The Greek philosopher Socrates, who lived 2,400 years ago, said that knowing oneself is one of the greatest virtues. Although today's general judgment claims that everyone is very self-centered, selfish and obsessively self-interested, the reality seems quite different from this.
In fact, we are not very aware of ourselves, our ideas and who we are. When we look at the studies, this does not seem surprising at all, as most adults spend a very small part of their day alone and thinking. The thinking here is “What should we eat for dinner?” or “Is the electricity bill a little high this month?” Please don't take it. “Who am I?”, “What am I doing?”, “What are the ideas and values that I attach importance to in my life?” I'm talking about questions like these and giving ourselves a comfortable space to relax.
However, we can't pass all this off with the excuse that I don't have enough time to spare for myself. In an interesting 2014 study (Wilson et al., 2014), researchers offered participants 2 choices: either to sit quietly and think about themselves and their lives, or give themselves painful electric shocks. 4 out of 10 participants preferred the electroshock option. They found the pain of electroshock more bearable than the pain of thinking about what they wanted or did about themselves, their relationships, and their lives. In short, even if we have time and space, we can avoid thinking about ourselves. However, when we spend too little time understanding who we are, both our sense of self and our relationships with important people in our lives are negatively affected.
So what is this self-knowledge? We can mention many concepts in the literature here, but self-concept clarity may be the most important concept here. This concept describes how coherent, continuous, tuned and clear a person's thoughts about himself are. People with a high level of this feature have little difficulty in defining themselves and their definitions remain constant over time. At the same time, they have less conflicting thoughts (for example, saying that they are both shy and easy going).
Such people They have little difficulty describing themselves to another person, their thoughts often have a certain parallelism, and they have a clear definition of who they are. Their opinions about themselves do not change quickly and constantly. Of course, there are many benefits to having such a feature. These people are less stressed, depressed, anxious, and anxious. At the same time, they are individuals who have high self-esteem, see life as more meaningful, and have higher levels of both life satisfaction and well-being. All of these work for us individually as well as for our relationship.
People with high self-concept clarity experience more satisfaction, warmth, and commitment in their relationships. Since they have a higher self-esteem, this influence is also reflected in their relationships.
Since these people have a more stable judgment about themselves, they reflect the extra time and energy left to them, nurturing and protecting the relationships. For this reason, the relationships of people with high clarity last for a long time. Since people have consistent judgments about themselves, they see their relationships as an important part of their lives.
Imagine having such a partner. Your partner's ideas, feelings and thoughts are not too volatile, but predictable and consistent. He knows what he wants and what he doesn't want. Their goals and values are parallel. The chances of a negative surprise are pretty low. Doesn't such a partner seem more attractive to you?
The friends, partners or people around the individuals with high self-concept clarity choose similar and close words when describing these individuals. Because these individuals have a self that can preserve its own structure regardless of the shape of the environment they enter, rather than a self that changes according to time, place and people. This makes them more predictable, reliable and desirable. Our relationships with such people are easy, rewarding, and carefree for us. That's why we find such people more attractive, caring and close. People who are emotionally unpredictable, inconsistent and distorted, and whose behavior is uncertain and unplanned create feelings of anxiety, fear and discomfort in us. For this unpredictability we usually try to protect ourselves by not getting close to these people or if we are close, we end our relationship.
The more our partner knows himself, the better we get to know him. If we have a partner who has no idea who he is, can we claim that we really know him and can predict what he will do?
In romantic relationships, couples often adopt the characteristics of each other. This is actually a desirable and positive situation. If you and your partner are people with high self-concept clarity, this adoption is highly lucrative. Because you know who you are and who your partner is, all that remains is to take the positive traits from him and give him the positive traits in yourself. However, if you or your partner are individuals with low self-concept clarity, you can easily copy the other person's self-characteristics and become alienated from yourself. You think, feel and act what you don't want. This makes it very difficult for you to read and predict yourself and the world. As a result, you feel trapped in a world of anxiety, fear, and discomfort. If you are experiencing such feelings, it may be beneficial for you to seek help from a specialist psychologist. Because copying someone else without self-discovery leads us to lose ourselves over time and leads us to an elusive uncertainty about who we are. However, for the person who knows and knows himself, there is not much new source of anxiety and fear apart from the ordinary difficulties of life. Because the person who knows his limits and potential will find the strength to fight the difficulties.
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