explaining myself through stories
The author reflects on using narratives as a primary way to explain their sense of self, noting that while most people associate rivers with personal identity, they use storytelling to convey who they are.
Background
- This is a personal essay from the blog "jyn.dev," likely written by a software developer or tech-adjacent writer. The blog's name and domain suggest the author goes by "jyn" and works in tech, though the essay itself is about identity, not code.
- The line "When most people think 'river' I bet they think 'personal identity'" alludes to the philosophical idea of the "river of identity" — the notion that a person's sense of self is fluid and continuous like a river, changing over time while still being recognizably the same "flow."
- The author is riffing on a common trope in personal narrative writing: using a natural metaphor (river, tree, mountain) to explain one's self-concept. The joke is that this is such a familiar move that a reader can guess the author's entire point from just the word "river."
- No specific prior news or controversy needed. This is an introspective, literary-adjacent tech blog post about selfhood and storytelling.