There's a dialectic of socialisation that your experience reminds me of, where we are trained - socialised - into (metaphorically) "hearing" the voices of the groups of which we are a member (nation, faith, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, politics, neighbourhood, profession, employer etc...) as part of the way we regulate how we think about and present ourselves. Those "voices" become a Generalised Other, a chorus of We's who can dominate (and inhibit) our sense of I-ness.

Establishing our I-ness, against a chorus of We's is a challenge, but this authenticity is essential for our mental health.