This quote resonated with me:
   developmental psychologist Erik Erikson in Identity: Youth and
   Crisis (1968):
   various selves... make up our composite Self. There are constant
   and often shocklike transitions between these selves... It
   takes, indeed, a healthy personality for the *I* to be able to
   speak out of all these conditions in such a way that at any
   moment it can testify to a reasonably coherent Self.
   [end quote]

   I read Youth and Crisis in college when I first got there. I was
   bored, going through the library stacks. I saw "Youth and
   Crisis". I sat down. I read it. Flipped through. Looked at
   charts. Absorbed Erik Erikson.

   I absorbed his conceptualizations of the composite self so
   completely that I sometimes forget that I got it from him, but I
   did. He put the pieces of "me" together better than any singular
   "tree style" narrative, or monomyth version of my life.

   I believe a monomyth (beats impossible monster, returns home
   changed) is _useful_ for many people; as something to help
   crystallize an otherwise chaotic existence... but I also agree
   with the negative side of it as well.

   Western culture tends to greatly support the narrative view and
   it doesn't seem likely to change, so it's good to be fluent in
   it, even with yourself. Some people speak only monomyth - only
   stories; for them, life seems to be a series of movie plots and
   Lifetime movies and they fit their own lives and the lives of
   those around them into stories they've heard, without even
   realizing they are doing it.

   It's approachable and simple. Life-as-a-fairytale or
   Life-as-a-horror-novel. It works. It's common, and it's hard to
   avoid at times.

   The alternative -full comprehension of the composite self - at
   this point in time in history appears to be at advanced level,
   although I suspect as Western culture delves more into Anime and
   its style of multifaceted, complex narratives, rather than the
   standard western Hero / Villain / fight-the-evil-and-win
   narrative, we might be ready to explore composite, complex
   selves a little more fully as a culture.

   I'm always hopeful.