Who am I? Explorations of Identity

 Back in 2015, I preached a sermon entitled, “Who Goes There? An Exploration of Identity.”  That was when I was preaching without a script or notes and just letting the many, many images and charts, etc. that I projected on the wall lead me in the sermon.  I pulled from lots of research and my own background with some discussion of stage development that I used to teach at Georgia Southern in my human growth and development classes and also my more recent exploration of identity related to ethnicity and race.  I watched it again recently.  It’s a good message.  And if you want to know more about those things, I encourage you to go to my sermons page which you can find on our website, and scroll all the way down to the sermons that Costya Ogloblin used to video for me back in the day and click on that one from January 2015. 

I’ve often admitted to you all that I preach sermons I need to hear – and I let you listen in on them as well.  And in terms of my identity – those things I preached in 2015 just didn’t seem to fit my needs in 2023.  You see, I’ve been thinking more recently about transitioning  in a few years to a chapter of life that many of you know about already – and others are looking forward to – or not; one that we label as “retirement.”  I wonder – who will I be? 

So I’ve been exploring how our identities change – not just our roles and jobs – but our identities, as we grow older.  What is our core identity?  What about our identity is static – the same throughout your lifetime, and what is dynamic, fluid, shifting to someone different than you were.  Are you the same person you were in your twenties or thirties?  Probably not.  And I’m glad I’m not. 

At some point in my first marriage, my husband noted that I had changed a lot about the way I thought about things from when we were first married.  And I said, “well – I hope so, I was 17 when we married.”  And he said, “we are married though, so we should think alike.”  I said – “if that’s the case, you are welcome to think as I do, but I can’t go back and think like I did when I was 17.  I’m not that person anymore.” I said – “I accept that we think differently, and that’s okay with me. But, this is who I am now.”  He could never adjust to that – and we eventually ended the marriage when he found someone who did think more like him. 

For this sermon, I’m going to explore two issues that all of this brings up for me – and maybe you.  What make’s me – ME – and you – YOU?  And how does our identity shift and change as we grow older.

Question # 1.  What makes me – me?  What are components of my identity?  Well, experts of course, have weighed in on this. 

Some note that we often define ourselves based on physical characteristics based on categories that are generally accepted in the societies where we live.  My height is probably 5’2” and decreasing.  Most folks would categorize me as a short person, and I’ve decided to own that.  My body parts at birth had the nurse sharing with my Mama that she had a girl – so I was assigned female at birth and I’ve retained that female biological identity.  My hair has turned silver and I own that too, though our society allows us to change this.  My eyes are blue and my skin is fair.  I’m 72 years old, and I own that as well.   These and other physical characteristics are more static areas of our identity – not completely, of course.  We’ve learned that we can change some of this as well.  Usually when we think of identity, though, we use more socially constructed categories – social identity categories like race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, ability, religion/spirituality, nationality and socioeconomic status.  Of course, more recently people like Kimberly Crenshaw have made us aware of the intersections of these identities – intersectionality – which can have implications related to oppression and more. 

We also have identities related to our roles in life – I identify as a family member to many, a friend, a minister, an activist and more.  And, of course, as indicated by my conversation I shared about me and my husband, we identify by our values, our character, by the way we think and feel, and act.  Which of these are central to me being me?

Philosophers have played mind games with folks about this.  I heard one of these commonly used on a video I watched while preparing for these sermons – and it had to do with whether or not you would still be you if you lost some of these characteristics.  For example:  If you lost your hair – would you still be you – of course.  What about a body part – like an arm or a leg?  Of course, you would still be you.  How much of your physical self could be removed and you still be you.  Most folks – they say – put the brain at the center – because that’s where they locate their thoughts.  Descarte said, “ I think, therefore, I am.”  But what part of your thinking exemplifies the real you?  What if you got hit on the head and the injury removed your ability to read?  Would you still be you?  Yes, - of course.  But what if you lost your memories?  Are we what we remember?  Well, someone may have to remind you of lots of things everyday – or you would have to read through journals – but if you still thought in the same ways – wouldn’t you still be you?  What part of your brain and thinking is that core?  Some people call that your character. It’s how they would describe your personality.  Someone who perhaps is shy or outgoing, someone who is frugal, someone who is compassionate, someone who is curious… or more.  And in fact, in these mind games, if we had to choose losing our memories or losing our character, the way we think and feel about things – most of us would prefer to keep our character, that’s who we are.  

For some of us, this helps us feel better about death.  For our bodies are not us and they don’t last.  Our names won’t be remembered.  But these ideas, thoughts, and character attributes that have been riding around in our brains and bodies will continue in our species with other people.  And just as I have been contemplating ideas about identity more recently by long gone philosophers like Descarte and John Locke or contemporary thinkers like Beverly Crenshaw – those same ideas and more will be explored and contemplated and acted on by others.  Our bodies – including our brains – are just the vehicles for these to be contemplated, maybe expanded on, and shared with others.  The most important part of the identities of all of us doesn’t die with us.  They may die with the extinction of humanity, of course – or be carried forth by artificial intelligence.  Hmmm.

Okay –

Question #2:  How does our identity shift and change as we grow older?

We have our same DNA throughout our lifetime.  But we change.  One metaphor for this is “Same Seed – Different Ground.”  We plant that DNA seed in different soils as we grow and develop.  And I don’t just mean geographically – soils in the knowledge and understanding we get, soil in the folks we hang out with and the events and activities in our lives.  We know that a Texas onion seed planted in southeast Georgia turns into a Vidalia sweet onion – tasting completely different.  Same seed – different soil. 

We change as we age – both due to our DNA and due to our environment

Of course, it’s easy to see the physical transformation that ageing brings.  Your skin gets thin and looses elasticity  Our gums recede, our noses grow.  Hair disappears from some places and grows in other places.  And – as I previously noted, we get shorter – and some of us get wider.  But we also change other aspects of our identity in as we become seniors.  For quite some time, folks thought that identity formation occurred till about 30 years old or so – and then we were pretty static. And – in fact, my Meyers Brigg values of ENTJ – have not changed as I’ve aged when I take that test.   But more recent research shows us that this is not entirely the case.  “The conclusion is exactly this: that we are not the same person for the whole of our life,” says René Mõttus, a psychologist from the University of Edinburgh.

An article by By Zaria Gorvett published by BBC.com shares a summary of finding from Mottus’ work and others.

Our traits are ever shifting, and by the time we’re in our 70s and 80s, we’ve undergone a significant transformation. And while we’re used to couching ageing in terms of deterioration and decline, the gradual modification of our personalities has some surprising upsides.    

 

We become more conscientious and agreeable, and less neurotic. The levels of the “Dark Triad” personality traits, Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy also tend to go down – and with them, our risk of antisocial behaviours such as crime and substance abuse. (Perhaps it’s just that the one’s of us who make it this far have learned to do better.)

 

Research has shown that we develop into more altruistic and trusting individuals. Our willpower increases and we develop a better sense of humour. Finally, the elderly have more control over their emotions. It’s arguably a winning combination – and one which suggests that the stereotype of older people as grumpy and curmudgeonly needs some revision.

 

Far from being fixed in childhood, or around the age of 30 – as experts thought for years – it seems that our personalities are fluid and malleable. “People become nicer and more socially adapted,” says Mõttus. “They’re increasingly able to balance their own expectations of life with societal demands.”

 

Psychologists call the process of change that occurs as we age “personality maturation”. It’s a gradual, imperceptible change that begins in our teenage years and continues into at least our eighth decade on the planet. Intriguingly, it seems to be universal: the trend is seen across all human cultures, from Guatemala to India. 

It would be reasonable to think that this continual process of change would make the concept of personality fairly meaningless. But that’s not entirely true. That’s because there are two aspects to personality change: average changes, and relative changes. It turns out that, while our personalities shift in a certain direction as we age, what we’re like relative to other people in the same age group tends to remain fairly stable.

So if Alice seems more agreeable than Sally when they are 40 – she will still seem more agreeable than Sally when they are 70 – though they may both have shifted their level of agreeability. 

Well, that’s good news! 

Now, there are things we may need to change about our identities – and we can. Just as I had to change my characteristic of being always so “high energy,” we can make changes as we face different challenges in our lives.  Many do seem to learn to cope – though that’s not to say that there is not also despair with aging and transitioning to different roles, etc.

Now as you may have noted in my introduction – that upcoming role change for me has given me a bit of motivation to try to shift some in my identity gradually – so it won’t be such a shock when I retire.  As your book of life goes along, you have different chapters, and it’s helpful if you know ahead that big changes are coming so you can prepare.  You don’t always know – of course.  You may get fired from your job; a loved one may suddenly die; and more.  But you can prepare for some transitions.

Several years before I became your minister, I felt called to move in this direction and began my preparation; first becoming a lay minister at Pittman Park church, then coming to this congregation and getting actively involved and gradually doing many of the things that ministers do.  Not long after I was accepted at Meadville Lombard Theological School and began my studies, I stepped down from the very demanding role of Department Chair at Georgia Southern.    I continued to share with others some of the research I had done, but took on no new research projects.  I even took my first sabbatical ever at Georgia Southern in 2004, so that I could do my onsite pastoral care preparation at Northside hospital in Atlanta and take some additional multicultural courses that would help me in both my final year at Southern and in my ministry.  After I retired in 2005, I began a year long internship with the congregation in Augusta – which gave my car a change to get used to not heading to Georgia Southern every day!  Because I was able to intentionally prepare myself for this transition, it was not difficult.  I do not miss being a professor and spending my time and energy at that University. I don’t even go to football games anymore, and being a big fan was at one time a central part of my identity.  I couldn’t even tell you the name of the coach.

When I transitioned to ministry, I was blessed to have the time to prepare for the transition.  Can I do that again?  I hope so – with your help.  Because we will all need to transition.  I’ll need to transition from being your minister – to being a member.  And you will need to transition to either a new minister – or new kinds of ministry.

So – I’ve decided to build in some practice time for us.  I’m going to take a mini-sabbatical from mid-May to mid-June this year.  Greg and I have rented a flat in London – and I’m going to try my best to go there and learn and grown in ways that will help me in my remaining years as your minister and in transitioning to retirement.  My “plan” is to continue with you till June 20, 2026.  That all depends, of course, on the health of my mind and body – and whether you want me to continue that long.  But it’s helpful, in any case, to try to be intentional about the changes that will occur.  I’m appreciative that our Committee on Shared Ministry, our board, and other leaders are energetic about helping us all with this transition as our roles and identities shift. 

Yes, our identities are not static, they, indeed, are fluid. Thankfully, Unitarian Universalism honors the fluidity of our identities. We can shift and still be UUs. 

Beloveds, may we learn together to swim along gracefully with the fluidity of our identities as they stream toward and eventually become a part of that big Sea of Love.

Amen and Blessed Be!

Big Questions: How do we Know?

 

 So, I bet you think you are sitting here on those nice green chairs

listening to what I have to say about knowledge. 

In fact, most of you KNOW that you are.  It’s obvious, isn’t it? 

Maybe to us – but not to philosophers who think a lot about what they know

or perhaps believe – or believe they know. 

So, I thought for this message,

 I should look first to those who have spent lots of time thinking about knowing.

 I had a book of philosophy by my beside –

and spent a little time reading what some of these folks had to say.  I started with Plato.  “Plato provided a basis for what is usually referred to as epistemology, or the theory of knowledge, by suggesting that knowledge must be distinguished from mere belief. 

 

In ‘The Myth of the Cave,’ Plato presents us with the idea that for us to know

 absolute knowledge, we must be able to see reality

rather than the “shadows” of reality that surround us.

The problem is, like those men in the cave, when all we see is shadows,

we swear that this is reality – and since it’s what we know –

some dare not venture into the light. 

And even for those who venture out –

do they have enough evidence that what they see is reality? 

How much evidence is needed?  That’s what many philosophers argue about. 

Then there are the skeptics, like Descartes (Day Cart),

who wrote about skeptical possibilities in his Meditations. 

Perhaps you are not really sitting here in church –

you are dreaming you are sitting here in church.  Is that possible?

 I’ve had some dreams that I “woke up” from to still discovery – later –

that the waking up was part of the dream.  Have you seen the movie Inception? 

 

Or like Alice, in Lewis Carroll’s “Through the Looking Glass” –

who was challenged by Tweedledum and Tweedledee

that they may actually be the players in the Red King’s dream –

and they not dare wake him – for they would no longer exist.  Hmmmm.

Now most philosophers and others

are pretty clear about knowledge regarding the external world –

like being here in this church today = because they experience it through their senses.  You can see me standing here and hear me. 

You feel the cushion on your back and rear. 

Later you will smell the coffee in the kitchen. 

Similarly, you know when you are eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich

because you not only see it, you can feel the stickiness on the roof of your mouth,

you hear the smacking of you lips, you inhale that smell of peanuts and grapes.

 

 

And all of this provides evidence to your belief that you are eating

a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. 

So, we should be able to be clear about this evidence leading us to knowledge. 

If I were to ask you to describe your sandwich,

you might say that it is about five inches square, about an inch think, is of various colors (white, purple, and brown), and so on.

 “But some philosophers, Betrand Russell among them,

might say that you have failed to answer the question.” 

You haven’t described the sandwich, but rather you have described

how the sandwich appears to YOU. 

“Physics, the science that tells us how the world really is,

would describe the sandwich as a cloud of colorless molecules. 

How can it be colorless and be white, purple, and brown. 

 

 

The color is not what the object is itself – but how you perceive it –

and that depends a lot on the light and your angle of perception and more. 

So, you don’t really see the real sandwich –

according to these philosophers and scientists,

you see a sense datum of the sandwich –

a mental representation of an externally existing object.

Well, -- if we can’t even really KNOW what we experience and perceive,

how in the world can we know that something like LOVE and compassion are real.

Now many of the experts on knowledge

don’t spend their time thinking about such things. 

Instead, they like to categorize.

I’ve read lots in preparing this sermon about categories of knowledge – most of it related to what the source of our knowledge is.  And I could share anything from 4 to 14  - depending on the scholar. 

The higher they go – they just seem to use different words and subdivide them. 

So for this short message, I’m just going to share four possibilities.

The first is intuition. 

Folks may say – my gut just tells me this is the right path to go down. 

Now we may laugh at that – but research tells us that many of us make

our actual decisions not based on the facts or evidence at hand,

but how we feel about it. 

I’m thinking, though, that when we use intuition,

we perhaps ARE using lots of evidence that we’ve gained through our lives

and that we have maybe not in the front of our brains at the time –

but that we have in our more hidden parts of our brain. 

You know how your brain can work on something without you knowing it. 

Like you can’t remember someone’s name –

then you get distracted and are doing something else and the name just pops in your head.  Our brains are capable of thinking and problem solving without us knowing about it.  And I really think – that sometimes these “gut feelings” –

may perhaps be based on some wisdom

 (and we will talk more about wisdom later in the sermon).

 So perhaps they shouldn’t be discounted and laughed at. 

In reality, though, I’m the type of person that wants more evidence

I can perceive at the moment rather than depending on my gut feelings and intuition.

Yet, I also know that

 Some times those intuitive ideas are there to help protect us

when we don’t have enough knowledge. 

When I see a snake in the yard – I back away from it because

my intuition tells me that it’s dangerous. 

Now if I studied snakes, I could more easily recognize the poisonous ones

from the non-poisonous ones – and perhaps my gut feeling wouldn’t be to back away. 

So yes, sometimes – when I don’t have the knowledge –

I choose to go with my intuition or gut feelings.

The second type of knowledge is knowledge we gain from an authority. 

My grandmother told me not to pick up a toad because it would cause me to get warts.  Now – I knew my grandmother to be an authority on all such things of nature –

so I KNEW that picking up toads caused warts. 

The use of an authority is the way that many of us gain lots of knowledge –

first from those who parent us and later from teachers, books, and maybe even preachers.  When I was nine years old, my preacher told me that I would need to accept Jesus Christ as my personal lord and savior and walk down that aisle if I wanted to be saved from hell and go to heaven and I believed him. 

Now I fully realize, as a UU minister, I don’t have that kind of authority with you folks – and I’m glad.  But we do rely on authorities. 

Many of us in our lifetimes have relied on Google or Wikipedia or other internet resources for our knowledge. 

I know when Greg or I get some diagnosis from the doctor,

 I go to the Mayo Clinic web page and read all about it.

 I view them as a trusted authority. 

Many of us learned from the pandemic though,

 that what the trusted authority tells us one day – is really their best guess

based on the evidence they had at the time – and the next month –

we may be told to do something differently.

The third type of knowledge is what some authorities refer to as rational induction or deduction or logic.  This comes through reasoning and proofs. 

I picked up the toad anyway – and I got a wart – therefore toads cause warts. 

Much of our knowledge is based on conclusions we draw from our experiences. 

We can use inductive reasoning by having lots of experiences and drawing a conclusion from that or deductive reasoning with the kind of if then possibilities

that lead us to new knowledge. 

Our own senses and experiences provide us with the evidence.

The fourth type of knowledge is Empiricism. 

Empiricism is knowledge gained through careful observation,

manipulation of variables through the scientific method,

repeating research designs, and taking in data to interpret. 

So let’s say I did an experiment to test out the Toads cause Warts hypothesis. 

I gave my brother a toad to play with and my cousin a lizard. 

He got a wart and she didn’t. 

Of course, scientists would tell us that we would need to replicate that study many times to draw the conclusion that toads cause warts.

I should tell you that scientists who do study toads extensively

tell us that they do not cause warts – which is one kind of skin infection 

However, toads do produce a slime that can irritate your skin,

so if you do handle a toad, you should wash your hands.

The bottom line – or conclusion that I’ve come to from my exploration of the question “How do we know?” is , of course, that for most things – we don’t really KNOW. 

But if we gather enough evidence, we can make really, good, educated guesses. 

And it’s okay to use words like knowledge and facts for these.

Another thing that I’ve learned in my exploration is that we can know a whole lot –

or think we know a whole lot, but still not be very WISE. 

Miles Kington helps us draw this distinction. 

Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit;  wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

The primary difference between the two words is that wisdom

involves a healthy dose of perspective and the ability to make sound judgments

 about a subject while knowledge is simply knowing.

Anyone can become knowledgeable about a subject by

reading, researching, and memorizing facts.

It’s wisdom, however, that requires more understanding

and the ability to determine which facts are relevant in certain situations.

Wisdom takes knowledge and applies it with discernment

based on experience, evaluation, and lessons learned.

You have to live a little, make mistakes and learn from them,

sit with it all and take some time. 

That’s why we sometimes refer to the “Wisdom of our elders.”

 You have to live a bit and experience life.

Rev. Mary Gear states “In spiritual language, wisdom is the process of finding meaning in knowledge in order to understand the universal truth or wisdom to inform our being and doing.”

A quote by an unknown author sums up the differences well: “Knowledge is knowing what to say. Wisdom is knowing when to say it.”

Albert Einstein famously said, “Wisdom is not a product of schooling but of the lifelong attempt to acquire it.” Indeed, it’s one of those journey-not-destination things.

Theologian Matthew Fox describes wisdom this way: “Wisdom is always taste—

in both Latin and Hebrew, the word for wisdom comes from the word for taste—

so it's something to taste,  not to theorize about.

‘Taste and see that God is good’, the psalm says; and that's wisdom:

tasting life. No one can do it for us.

It takes time, it takes patience; sitting and sifting through the knowledge we’ve obtained, experiencing life and learning from it.

I can share with you that life has gotten easier for me as I’ve gotten older. 

Not because I don’t have lots of problems to deal with;

not because I don’t have lots of work to do;

Not because my health is better than it was when I was younger. 

If you look at the evidence, I should be saying my life is much more difficult

than it was in my youth and young adulthood. 

But folks, I’ve gained some wisdom though all of this.

 And I know that many of you know what I’m talking about.

That serenity prayer shared by Reinhold Niebuhr is easier to say and and practice when you have lived longer.

If you know it, say it with me.

God, Grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things that I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

 

 

Beloveds, 

May you live your life with the knowledge and wisdom that helps you through each day – and helps you to make your own life, the lives of those you encounter (like in this congregation) – and the lives of others through out the world and the world to come – just a little bit better.

Amen and Blessed Be.