Who Are You?

Amlesh Ranjan

3 min readOct 6, 2023

The Philosopher-Writer, Kahlil Gibran, expressed so deeply –

“Someone asked me, who are you, and since then, I have been silent.”

He was so right. Do we really know ourselves?

Let us stand in front of the mirror and ask this question repeatedly –

Who am I?

The likely answers may be:

I am ‘my name.’

I am ‘my religion.’

I am ‘my geography.’

I am ‘my nationality.’

I am ‘my family name.’

This is how we mostly look at our identity. Interestingly, either we were born into it or someone chose it for us. We do not have a choice in deciding the same.

This leads to another question –

Who am I being in my life?

We may come to the following answers:

I am being a son/daughter/child.

I am being a wife/husband/spouse.

I am being a brother/sister/sibling.

I am being a father/mother/parent.

I am being a friend/companion/partner.

I am being a manager/executive/professional.

Right from the beginning of our lives, the emphasis is on the expectations of us: as a child, good behaviour; as a student, top grades; as a player, to win; as a grown-up, to conform.

When we step into our married life, the expectations change. We need to fulfil our responsibilities and obligations. We become parents and new expectations are in place.

Professional life has an even more demanding situation. Expectations are to justify our being in that role; deliver all that is due; achieve the planned targets; secure the next position…

Then the desire to keep looking good and the pursuit of health come into the picture. We create a new set of targets for ourselves — the number of steps taken per day; number of hours spent in exercise…

Added to the above is the societal norm dictated or, I would say, mostly self-inflicted expectations — a bigger house; swankier car; bigger bank balance; latest attire… the list is endless.

I have asked myself this question: Who am I?

I have an answer-

“I am a benevolent and vibrant bundle of energies and waves in human form who is in a relentless pursuit of contribution for an infinitely better and unconditionally loving world.”

As you can see, the answer to who am I, becomes your personal mission statement.

Not that this answer is complete, but it begins a beautiful journey of knowing yourself. It is worth asking this question.