The True Self

Here's an excellent essay: https://www.academia.edu/12250379/_Kierkegaardian_Deconstruction_and_the_Paradoxes_of_Faith

I had a realization: when one realizes that "just be yourself" doesn't mean anything, and even if there were some static "true self," most people lack the self-reflection and sensitivity to even know what that true self entails. Why else do we have to "find our passion," as though passions are pre-packaged dimensions of our selves and not reactions to experience? If I already have a set of passions, shouldn't I already know what those are?

From where does the static notion of the self arise? Why do we speak of the majority of social or intellectual traits as being genetic, inborn, innate, "natural" rather than learned, studied, trained, practiced? Why do we possess down to the dot a complete package that is unalterable and to which we must be true? Do we?

It will further be interesting to consider Kierkegaard's definition of the self as a relation relating itself to itself in light of semiotics.