You Are Five People

A long look at how you are perceived

and how people perceive you

You are five people. Like everyone else you are a different person in different eyes.

• You are the voice in your head, a constant companion that thinks you to sleep and greets you awake. It is the thoughts that plan and ponder, that worry and wonder.
• You are an acquaintance, the person people know as friend, colleague or nemesis; the one they kiss or hug or push and poke.
• You are a reputation, a stranger, a victim or hero known only by words in a news story, or in rumor or gossip.
• You are a nameless image, a stranger in a store, across the street, on a train; and
• You are an anonymous being without form, lost in a in crowd or a census or a tally of population, or in a headline like "hundreds flee flooding."

Think about those five persons you are. Then reflect upon those other people that come into your life through touch, sight and sound, that are kin to each of your selves.

• When you hear about a crowd, consider that each individual there has a voice talking to itself, thinking a thought, pondering a purpose, expecting an event.
• When you see a stranger, obese or thin, beautiful or odd, lively or disabled, know that inside his or her head are moments of imagination, fear, and happiness.
• When you read a biography or hear gossip about someone, realize that person has memories, considers circumstance, harbors hope.
• When you meet an acquaintance, friend or foe, appreciate their need for respect, their search for comfort, their want of love.
• When you see your face in a mirror, know you are five people, just like everyone else.