Possible Selves: the person you hope to be, fear becoming, and are

There’s a gap in your perception.

And the reality is, you likely exist somewhere between who you hope to be, who you fear you are, and who you actually are.

We’re all like this—to some degree.

Psychologists call these our possible selves: who we hope to become, who we fear becoming, and the other versions of us we carry around in our heads (Markus & Nurius, 1986).

If noticed, we can use them to our advantage.

But the best news?

None of them is absolute. And none of them is entirely real.

Possible selves, three main versions

At one end, there’s the person you hope to be.

This is who you aspire to be. The gracious, magnanimous, gregarious, generous. If you want to know this side better, look to your heroes. Look to your idols. They often embody the qualities you desire and admire. That’s part of the point of an aspirational self: it doesn’t just tell you who you want to be. It pulls you in that direction (Markus & Nurius, 1986).

At the other end, there’s the person you fear you are.

This is who you want nothing to do with. The petty, stingy, greedy, mean. Psychology has a name for this one, too: the undesired self—the person you desperately don’t want to become (Ogilvie, 1987). If you want to know this side better, look to the people you despise. Look to those you judge—the “evil,” awful, and deplorable. They often embody the qualities you disdain.

And then, somewhere in the middle, there’s the person you actually resemble.

This is the you, you most likely are.

This is where you start.

Now imagine these “selves” online

The internet is a powerful tool and a silly place.

It also gives you unusual control over which version of yourself other people get to see.

You can project who you want to be. Emphasize some qualities. Minimize others. Crop out the inconvenient bits.

We do, in fact, present idealized versions of ourselves online (Harris & Bardey, 2019). But that doesn’t necessarily make the story false.

It makes it incomplete.

Confusing yourself with your story is an easy trap to fall into.

Don’t mistake the machine for your message

In media, you are what you say you are.

In life, you ARE.

Everything else is just a story.

The internet acts like a microphone. It can only pick up certain frequencies and notes. Some things come through loudly. Others disappear. It helps to know that.

What you project isn’t the sum total of you, even if it’s what other people come to believe you are.

The person you hope to be can guide you. The person you fear can warn you. The person you are gives you somewhere to stand.

You are what you say you are. But what you say is only a story.

Choose your story wisely. Just don’t mistake it for yourself.

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References

Harris, E., & Bardey, A. C. (2019). Do Instagram profiles accurately portray personality? An investigation into idealized online self-presentation. Frontiers in Psychology, 10, 871. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00871

Markus, H., & Nurius, P. (1986). Possible selves. American Psychologist, 41(9), 954–969. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.41.9.954

Ogilvie, D. M. (1987). The undesired self: A neglected variable in personality research. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52(2), 379–385. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.52.2.379