« Habit », « inhabit », and « habitual » all stem from the same Latin root, habere (to have, to hold), which still resonates in the Spanish haber (to have). Each of these words unfolds from that core into distinct meanings. Habitual (from Latin habitudo) refers to something one « possesses » inwardly, a disposition shaped by repetition, an acquired « way of being« . In contrast, habit (from Latin habitus), originally meaning an outward « way of being », came to refer to clothing, what covers the body and shapes appearance in French. We will thus appreciate even more the meaning of habit in English. As for inhabit (from Latin habitare), it refers to settling into a place, asserting one’s presence repeatedly, and establishing a concrete link with one’s surrounding space.

These three forms—interiority, exteriority, and spatial relation—are constructed through repetition, which inscribes each of these facets into time and material. The force of recurrence structures inner movement, sculpts visible image, and outlines lived territory. Repetition, then, may contribute to giving form to any identity by providing the rhythm and boundaries needed to become a recognizable entity.

To be and to have may not be as distant as they seem. Être in French comes from the Latin esse, but the present participle étant, the past été, and the imperfect étais come from the Old English wesan, which itself derives from the Indo-European root for “to remain”. In French, too, être borrows from the Old French estere, “to stand, to stay”, derived from Latin stare of the same meaning.

This etymological link between “being” and “remaining” suggests that being is not a momentary state, but a persistence in time. For a being to become an identity, it must do more than exist momentarily: it must endure, maintain itself, repeat itself. To remain in space implies stability, an assumed position; to remain in time is to mark continuity, to imprint oneself in memory—one’s own and that of others. Identity thus emerges not as a fixed essence but as an imprint shaped by duration.

To be, in this sense, requires a constancy that allows for recognition. It is not simply to « exist », but to exist long enough, and with enough intensity, for something to be inscribed, perceived, identified, retained. To remain in another’s imagination is to have taken place there—to inhabit that immaterial space—just as remaining in one’s own imagination implies a loyalty to certain traits, gestures, or narratives.

To have and to be share this proximity to the subject, but differ in their mode of relation to the object and to quality. While to have indicates a relation to something external to the subject, to be engages and integrates the subject with it. Still, if a subject has an object for long enough, an association may form between them in the subject’s representation, thus contributing to the formation of identity.

There is something reassuring in this idea: empty words, misjudgments, regrets, awkward expressions and moments—are all fated to be swept away by the current of time that moves relentlessly forward. Unless, of course, they were published on the internet. Although even then, one can hope that the flood of incoming information will bury the source of embarrassment beneath a dozen new ones.

But this brings up another aspect: identity can wear down over time, which will retain only the most pronounced contours in our imaginaries. Perhaps this is one reason why identity-based struggles resound with such urgency: they strive to preserve the integrity of an identity that has been erased, censored, smoothed out. They are more aware than anyone of the living—and therefore unstable—nature of identity and its need to be nourished, shared, cultivated.

And maybe this also explains a feeling that has followed me for a long time: the awareness of a personal plurality that gives me vertigo, akin—down to the last drop—to a visceral fear of the void. For to be plural is almost to be no one at all. A word that means everything is a word that means nothing. And to define oneself by duality, by plurality—doesn’t that also mean defining oneself by a kind of emptiness? I am afraid of my own void.