Would you say "My own self is doing his homework" or "My own self is doing my homework"? Or is it wrong to use "my own self" in this way?
Technically, I think it should be possible even if not widely used (searching on google gives no results; never read anything that resembles with this structure) and I'm more inclined towards the former. But both of them sound unnatural.
Context: I was writing a blog post when I happened to just write the following sentence down:
Deadline is knocking on the door like my own decrepit self banging his
head on the wall.
On rereading, I realized that it sounds off. I'm sure I can phrase it differently if it comes to that, but I'd like to know anyway.
Best Answer
I agree with the @seventyeightist's comment - this is a "poetic" usage of English. And I would say "self" is in the third person, so "his" or "her" makes more sense than "my". But - I think your blog post has a more likely usage - "my own decrepit self" sounds better than "my own self", because the use of a modifier in the middle makes the use of "my own self" sound less gratuitous. So I would say either "My own decrepit [or whatever description] self is doing his homework," or simply "I am doing my homework." And definitely don't use the reflexive object pronoun "myself" as the subject - as in, "Myself is doing my homework"- that would be very wrong.