Jessica Böhme writes about The Unseen Value to “Know Yourself” and takes a somewhat contrarian position that I love.
I don’t know how many times I have found who I was at my core, only to realize a little while later that that wasn’t me and the search began again.
Many argue that such a part within ourselves exists, that there is a core identity or a soul that came here for a specific purpose. I am not saying that this is necessarily untrue. My lived experience, though, is that searching for it often makes me feel worse and is also a tedious process of which I can never be sure. I will say more about this another time.
Please do.
The point I want to get to here is that the self is not a static entity but a dynamic, evolving construct.
We don’t discover ourselves; instead, we create ourselves.
It is very encouraging to read these words, knowing that someone else shares my sense of Self.
I will add some words…
I have no core. I have no True Self. I am a mysterious Self that is creating my Self. I am a complex system from which a new self emerges each day, a Self that is constructing a Self in an ongoing process.
I have constructed three versions of my Self. For the first half of my adult life I constructed my Self as a True Believer in the Christian tradition. At midlife I lost my faith and I reconstructed my Self as a Secular Humanist. Now I am again reconstructing a new Self as a Metamodern Wannabe. Which one is the the real me? All of them and none of them. Whatever I am, I am a Whole Self that cannot be reduced to these words.
…the way we create ourselves can be conscious or unconscious, it can be intentional or unintentional.
The way we create ourselves can be with awareness or we can be oblivious or anywhere in between.
I am sharing My Self by telling my story on my website, The Life of John Stokdijk, hoping to inspire a few others to do likewise.
I am reminded of Chapter One of The Art of Self-Improvement: Ten Timeless Truths by Anna Katharina Schaffner.
GENUINE SELF-KNOWLEDGE HAS to be the starting point for any attempt to improve ourselves. Without a proper understanding of our strengths and weaknesses, we cannot determine what needs to be improved and how that might be possible... But knowing ourselves—truly understanding who we are—is by no means easy.
Finally, it is my sense that those who have found their true self have not yet found their true self.