I’ve never been a religious person, nor a superstitious one. I’ve never found myself convinced by the realms of faith or magic.
But ittedly—against my own beliefs and convictions—I’ve often found myself fantasizing that some abstract omnipotent being, one with the magic and generosity of a genie in a bottle, might spawn to my command, granting me endless wishes of my wildest desires at the mere snap of a finger.
I like to think I would first do the selfless thing and use my newfound power to right every injustice in the world. But this is not what the dream is about. At the heart of this fantasy are far more selfish inventions.
When I conjure up this vision, I see myself able to rectify every one of my flaws, insecurities, and imperfections at will, in an instant. I indulge in imagining how I might cut, paste, weave, deconstruct, and reconstruct myself again and again until I’m a perfect, flawless version of me.
I would wish to be carelessly confident; to navigate the world with comfort and certainty, not apprehensiveness and unease. I would wish the dreaded feeling of eyes on me—of being perceived—went unnoticed, was natural and insignificant. I would wish I could walk into crowded rooms without hesitation, without waiting sheepishly with my hand on the doorknob, cheeks burning and heart inexplicably racing, looking for a shameful excuse to turn around and walk away.
I would wish for these things and a million more, absolving myself of every deep-rooted, nagging, baseless insecurity, greedily redressing every self-perceived shortcoming, heedlessly taking myself apart piece by piece until nothing was left of me.
All that would remain would be a stranger carrying my name.
I imagine if I could methodically fix myself, piece by piece, wish by wish, I would eventually achieve complete satisfaction. The project would be finished, no more boxes to check, no more holes to patch, and I’d finally be the person I always wanted to be but never could, and life would float by in a meandering river of comfort, serenity, and contentment.
But the truth is, there wouldn’t be a ‘myself’ to reap the benefits of this exhaustive project of amendment. At least not the same one who started it.
There’s a philosophical thought experiment called “The Ship of Theseus.” It tells the story of a wooden ship belonging to the divine Greek hero, Theseus. The ship, made entirely of wood, was kept in the Athenian harbour as a memorial of Theseus, and for preservation, each time a wooden part became too deteriorated, it was replaced with a metal part. Eventually, every piece of wood was replaced, until the once wooden ship was made only of metal.
The parable asks whether Theseus’ ship, now entirely metal and without any of its original wooden parts, is still the original ship that Theseus first sailed into the harbour. It poses the question of whether an object is the same object after having had all its original components replaced.
Much like Theseus’ ship, the ‘me’ that remained after I’d so enthusiastically wished away every part of myself I might resent—after I’d replaced splintered, decaying wood with shiny metal—wouldn’t be ‘me.’
Every single one of a person’s idiosyncrasies and eccentricities—the raw and infinitely unique characteristics that differentiate us—are what make us distinct and real. Even our flaws, the things we wish we could change, are what make us who we are. They make you, you. This isn’t to say that our flaws are permanent and defining, but the true process of addressing them takes time and dedication.
In these arduous efforts, we might learn to accept or embrace what we once thought was a flaw, might discover or develop a new flaw, another peculiarity that adds to our being. This is all natural—a part of the human experience of becoming.
The genie fantasy lets me skip the hard part and instead jump headfirst into stitching and sewing together a new me with momentary ease. It byes the slow process of self-improvement that sees personal growth through struggle and discovery and instead lets me swap myself out for a stranger.
For my own sake, I guess it’s a good thing genies don’t exist.
The message, however, isn’t that in a world devoid of magic genies and endless wishes we’re left no choice but to begrudgingly accept the way we are. Genies or not, we should still strive toward accepting and embracing our flaws. We should come to see even the parts of ourselves we might not like, might want to change, as foundational pieces that make up our being; patterns woven into the tapestry of us. Whether they exist as something we might work toward improving, or as an insecurity we can learn to harness and cherish, they’re nonetheless integral facets in the structure of distinct personhood that defines us.
Now, this is ittedly an idealistic approach. If my presumption about the impossibility of genies and wishes is proven naive and a glowing lamp appears in my room tomorrow, carrying all the temptations of my grand fantasy, my convictions would certainly be tested. But after writing this, I think I’d hesitate, if even for a moment, before recklessly plunging in the knife and cutting out any and every part of myself I might dislike, wishing myself away in the vain chase for perfection.
Instead, I’d feel a surge of warmth inward, a sense of sentimentality, care, and possessiveness toward every single part of myself, a desire to preserve and protect even my flaws, because ultimately, above all else, they’re mine. And, in the continuous struggle between self-love and self-improvement, the precarious balance between confidence and complacency—the pursuit of the elusive, ever-receding horizon of self-acceptance—I think that this must be, at the very least, a step in the right direction.
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