If you had to change your name, what would your new name be?
And I don’t know whether it is a good thing or not. What we are known by is what others decided to call us. Some had very creative parents who named them after mathematical or chemical formulas, you know like Na Chi or Pi Lee or Hillman jagot. Other people were given names at the height of a soap opera – Alejandro or Jesus.
And what is in a name? Does it matter what name you go by unless for extreme cases where you need a new identity? Say you have been running a pyramid scheme in one area and want to start a new one in a different locale, should you start the business under your old name or new name? Will this be good for business?
My new name would be like my old name, maybe just shorter.
Random thoughts 
I’d change my name to “Hey You!” I’d do this cause every time someone called me by name, everyone around me would think they were the ones being called. Hey You, watch ya doing? And everyone around me would look and answer saying, “are you speaking to me?” Oh, what fun that would be. ๐
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Hey You is a masterstroke!
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Qiana Maeev….I like different…..Patricia Jean is so mundane.
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Patricia Jean is beautiful!
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I was named after an old girlfriend of father’s, & mother going along with it, doesn’t sit well.
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I hear you.
I got named following the season and time I was born
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Yes, I figured that one out sometime ago.
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Been thinking of dropping the season associated name but changing names in this country is harder than removing a tooth. I would have to jump loops to just get it done then changing certificates and all is a hassle
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I think it’s like that everywhere, which is silly. If a person wants to change their name, they should be able to without a huge effort to do so, as long as it stays a one time thing, for given names.
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But changing my name to No Hell would be nice.
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Well, I could call you that, if you like, & make a start with it….hahahaha…
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Brilliant reframing.
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I know.
I had a boss who always called me no hell
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even better add this middle name:
No Hell GodFrey
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Haha. I should start signing off as no hell godfrey
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Change it from Noel to what, Christian?
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To No Hell
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BITE TOUR TONGUE!!!! Hahahahaha……
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HA! I don’t think my name could get much shorter!
Overall, names are simply identifiers. Obviously, some wonder what was going through their parents’ mind when they picked their name! But overall, we are who we are no matter what name is on our birth certificate.
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Yours can’t be shortened unless we just say Na
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I kind of did. I chose a name for my online identity, and have kept it without changing it for over 15 years. Most of the people that I would consider as online friends only know me by my internet handle.
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Your online name is quite unique, I must say
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I hoped so, but every so often I try to create an account somewhere, and the name will already be taken and I have to use a variant. (Most recently, on Twitch.) So there’s at least one other person out there who has used it.
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The important question is what pronouns MUST be used in referring to your special self. Mine are โRoarโ and โScreechโ as I identify as a blue-scaled Venusian Dragon
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a rare breed to be sure.
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This is very critical
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I did give myself a name when I got to adulthood. In real life I was named after my grandfather, but I wanted to create my own place in the world without that weight.
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You didn’t have to change any of the IDs? Or certificates?
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No. I just adopted it socially.
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Ah, I think changing mine now even socially would be a hard sell.
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It must be more complicated in Click Click language.
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Don’t say that aloud! Complicated doesn’t even come close. You are trying to have the exclamation mark before or after the name and introduce new sounds. Hellish stuff
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Do you have to become a dolphin and go into the sea if I say it three times? ๐
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Pink go and sleep ๐
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Iโd only change my last nameโto nasium. Jim Naseum
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Haha. Jim this is lazy ๐
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It only sounds that way because it is
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the problem with changing your name is that by the time you do it, it’s too late. You are your name, like it or not.
Performers have the best deal, they can keep their old name, or invent a new one, or have one handed to them. Would anyone have had the impact of Marilyn Monroe if she had kept her original “Norma Jean”?
I was named, I suspect, because of the popularity of Judy Garland in the mid forties. sigh. It was a woefully popular name, in my high school graduating class of 30 kids, four of us were named Judy. I would loved to have been called Jessie or Jenny. And I utterly detest ‘Judith”. Which is why I rarely use it online…=)
I’ve read that in some cultures children have a baby name, and when they reach a certain age they get to choose their grownup name. That makes much more sense than hauling around a cute baby name when you’re no longer cute or a baby. And these days it seems, at least in the US, that parents have gone off the rails when it comes to names and spelings; Edith is now something like eDDeyeth, and Marian is Marryuhnne.
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I gained a new great-granddaughter a little less than a month ago … and she has been named Harlow!
I can’t help but wonder if this is the new trend … to give non-binary names to kids because … well, you never know.
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Maybe that could be at play
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why not name the kid Spot or Rexbecause they might not identify as a human being and a typical canine name would be safer?
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Then they grow up and they want a name like Paul because they have met Jesus? I think we should just give them placeholders and when they are ready, they pick a name.
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Harlow isn’t bad. I think of Jean Harlow, and I just hope she doesn’t get called “Harry”…I suspect that this is going to be the decade of the awful names, the kind that parents think are so cuuuute… and congratulations on your g great-granddaughter,,,
t
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Actors can just come up with a new name or celebrities. Muhammad Ali for example. And I think the issue is to get it to stick.
A baby name seems like a good idea but only to a point. As you say by the time you get to change your name it is way too late.
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and often enough, if you make it through grade school, by then you probably have a nice new name that either your friends or your enemies dreamed up for you.
A friend of mine told me that in order to give her daughter a choice in ‘what to be called” she chose the name “Elizabeth” which can be adjusted almost eternally. So what does the kid do? “MY NAME IS ELIZABETH” and no one ever dares call her anything else. “Eleanor” can also be adapted, almost forever, from Ellie to Lena…
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Elizabeth is a versatile name: one can be Eliza, Liz, Lizzie, Beth, Lisbeth and other combinations.
Friends and enemies will always give you the name they think fits you or change your name to their liking
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that was the original intent. Her mother had one of those one-word names, and she wanted Elizabeth to have choices. So the kid chose “Elizabeth” instead of any of the alternatives. sigh.
I knew her daughter, and trust me, you only called her “lizzie’ or “betty” once. Then you picked up your ego and left.
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I wouldn’t want to suffer her wrath
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There have been a number of studies that show that names do effect and help development your personality, and even your health. People are treated differently according to their names, and that changes them. And names alter self image as well.
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This is interesting.
I will try and get some studies on this
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I don’t think the name matters as much, as the who and what the person carrying it, is. I know of some people who should have been named integrity, as they have absolutely none whatsoever otherwise.
Trump for example. Now, excuse me, I need to go wash my mouth out with soap, for putting that name in print on the internet.
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Hahahaha.
Some people are the exact opposite of their names. You look at a person and you are like the name and the person don’t gel
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I remember reading, long ago, of a tribe that has what is basically a bar mitzvah for young boys, and when they reach a certain age they are allowed to choose their adult name.
Life could be so simple if we did that regularly. There is also a study that shows that people who are named after their father often go nowhere in life, and in looking around, I can see that, here. They grow up being called “junior” or “bubba” or “little john” and that has to affect them somehow.
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I think our social systems make this complicated. You want to get a passport for your child and then tell the registrar that we are yet to give this person a name. Or they go to school and then the teacher has to differentiate between one you and the next.
I think it would be an interesting study to look at what people with different names have become. A large sample size would be useful.
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