My Identity Is a Passing Cloud

Identity is a hot topic. It is at the center of politics, social justice theories and practices, pronouns, gender, conscious language, and truly any sentence that beings with “I.”?

From this storyteller’s point of view, identity is a product of stories. Honestly, most things are stories, as far as I’m concerned—but I want to make clear that this article is written from a storyteller's perspective, not a psychologist’s or a social scientist’s or a medical doctor’s point of view. This article is all about the stories that comprise our identity.

We make statements all day long about who we are: “I do not like eggs,” “I am bad at spelling,” “I’m a socially progressive and fiscally conservative Democrat,” “I love the Harry Potter series.” Identity is essentially a collection of stories that are true in this particular moment. Perhaps there is a way to prepare eggs that changes your mind about eggs. The term “Democrat” might mean something different in the future. You might outgrow “Harry Potter.” Everything changes and, of course, so does our identity.

So why do we cling to it so tightly? Why is identity such a hot debate right now? If someone wants us to call them by a new name, is it really just the inconvenience of learning a new name, or does this trigger something bigger in us? Does identity actually serve to tether us to something dependable and secure? Does a fixed identity give us a sense of consistency???

I’m not sure. I’m actually not sure about anything right now, and I’m learning how to be more comfortable with that. One of the emerging ideas that is seemingly led by my son’s generation is the idea of a fluid identity. The nonbinary impulse that is often focused on gender can be applied to all sides of identity. Male/female are not the only two options. Gay/straight are not the only two options. Democrat/Republican are not the only two options. “Us and them” is something that we are regularly encouraged to engage in. Pundits and influencers want us to choose. The political sphere, economic sphere, religious sphere, and even cultural sphere all have a long history of developing a sense of “us” by identifying a “them,” and we are all finding that this binary way of living isn’t working. It's not accurate. It's not real. We don’t like it, and for some of us it is actually dangerous.

So our kids are rebelling and the revolution has legs. My generation, even the most “progressive” of us, has a lot of catching up to do. We can get tripped up on pronouns and name changes, but that would be missing the point. This is not only about accommodating people, it is about seeing what is true: that our “identity” is not fixed. That it doesn’t have to fit within the same construct we have been using. We don’t have to check the boxes available anymore. Like all storytelling, identity is a living, growing, changing, and sometimes confusing thing.??

When I discover who I am, I’ll be free.

―Ralph Ellison, “Invisible Man”

I am my own experiment. I am my own work of art.

―Madonna

We can examine our stories in search of truth, and we can also treat our stories like paint on a canvas. We can insist that we have discovered our true identity and give ourselves a new name, and we can try on something unexpected and inconsistent to what we have built so far. In other words, when it comes to identity, there might not be any rules. There certainly might be implications and consequences for our choices. There might be pushback. We might offend. We might confuse. But there is no rule that says what we are doing isn’t valid and isn’t the truth.?

So what story do you want to claim as yours? Something fixed and static? Or something alive, curious, and perhaps even messy? But like all things nonbinary, these are not your only two choices.

He allowed himself to be swayed by his conviction that human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, but that life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves.

―Gabriel García Márquez, “Love in the Time of Cholera”