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coping_and_otherlinkers2025-09-12 11:53 pm
weirdnerdygoat) wrote in coping_and_otherlinkers2025-09-12 11:53 pm
Linking and Time
(this is my first time posting on dreamwidth, so hopinggg that i'm doing this correctly!! send help if i uploaded wrong or something x3) (also i wrote this a whileee ago but procrastinated posting bc dreamwidth intimidated me XD)
(The title is a silly reference to Being and Time, no I have unfortunately not read it yet so the actual essay has no relation to it. BUT I THOUGHT IT'D BE FUNNY.)
The way I used to think of linking was of it as something that you do at one point of time, and then the identity continues linearly forward. Wow, this turns out to actually be a difficult idea to communicate, SO HERE'S A DIAGRAM
However, that's not really the way it ended up working for me.
You see, an important aspect of my linking process was changing my perspective of myself. I looked at traits already within myself and reinterpreted them as goat traits. For example, I had always enjoyed feeling different textures- this is also a thing that goats do!
(This is also one of the reasons for why my identity feels quoiluntary- I specifically chose to link a goat because I already had a lot in common with them, and the more I did this reinterpretation the more things I found. For my pattern seeking brain, this often felt like too much to simply be a mass of coincidences. But that is an essay for another day :3)
This process of reinterpretation also involved things that happened before I even began linking. Of course it did, I had *always* enjoyed feeling different textures! Same with my propensity for climbing stuff, love of foraging, taste for grass, general personality and much, much more.
So basically, I not only reinterpreted my current self as being a goat, I also reinterpreted my whole childhood and everything else that came before the linking. Looking back now, I can see how much of a goat I was throughout my whole life.
Building onto the earlier diagram, this is how my linking actually affected my identity:
Like 5 years ago if I were to say "I am a goat" I would have considered it incorrect. Now, if I say "I was a goat 5 years ago" I consider it correct. I look back, and I see a goat.
WHICH IS SO COOL. I changed my (subjective) past through linking! (I also have thoughts about how this relates to the metaphysics of time but I don't feel confident enough in my knowledge of the philosophy to attempt explaining them just yet, so yay this is it from me ajxjdjs)
Did anyone else experience weird time stuff like this with their linking, or any other identity?
(The title is a silly reference to Being and Time, no I have unfortunately not read it yet so the actual essay has no relation to it. BUT I THOUGHT IT'D BE FUNNY.)
The way I used to think of linking was of it as something that you do at one point of time, and then the identity continues linearly forward. Wow, this turns out to actually be a difficult idea to communicate, SO HERE'S A DIAGRAM
However, that's not really the way it ended up working for me.
You see, an important aspect of my linking process was changing my perspective of myself. I looked at traits already within myself and reinterpreted them as goat traits. For example, I had always enjoyed feeling different textures- this is also a thing that goats do!
(This is also one of the reasons for why my identity feels quoiluntary- I specifically chose to link a goat because I already had a lot in common with them, and the more I did this reinterpretation the more things I found. For my pattern seeking brain, this often felt like too much to simply be a mass of coincidences. But that is an essay for another day :3)
This process of reinterpretation also involved things that happened before I even began linking. Of course it did, I had *always* enjoyed feeling different textures! Same with my propensity for climbing stuff, love of foraging, taste for grass, general personality and much, much more.
So basically, I not only reinterpreted my current self as being a goat, I also reinterpreted my whole childhood and everything else that came before the linking. Looking back now, I can see how much of a goat I was throughout my whole life.
Building onto the earlier diagram, this is how my linking actually affected my identity:
Like 5 years ago if I were to say "I am a goat" I would have considered it incorrect. Now, if I say "I was a goat 5 years ago" I consider it correct. I look back, and I see a goat.
WHICH IS SO COOL. I changed my (subjective) past through linking! (I also have thoughts about how this relates to the metaphysics of time but I don't feel confident enough in my knowledge of the philosophy to attempt explaining them just yet, so yay this is it from me ajxjdjs)
Did anyone else experience weird time stuff like this with their linking, or any other identity?