Buried Selves: How Identity Mirrors Historical Preservation

Imagine walking into an ancient church in Turkey, its walls layered with priceless remnants of human history. Most of the edifice glimmers with the elegance of Islamic calligraphy. But just beneath the whitewashed plaster, a Byzantine mosaic shimmers faintly where the years have forced the plaster to fall away, whispering of a time when this space was a Christian basilica. And beneath that, hints of an even older pagan temple with hand-painted stick figures tempt the visitor to remove a little more plaster.

How far back does this building go? You learn from the curator that its preservationists face a dilemma: Which of these layers should remain? The newest? The oldest? The most precious?

Which layer would you preserve? Which layers would you throw away? This question may seem to be about architecture, but it is also a deeply personal dilemma related to a person’s psychological sense of identity.

In many ways, a historical building is like the self—layers of once-successful selves that are no longer the person with whom we identify. You may have been a popular teen, but that was long ago. You may have been a successful artist but now manage a growing business. Which layer best represents the person you want others to see? Which layers do you desperately need to keep hidden?

Memory Is a Layered Structure

Cognitive psychology teaches us that memory is not a static thing. Something inside is constantly revising everything we think we know to ensure that the sum of what we know remains consistent and coherent. Every time we recall an event, we subtly rewrite it, much like a historian restoring a fresco who inadvertently modifies its meaning. Our minds, like buildings with many coats of plaster, carry traces of past experiences, some of which are visible while others remain hidden beneath newer layers of self-explanation. The story of one’s life is ever in flux.

Psychologists call this process memory reconsolidation to explain how older memories can be reshaped or even replaced by new experiences. Just as a church-turned-mosque might have its Christian art covered and then later uncovered, our minds suppress and then later retrieve certain aspects of our past. But what should be preserved? The most acceptable self?

Cognitive Dissonance and Identity Confusion

A society restoring an ancient building—or perhaps rewriting an embarrassing history—faces a decision not unlike an individual grappling with various conflicting memories. If a building has served multiple faiths over the centuries, whose history should be honored? Similarly, if an individual has been many things during his or her life, which version of the self should he or she decide to be? Which parts of oneself should one strip away to reveal the best parts?

Psychologists call this dissonance reduction—the odd attempt to reduce psychological discomfort by tweaking conflicting beliefs. Just as a historian may struggle with whether to emphasize Christian or Islamic elements in a restoration, individuals often work to resolve contradictions in their personal narratives. Sometimes, they suppress inconvenient memories or rewrite their pasts to preserve the self-image they want others to see.

Selective Attention

Another thing cognitive psychologists have noticed is that our worldview is greatly influenced by what we do or do not pay attention to most of the time. We are exposed to an astounding amount of stimuli each and every day but can only preserve a little of it for very long. What we eventually remember is more selective than accurate, much like preserving only one layer of an ancient temple while ignoring the others. The surviving layer is the one we become most familiar with and believe in, just as memory retrieval is heavily influenced by what is easiest to recall.

The Ethics of Personal Restoration

The decisions faced by conservators are not so different from those encountered by psychologists helping patients reconstruct traumatic memories. Once a historical layer is removed, it is often lost forever. Similarly, once a person has reframed a past experience (to get past it), it may be difficult to retrieve the original trauma the person needs to be rid of.

Some find strength in remembering the adversity they survived and overcame, while others accidentally cling to it by trying to cover it up with more and more plaster (as though it never happened). Meanwhile, the memories lay hidden, afraid to be uncovered again.

The Mind Is Like a Temple Under Construction

The mind is like a temple under constant reconstruction. At its core, the dilemma of architectural preservation reflects a deeper human struggle: how to reconcile the previous self with the self we want others to see. Should we erase, rewrite, or find a way to reconcile our conflicting life stories? Just as historians must navigate these questions in restoring sacred spaces, individuals must do the same in reshaping that sacred inner architecture known as one’s identity.

Whether you are a historian, a psychologist like me, or simply an individual reflecting on your past, the challenge is not just what to remember but how—without erasing, distorting, or losing sight of the truth of who you really are. Perhaps, like a carefully preserved ancient church, the most honest approach is to let every layer show anyway, revealing a struggle to find worth and meaning despite the ravages of time and continual self-doubt.