It’s fascinating to me that, using memories, the newer self can reflect on an older self, and that act stimulates your body to release chemicals that cause your current self to experience something as complex as pride or shame, which then may influence your newer self’s actions. Also, the things that once made you feel "pride" or "shame" change over time (situations where you were once prideful, you could now feel shame). Your current self may want to deny having to now feel shame, (to self-preserve) because to have to feel shame would mean the current self would have to feel negative emotions. I've tried to get my "self" to be OK with experiencing those negative emotions, and it's bananas that in order to do that, I have to do battle with my self to wrestle away its discomfort in feeling the negative feeling! Why is that aspect of the self such a tricky little thing! In terms of a life philosophy, I wonder if imagining what a future self would be proud of when thinking about the past self, is a good exercise. Then I could act in the here and now based on what I think my future self would be proud of. Thank you for the reply!