The actual You at any moment would likely be a fast changing thing, don’t you think? Much depends on your self-perceived role, your self-perceived abilities, and whoever / whatever is involved in the present “situation” as you see it. And however other people respond to whatever you come up with also necessarily requires your shifting gears as to whatever aspect of your Available Self you had better call up right then.
Reading the Situation. Another angle on this can be that we sometimes don’t even see the larger situation we may be sitting in or that we may be affecting, as we bring ourselves in and choose what to notice and how to respond to it. You and I meet, for instance, but I neglect to consider what you’re ready for, whether this is a good time for you, anyone else I might have invited to our meeting and how they will feel about it. Or I don’t even really consider who else will be affected by whatever you and I discuss and decide.
Even more immediately, I risk not noticing the moment to moment changing as to who You Are right now — whether you understand, agree with, question, or are even interested in what I am saying. And you the same with me. We may both be lying to ourselves as to who is really present in our encounter.
If I were to think about such things — moment to moment, at the time — other parts of Me might step up very well, and I’d make better decisions. You can no doubt think of many such possibilities of unintentional neglect in your own life. It’s more difficult to be “present” if you don’t even realize what the real Here/Now is.
So the package of Available You’s, and the changing You that’s actually present from moment to moment at any particular time – these are two very different pictures of “Who You Are”. How well you’re able to recognize and play (whatever the package of cards you’ve been able to accumulate so far), becomes pretty important.
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