Who Are We?

Who I am, who you are and who anyone is, can be defined many different ways; but first and for most is our name. Names are particular to a person; it is the first step in creating an identity. Yet it is completely out of the person’s control. A person’s last name and sometimes even their first name are already decided before their birth. The implications of a person’s last name are great. The most obvious is genetic s, which defines how we look, or what we are. How much control does a person who is born with Downs Syndrome or Cystic Fibrosis have over their life? Then there is also the other side of the spectrum with professional athletes who are born with huge physical advantages, or geniuses who are born with a larger than average mental capability. Granted these are the tails on the bell curve, but does it not also show that the mere concept of being in the “bell” or on a “tail” is also out of our control? A last name also tells of the family situation the person will grow up in. This situation impacts who a person is through what type of morals and character will be taught to the child. All of our actions are based on our morals, or what we believe. A name impacts both our outer and inner person.
Another inherited aspect of life that applies is the social/economic class that a person is born into. The place a person is from can have a large impact on this constraint. Compare a person who is born into a middle class suburban family and one who is born into a low income housing project. For the first eighteen years of life, a person is confined to the situation they are born into, and have very little control over how to change it. A main contributing factor to this would be education. As the typical person has no control over their primary education, and with education being so valuable in one’s ability to have control in the decisions in their life, it is easy to see how little control a person has. Yes, there are stories of people who fail having had every opportunity, and people who succeed without opportunities, but these are outliers. These outliers probably occurred due to an event that had the same chance of occurring or not. For example, a student in a poor school has equal chance of getting a teacher who expands their mind or not. In either case, the outcome seems out of the student’s control.
When the bigger picture is examined; the culture, government and era that we are born into are completely out of our control. I have been blessed with the freedoms of America, but were I to have been born in North Korea how different I would be. Would I still have my Christian faith, would I spend so much of my time pondering how to make the government better? I cannot say I think this would be the case. Then there is culture. American culture is very materialistic in comparison to a third world country where the average citizen is just trying to stay alive. The era we are born in greatly affects who we are and how we view the world. If I was born in Georgia in 1820 I would have most likely been a supporter of slavery. I feel slavery is wrong today, but how much of that is what I believe and how much of it comes from the era I was born in, an era of equality.
The general populous is set on a track for their life from the moment they are born. So much of who we are is out of our control, yet so much value is placed on decisions. Maybe because every choice is a chance to take control. What I can say for certain is that I am fortunate and humbled at the situation that I have been born into. I have a wonderful family, a comfortable lifestyle where I have plenty of luxuries but they do not come without hard work. I have the opportunity of a fantastic education, and live in a time and culture where love for fellow man is free to roam. Due to this, I have chosen to live my life and the decisions I do get to make , by the adage “to those that much has been given much is expected”.