Existential authenticity: What is the “self” anyway?

To argue that digital nomadism is used as a vehicle in which to find a better geographical fit for one’s existential self – that is, to achieve authenticity – is not to argue for the ontological truth of the self, that is, in an essential “authentic” self that exists unchanging over time waiting to be discovered. This is part of the reason why I’ve always disliked the common trope in backpacker circles of travel being touted as a means to “find yourself” and discover who you really are. I don’t think the self ever stands still, so to speak, but is constantly being (re)created through experience – through the maelstrom of life itself. I lean more towards social constructivism/poststructuralism in my ontological view of the world in that I think that the self, as well as meaning, is created through context; that is, through discourse, history, social relations, the social/cultural milieu, etc.

And yet, whilst holding these views of the self, I’ve always felt that a part of us – our values, and, relatedly, our morals – usually stays the same over the life course. But not because of some ontological necessity or some essential fact of our existence, but through the momentum of habit and the difficulty in changing conditioned patterns of behaviour from when we were young or more generally through repeated experience. Be that as it may, my position is that the self is always in flux and never fixed. The self, as an unchanging entity over time, I’d argue, is an illusion.

But this isn’t to deny the imperative to achieve existential authenticity of the self, because even if the self is the product of creation, at any point in time, there is still a created self that needs to be authentically realised. When we are able to live in an authentic way (which means dedicating our lives to doing the things that mean so much to us that are in accordance with our values) we are able to feel fulfilled, at least until the self – which we mistakenly take to be fixed in stone – starts to shift into something else as it continually confronts the unknown.