WHO ARE YOU?
I have just gone through another interview.
I am always ambivalent about such things, looking forward to seeing the interviewer’s
reaction but dreading the outcome.
I never know what side of me to present — Am I the fun-loving bon vivant about town or the misplaced academic with an inquiring mind trying to make sense of living in a totally different culture.
I have learned through the years that most people have difficulty in dealing with multidimensional people. Either you are one thing or you are another, a scientist or an artist, a businessman or an entertainer. Heaven forbid that you could be both.
The truth is we are all multidimensional beings. It is our life-long developmental task to integrate all those disparate pieces of our being into a functional whole.
Unfortunately, the sad fact is that our education and other social conditioning don’t facilitate that; in fact they purposely hinder it. Early on we are all forced to choose one aspect of our being and focus on it, perfect it and define ourselves by it.
That’s how our educational systems work, push people to specialize — to learn more and more about less and less ever further removed from consequence and context. Then once they have defined themselves as the world’s expert on some sub-specialty they can secure a place for themselves in the scheme of things. The very real danger of this is that they have us specialize to a point we think we can control the piece of the universe we know so well. (Never mind that it is connected to a myriad of pieces we know not well.) Our education fuels such hubris, crushing the humility of the devout generalist seeking an integrated gestalt.
From my earliest schooling on I was asked to choose, Did I want to be a scientist (my Dad was) or an artist? Throughout the entire process (even through graduate school) I refused to specialize in either. Consequently, now as a Ph.D. I still am not an expert in anything and I continue to find that there is more and more that I know less and less about.
Our social conditioning also thwarts personal integration. There is little support for the youngster trying to integrate the tough, aggressive masculine with the more sensitive feminine part of their nature. We are all aware of the concern for the girl who has actually come to deal with their masculine (yang) and become a “tom-boy” or a boy presumably too in touch with the yin in him who is overly sensitive and delicate.
Enough, lets leave this for another time.
Back to interview. I have been through these things before here in Shanghai. They are looking to see where you fit — into which category of expat, Missionary, Mercenary or Misfit, you fit. It is immediately obvious that I belong to the “misfit” group for a number of reasons. One is because I do not like to be defined by a job, a title, or what I say. I don’t mind owning up to the totality of what I do. But who’s interested in the totality? My eclectic interests and activities always create a problem. What box do you put me in? and what do you label it?
In the past, the printed profiles have had me dancing around town throwing April Fool’s Parties (see “More than a Dancing Fool” Metrozine, 2004), or as a retired US academic here consulting with an International Wine Company, and co-directing a new English program for business professionals (see. “The Magic of Miraculous English” Shanghai Scene, 2003). It remains to be seen where they will put me this time.
(Note: Several weeks later the following Expat tale appeared in the Shanghai news paper)