To know oneself is something that is very difficult as there are many layers to personality and actions. I think that the most important factor to knowing oneself is time. I think that by reflecting on one’s past and tendencies we can begin to understand patterns in how we act and react in the face of different situations. I think that for me that a lot of the time I have reflected on things I have done in the past and I have seen striking similarities to how I act now. The past is important to understanding oneself but also humans change and especially as we grow we may change how we react. I think that to some extent it is impossible to completely understand everything about ourselves because there exist some things that are just buried so deep and are so subconscious that it is nearly impossible for us to truly comprehend them. I think that this can abbrituted a lot of our memories. I think the way that we look back on our past omits many important details and we tend to romanticize certain eras of our life and look back on them with nostalgia while not remembering everything about it. I think also the fact that the human brain is always moving and we get caught up in the fast pace of life and bury a lot of things and then forget about them. That is why a lot of things get buried and we don’t deal with them. These can be emotions like hurt, pain, resentment. These for example can be very harmful as we let the fester and this can make us get angry and we don’t even know what we're angry about. I think that one thing to understand about us humans is the fact that we are fundamentally flawed in a society that wants us to be as close to perfection as possible. I think that this really fundamentally creates a mindset that is heavily focused on improving oneself in every aspect of life. This can be very harmful as when we build our self esteem and pride on being successful in certain areas. When we inevitably fail, all that pressure put on top us leads us to collapse. In this world full of expectations be they self-imposed or put by family or friends can lead us to be crushed under the pressure. I think that is why people nowadays tend to fall so often into depression as our self esteem is fragile and when it is damaged it can be really hard to get the motivation to continue. That is one of the great flaws of modern society as it defines us by our skills and achievements.