman is defined by how small she is and a man is valued by how big he is; when a women is critiqued by her waste size and a man’s strength is judged by how much weights he can lift; when a women is valued by her youth and a man is honored by his honor; when both women and men are are understood by the color of their eyes, their height or lack thereof, does such a civilization breed such incredibly lonely and insecure people. That’s why in our generation we have such an aggressive packaging of the personality, where we say the most outlandish things and dress in the most bombastic ways and act in the most painful manner, all simply because we are insecure, we are lonely, and we are afraid – and all because we want to feel valued and loved.
Only when we come to define ourselves by the richness of our heart, by the depth of our being, by the essence of our very essence – can we claim security and sanity, and become truly happy. That is, the truly happy man is the one who defines and understands him or herself as being created in the image of G-d, everything else is vain, all other definitions are hopeless.
2015