What does ​"findi​ng ​yourself&qu​ot; mean?

...and why does it involves backpacking through Europe?

...and does it mean you're lost?

...and would you know it if you're lost?

...and how do you know when you've found yourself?

It's what people without a sense of direction do

It involves different things for different people.

It involves figuring out who you are or who you wish to become.

 You just know.

Speaking of lost, this must be one of my favourite quotes:

Some Guy wrote:

One who wanders is not always lost

Minh wrote:

...and why does it involves backpacking through Europe?

Girlfriend left ya?

Matthew van Eerde wrote:



Lloyd_Humph wrote: Speaking of lost, this must be one of my favourite quotes: Some Guy wrote: One who wanders is not always lost

J. R. R. Tolkein - "Not all who wander are lost".

Indeed

Bas wrote:



Minh wrote: ...and why does it involves backpacking through Europe?

Girlfriend left ya?

She can never leave as long as there's a Google.

But seriously, of course, the cliche' meaning of "finding yourself" was always understood, and readily presented in bar arguments.

But what does it really mean? Maybe behind the seemingly faux intellectual pretention, there's some real meaning there?

Oh, f*ck it!

Minh wrote:



Bas wrote:  Minh wrote: ...and why does it involves backpacking through Europe? Girlfriend left ya?

She can never leave as long as there's a Google.

But seriously, of course, the cliche' meaning of "finding yourself" was always understood, and readily presented in bar arguments.

But what does it really mean? Maybe behind the seemingly faux intellectual pretention, there's some real meaning there?

Oh, f*ck it!

It's 'becomming comfortable with who you are'.  You don't have to go backpacking to do it. 

Doesn't mean you can't lose yourself again, though. I did.

Herbie

Lloyd_Humph wrote:

Speaking of lost, this must be one of my favourite quotes:

Some Guy wrote: One who wanders is not always lost

somehow makes me think of Jack Karouac's On the Road.

What if you're to lazy to go find yourself? Can't you let someone else find you and return you to you?

"Life is not about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself."

blehbleh wrote:

It means you know who you are and what you want to do with your life. I'm one of those few lucky ones who found myself long ago. The result is a happy life.

I'm really not picking on you (really), and this is the last of any literary quotes;

"Only the shallow know themselves".

Oscar Wilde.

Minh wrote:

...and why does it involves backpacking through Europe?

It does?

Minh wrote:

...and does it mean you're lost?

Somehow... a little maybe.. you know... you gotta find yourself, your true self deep inside you.

Minh wrote:

...and would you know it if you're lost?

No, not when you are, but finally when you found yourself again, you normally realize it.

Minh wrote:

...and how do you know when you've found yourself?

No, others do, and maybe... they tell you. That's when you start to realize.

PS: I am psychic. It might be different for you, especially for the part of others telling you.

and yet Oscar Wilde was very content with defining what his life meant, what his calling was, and what it meant not to be shallow. I'm not saying Wilde had no point in saying that, but that his point is betrayed by some complication.

Interestingly, a book out of the Vatican is praising Wilde, who was a convert to Catholicism, as an example of a great anti-conformist Christian thinker : http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/features/daily-features/article2126380.ece

Charles wrote:

"Yeah, I think I'm in the midst of a mid-life crisis, but I'm at peace with it

Tell me about Charles. Though in my case I'm not so much at peace with it, but want to kick the living daylights out of it...

Anyway, for a lot of people, they tend to load themselves down with various forms of heavy commitment. At a young age, which you seem to imply by your examples, the 'find yourself' stuff is often a load of rubbish. Yes, there are exceptions, but they typically don't have anything like the 'baggage' of an older person, in say, a mid-life crisis.

Plus with the international media, etc, people are not so isolated anymore, being exposed to many, many ideas, etc. Though I'm not saying that experience is not a good teacher. Not at all.

So the basic premise behind the 'go back packing' idea is that you free yourself of all of your major burdens and commitments, allowing you to, after some time, naturally find your 'buoyancy'. If you can't, or are unwilling to do that, then something is gotta give... enter the stereo-typical mid-life crisis often documented…[A]

It means looking in ward to see who you really are. Some people can go an entire life time with out digging into them self. It doesn’t necessarily take back packing threw Europe to do this. Some times finding ones self comes after over coming some kind of adversity.