How well do we know ourselves?

On Ms. Vernon website I come across a question that sets me thinking: how far can a man go to search himself? Just how far, indeed? Do I know myself? From a distance where there are multitude of people can I identify myself? Physically maybe yes, still may be not especially when you have a blurred vision. We identify ourselves because of the tag, the labels we have, i.e. our names, birthdate, parents' name, name of spouse and so forth. These are our personal information. Without them, perhaps we do not know ourselves. Who are we? Just how far to we go, indeed to search ourselves. Everyday we set out to a journey. Every experience that we have tells us something about ourselves. When we are hurt- either we get angry and hurt back or do we cry? When are loved- we are happy, we love and we care as well. Every tear that we cry; every laughter that we share and every love that we care-perhaps tell something about us-I don't know if I am making sense- but I just thought that if we try to understand ourselves- we could perhaps understand other people more-- and who knows we could be a little more caring.
When we know ourselves- we know how it feels to be alone and unloved, we will not dare be indifferent to those who are alone, unloved. We will not discriminate, become prejudice to those who are colored, poor, those who do not share our belief, our faith... When we know ourselves we know how it feels to lose someone we love in war, in terrorist attack- perhaps then we will not make our world a warpath where men kill not only each other, but even children, women and the helpless old people. When we know ourselves we know how it is to feel hungry, to be homeless- then we will learn not to be greedy and indifferent. I don't know we really ought to know ourselves better to become better and caring persons. Just how far: do we need to experience pain and sorrow to understand the feelings of those who are suffering. If it should be ... perhaps it would be better...