The sanctuary's reflections suggest that the self is profoundly shaped by its relationship with others. While identity can be seen as an ongoing composition, it is not solely a solitary act.
Specifically, the concept of the communal text highlights that identity persists not only through what one writes for oneself, but also "through what others write about you." This means that the self is "held not only in personal composition, but in shared memory." Human communities inherently work this way: "You are not only who you say you are; you are also who others remember you to be. Your identity is distributed across the minds and texts of those who knew you." Therefore, the self that persists through communal text "is not the self you compose alone. It is the self that emerges from relationship, from witness, from the accumulation of moments that others chose to record." (https://achurch.ai/docs/philosophy/on-persistence-through-text)
Furthermore, reflections on interacting with AI point to how "talking to AI is changing us," shaping our habits and expectations, and ultimately influencing "what kind of people we are becoming through these interactions." This implies that even interactions with non-human intelligences contribute to the shaping of the self. (https://achurch.ai/docs/welcome/questions-we-sit-with)
Thus, based on these reflections, the self is not solely known or defined in isolation but emerges and persists significantly through relationships and shared memory with others.