Chelsea Swan

Recently my thoughts have been mostly connected with the theme of the inner and outer self in relation to it being a condition specifically felt by women (gender not sex). This is not even taking into account the way in which women within other minorities may feel these aspects. I only feel qualified to speak from the perspective of a cis white woman but that does not mean that I see this as purely a condition of that section of society.

As I see it there is the Inner self which relates to the true self, the form taken by a person’s thoughts or feelings, which is only known by the self. Which can never be known fully or truthfully by any other. It is fully within, isolated, and inexpressible. It can never be seen by any other without being manipulated either by the self or by the other.

The Outer self has two components. The first is the projection of self. I don’t believe anyone can ever be truly themselves, openly and honestly. We cannot project ourselves as we are at a primary level. We alter ourselves for the audience, the setting, the purpose of presenting our-self. We live in a patriarchal society and view ourselves through the male gaze, which is the dominant gaze for the woman, but society also holds up many other gazes and lenses which we play to, feeling the self bump up against the boundaries. We express the self within these social and societal selves. We protect ourselves and manipulate how we are perceived in order to best communicate to others who and what we are, how we feel and how we see things. The second component is the Perceived self. Try as we might to be our true selfs, to be seen by others, we never are. Even our projections are rarely taken as we have given them. The self that is our inner self, the self that we project, and the self that is perceived are three completely different entities. They do not know each other and may not even like each other.

This relates to the concept of otherness – femininity and womanhood / girlhood as a state of otherness. There is a feeling of being outside, of not being what the world is catered towards, not who the books were written for or who the art was made for. Again this does not even touch on the intersectional view that exists within this frame of being othered. As a woman our difference has been defined and no matter how much our inner self may identify with humanity as whole or certain aspects of humanity, certain spheres of reality or society, the outer self cannot project this, it can not be perceived as such.

For women there is the ‘ I ‘ of the lived experience and there is the ‘We‘ of the shared experience which are both gendered. The inner self is not gendered. Women feel this othering, this gendering, this outsiderness more because we live in a patriarchal society. We play the part to exist and achieve without fear of negative consequences.

I need to look more at the work of Simone de Beauvoir, not so much her work on The Second Sex but her philosophical and autobiographical works of literature which relate her ideas of inner and outer self.