Ko Aham (को अहं): Fragments of Self

"Who am I?" The question appears quite simple, but it is as ancient as human existence itself. It lingers beneath our daily routines, shaping our choices, forming our relationships, and influencing our understanding of the world. Identity is both the blueprint of our soul and the social DNA through which others recognise us. It constructs, deconstructs and reconstructs in response to experiences, geographies, cultures, traumas, and triumphs. And at the core of this evolving landscape lies the possibility, and sometimes the pain, of a fractured identity.

Throughout history, identity has often been imposed rather than discovered. In traditional Indian society, for instance, identity was once closely tethered to caste, lineage, and community. One was "born into" an identity long before one could speak, choose, or question, or like in today's world, it is perceived by one's abilities. Yet the philosophical pursuit embedded in the Sanskrit phrase ko aham?—"Who am I?"—suggests that identity is not merely inherited or a label but also sought after. It is an inward journey, a search for meaning of self that cannot be dictated by society alone.

My own pursuit with identity has never been straightforward. I have often struggled with questions like: Who am I? Where do I belong? How do I fit into the multiple worlds I inhabit? My life has been shaped by forces that both anchored and displaced me; by a childhood defined by transitions and an adulthood shaped by transnational existence. Due to these constant moves, I feel that my identity is less like a stable constant but a variable, and more like a jigsaw puzzle of different experiences coming together to form a whole—ME.

A Childhood on the Move

I grew up in India in a family which often moved due to my father's work. Every few years we packed our lives into trunks and started again in a new place. Each move was marked by a new geography, new school, new friends, new languages, and new cultural landscapes.

Sometimes the move felt liberating—especially if the previous school had been difficult—or it could be isolating. A new city meant a fresh start, a chance to rewrite oneself in small ways. But other times, the transitions were difficult—leaving behind close friends, familiar streets, and comfort zones created a sense of disruption and lost bearings. Every transition came with excitement and sadness, gain and loss, novelty and grief.

These continual relocations at times had unexpected and surprising outcomes too. When I entered university, I realised that I had become more tolerant and adaptable than many of my peers. After having moved all these times as a child and integrating into new environments, I developed a natural adaptability and curiosity towards differences. At my university in Delhi, which was also my home for the longest time, there were students from across the country with varied backgrounds, traditions, perspectives, speaking different languages/dialects. For many, this diversity was overwhelming and they clung to their regional cohorts. For me this new environment felt familiar—almost like coming home to the unfamiliar once again.

Assimilation amongst such a varied group of fellow students was not so difficult for me as I had learnt to adapt to differences. But this adaptability came at a cost: the unsettling thought that I belonged everywhere and yet nowhere, for I could not answer where I was from.

Crossing Oceans

These fractures within myself deepened when I moved beyond India—first to the United States, then China, and eventually, the Netherlands. There was a constant 'tug of war' between each transition and identity. These relocations transported me far beyond the cultural frameworks and my comfort zone that had shaped my early years. Moving abroad, unlike moving within India where cultural threads remained recognisable, meant encountering environments where everything was foreign: language, customs, people, even the rhythm of daily life.

Arriving in the United States, I found myself anonymous and hyper-visible simultaneously. It was easy for me to disappear into the vastness of the country and its diversity. Even though I am married to a person who grew up in the United States, I was often marked by my accent, ethnicity, or habits—sometimes leading to curiosity, other times to misunderstanding. While I was navigating this new land, I learnt that identity is just not a self-perception but is negotiated also through the eyes of others. I was Indian, yes—but I was also an immigrant and FOB (fresh off the boat). Internally, I was torn and struggled to be accepted 'as is', with another layer of fragmentation: Was I still the person I had been in India, or was I becoming someone entirely new? And this question was quite unsettling as I did not want to lose myself!

China posed its own challenges. The language barrier was immense and the cultural codes opaque. In China, small daily interactions, like buying groceries or asking for directions, became exercises in vulnerability. I often felt my capabilities and interactions reduced to gestures, smiles, and approximations. I felt frustrated, sad, lonely and uprooted as I found this unfamiliar ground daunting and too hard to tread on. But within this struggle emerged perseverance and humility. I learned that identity is not only what we bring to a place but what we absorb from it and become. Moments of helplessness and desperation helped me discover new forms of strength: patience, observation, and an ability to exist in uncertainty. Over time, these became part of my internal design, my new blueprint, further complicating and dividing my inner-self.

Then came the Netherlands, adding yet another layer to my complex self. Dutch society, with its emphasis on directness and egalitarianism, contrasted sharply with the collectivist nuances of Indian culture or the warmth of Chinese interactions or even the warm hello of strangers in the US. Once again, I learnt to read and navigate a new social landscape. Living in Amsterdam—surrounded by people from all over the world—augmented the sense of multiplicity within me. I felt that my identity was no longer linear; it felt layered, global, disjointed and unsettling at times. And the question of where do I belong deepened.

The Beauty in the Fractures: Still Becoming

The underlying theme of fractured identity persisted through all these transitions. Over time, I learnt to see fracture as a form of complexity, not as weakness. A fractured identity is not a broken identity but a piece of the jigsaw puzzle—ME.

It is important to acknowledge and appreciate the emotional terrain of such multiplicity. Moving across continents to new countries often meant starting from scratch—building new friendships, decoding cultures, re-establishing routines. It was never easy—it came with sadness and lows of life. Many a times it felt that I was putting up a facade, being untrue to myself. Each time I left a place, I left behind a part of myself that had learned to belong there. The person I was in India was not the same as the person I became in the US, China, or the Netherlands. But these versions did not disappear; they coexisted, at times harmoniously and sometimes in tension. The fractures were real: moments of doubt, loneliness, sadness or dislocation. But these fractures also allowed the light of new beginnings to enter. They created openings for introspection, appreciation, empathy, curiosity, hope, resilience and a more humble, adaptable self.

My life echoes these ideas, not as abstract theory but as a lived reality. I am not one cohesive, uninterrupted story but a superimposition of layers of intersecting stories, each shaped and coloured by place, time, people, relationships and challenges.

So, who am I? The answer remains evolving. I am the child who learned to adapt to new geographies. I am the university student who embraced diversity. I am the immigrant in the US, the perplexed newcomer in China, and the global citizen in the Netherlands. I am Indian, shaped by cultures far beyond India's borders. I am fragments, but these fragments create a mosaic that is uniquely mine and my blueprint—my identity.

Belonging, too, reveals itself differently with time. Once upon a time I longed for a fixed spatial point of reference—a geographic place or culture to call home. And today, home is beyond a physical location. It is a collection of fragments of experiences, relationships, and internal landscapes. I belong to the memories of each place I have lived. I belong to the cultures, smells, and tastes that I have adapted to, the languages I have learned, the friendships I have nurtured, and the environments and geographies that have carved me.

And perhaps that is the most honest response to ko aham?—I am many things: I am shaped by movement, I am shaped by learning, I am shaped by people, I am shaped by every place I have called home… and I am still becoming—I am fragmented yet I am whole!

About the Author:

Dr. Purva (Ph.D.), based in Amsterdam, is a geographer and conservation practitioner working at the intersection of protected-area management, community-based eco-development, and environmental education. She served as South Asia Coordinator with the Smithsonian Institution's UN-funded Man and the Biosphere (MAB-BRIMS) team and consulted for UNDP, the Wildlife Institute of India, WWF-India, and the World Bank. She earned her Ph.D. at Jawaharlal Nehru University, with a Pre-Doctoral Fulbright Scholarship at the University of Colorado Boulder, and also leads her family foundation's work supporting education and life-skills development.