Sartre's lemma

This is Sartre's lemma: l'être n'est pas ce qu'il est, il est ce qu'il nes pas,

self is not what it is, it is what it is not.

Our identity, l'être, the self, IS in time.

There are two cuts: past to present and present to future. The yellow indicates past-to-present. the green, present-to-future

1- past-to-present.

this is our past, meaning all the q-memories and q-desires and beliefs of the past. ourselves' own movie, a unique, first-person-report movie.
 
This self-movie we all have is our NARRATIVE. Whatever you say about yourself, however you describe yourself is yours, whatever you think you can be (with all the emotional coloring of your-self). Did you lie? Do you hold back? Do you feel traumatized? Do you feel empowered? All this happens because of all the bits and pieces of your own narrative.

NARRATIVE always supervenes on your actual person.  

2- present-to-future. 

this is the projection of the self into the future. it hasn't happened, but it's contained in the NARRATIVE (for example what you want to do with your life). Whatever we wish for the future is part of our PROJECT. Selves have projects. We've done this in class. You "see yourself as..." the future self is different that the present self in the execution of the project. in fact, the self "as-projected" is already different than the present self. it's different in a potential sense, not in an actual sense.

Sartre's lemma indicates that PERSONAL IDENTITY IS A SELF-GENERATING PROCESS.