You're going to be. Welcome to the happiness podcast. I'm Dr. Robert Puff. In last week's podcast we examined together how awareness is the

cornerstone of helping us change our behavior. In this week's podcast we're going to look at how awareness is the cornerstone of who we are.

But Dr. Puff, how could awareness be the cornerstone of who we are?

I mean, after all, we have our families,

we have our experiences, we have our schooling,

we have our memories.

Don't all these memories experiences together, create and make us

and define us as to who we are?

They definitely play a role in who we think we are right now, but the key component there is who we think

we are. But who we think we are is actually in constant flux and changes all the time.

For a moment, let's all close our eyes together and let's remember who we were

four days, three hours, and ten minutes ago. Can any of us remember? Clearly our memories

aren't exact. They change, they transform, we forget things, we have new memories that replace

old ones, we talk to someone else, they see it very differently than we do, and then we change it. We change our memories

of who we are changes. Let's say, for example, when we were in elementary school, we were

very shy and hesitant to make new friends.

Then we got into high school, got into drama, became more actively involved with other people,

and enjoyed interacting with other people.

But if we then went up the university, we may take on a completely different persona, a different

identity. We may now become the party animal,

and we may become the academic scholar. There's different hats that we wear throughout our

lives. When we go to family or high school reunions, yes, there's characteristics that are the same,

...