Drug addicts, bulemics, anorexics, all wrestle with differing threads of their personalities. Bundle theory dates back in philosophy all the way. It is finding fresh converts from modern neuroscience. The bundle of impulses and yearnings, thoughts and desires, are like threads in a rope. Strip them away one by one and you are left with no rope; strip away the threads of a person and there is no self remaining. One thread in all sincerety may believe it will not drink again whilst another thread pulls a different way. The alcoholic, in the chaos of addiction does not have a true self. None of us do. We spin a tale of a hero of high morality and bravery, we tell ourselves we are this person. But a person is no more than the bundle of impulses.
Isn't this defeatist? Do we have no free will? We can change ourselves. If you have sufficient neuroplasticity you can retrain. You can practice till your patterns change. But we are like stretch armstrong, the childrens toy, warping out to its limits yet returning to its core being. Learning; changing is difficult, very hard work. Too hard for most. Most never need to. Only those who find their nature likely to kill them ever really do. Like recovered addicts, over eaters, under eaters. By middle age most people have become compacted parodies of themselves. They all require rehab. By cutting away at the brain, or drugging it up, psychiatrists can alter peoples patterns but it is incredible how usually the personality will reform, even after severe damage.
Thinking is a corrective system. When our intuitive, animal side lets us down we use reason to put things right. 
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