The Two Main Things Which Shape Us

Who you are right now, what makes you who you are, what you are, and the way you are, is shaped by two things: The past and the future.

It goes without saying that we are shaped by the events and experiences of our past. But we are also shaped in many different ways, by the events and experiences of a future we already imagine we know. Our fears, our anxieties, our plans and preparations, our emotions, our moods, our actions, and more than that, are shaped and molded by what we expect to happen in the future.

From a knee jerk reaction in anticipation of the doctor hitting our knee, to eating a healthy diet, to assuming to anticipate a lover or spouses action or reaction, to dedicating yourself to getting that good job or promotion, to reacting to others based on what you think they will do or say in the future, to awaiting or fearing the future, to living your life to be known as a good moral person and feel proud of yourself, to shaping and molding yourself to be the person in the future you aspire to be, to being self-reliant and/or lack of trust toward others, the list goes on and on. But it all goes to show that we are who we are because of what we remember from the past, and what we expect of the future.

It is also the fulfillment or failure of things that we expected in the future, when that future is reached, that determine who we are and how we are in the here and now; and all because of how we shaped our lives and our expectations toward the future when the future was still just that.