Who Are You?

Who among us is as he or she appears to be?
As a younger person, I thought older people, ostensible adults, had it together. That's why I believed my mother. I thought at some point you crossed a line and maturity lay on the other side. My notion of maturity meant that the insecurities and pettiness and general lack of knowledge about life dissipated once a person crossed that line. But it ain't so.
Maybe I was at fault when I perceived my elders as being different from who they were. But I wasn't completely at fault. Because how people behave doesn't necessarily reflect who they are. Sometimes flashes of the real person break through. But certain societal norms or perceived political correctness can bring pressure to bear, and the person forsakes core beliefs.
Sometimes people want to look good to someone else. At least they think what they do makes them look good. In so doing they draw conclusions about what the other person finds appealing. Better to be oneself and attract people who find that appealing, rather than draw someone to you by acting differently from who you are. Does outside acceptance outweigh being genuine? Do people lose sight of who they are or want to be because they're caught up in putting up a front for others? We can tend not to let other people make their own decisions with respect to whether they want to be around us. We want to hoodwink them because we're too insecure to believe they might like us.
Sometimes, however, people can't even own up to who they are. They can't admit it to themselves. They don't like themselves, so they fashion another persona.
Expectations also can influence self-acceptance. Parents have expectations. Kids can try to live up to those expectations and run the risk of losing sight of who they are. I guess the rebellion stage of life comes into play when children begin to realize that they have tried to live up to parental expectations for too long and need to plot their own course. But the specter of those expectations never completely disappears, and those expectations become imprinted on the child, who now has imposing expectations for himself.
I have heard it said that people gravitate toward partners who reflect their parents. Boys marry their moms, and girls marry their dads. In some cases, I suppose. But what else draws people together? Have you ever seen two people walking down the street and wondered about the circumstances that rendered them a pair? And so many couplings go awry. Is it just the human condition that predisposes us to involvement in such relationships? Does an inherent vulnerability make us helpless to avoid them? The facades people construct early in relationships likely influence longer-term compatibility. Maybe, though, nobody would find a significant other if everyone put their true selves on display. Perpetrating a ruse provides a way to hook someone else, then, when that person knows who you really are, it's too late. They've either come to love you despite the deviation from what you first put forward or they fear being alone or financial dependence has arisen or whatever.
Sometimes I look in the mirror and almost don't recognize myself. I have to take another look, a closer look, to make sure it's me. Antidepressants can muddy the water. I find it hard to distinguish who I am when I've stopped taking them. Do I recognize this person? Has medication turned me into someone I'm not supposed to be, even if the person who doesn't take drugs tends to have a grimmer perspective? I can still be dour while taking medication, but it feels less authentic. Pessimism tempered. But is that bad? I don't see how it can be, but then I have to come to terms with this fundamental alteration of my psychology/biology. On the other hand, how I am without medication fails to promote longevity and can inhibit beneficial human interaction.
I feel like a child, trapped in the past and trapped in the present. As that cantankerous TV doctor House said recently, "Everybody lies."