Communing With The Self
A Journey To The Self
“Is self-observation a moment of accepting oneself, or does that come afterwards?”
Self-observation, in its purest form, must be uncritical, a dispassionate witnessing to the inner workings of our being. It is the patient work of the Observing ‘I’, that quiet observer within, that allows us to begin to glimpse the fragmented nature of our reality.
We are, each of us, a multitude. A chaotic collection of ‘I’s vying for dominance, lacking the unity of a true, integrated self. This internal discord, this inherent contradiction, remains largely hidden from our conscious awareness. So we live in a state of self-deception, blind to the disharmony within.
True acceptance, arises not from the act of observation itself, but from the conscious assimilation of its fruits. The Observing ‘I’, through its diligent work, gathers fragments of our hidden nature, storing them in a new and unfiltered memory. It is here, in the confrontation with these unvarnished truths, that the challenge of acceptance lies.
Yet, we are resistant to this self-acceptance. We may glimpse our own shortcomings, our hidden flaws, but recoil from truly acknowledging them. This resistance stems, in part, from the machinations of the False Personality, that carefully constructed facade we present to the world, and indeed, to ourselves. It is a hypnotic sleep, a self-imposed blindness maintained by buffers that shield us from the discomfort of our own contradictions.
These buffers, these psychological defense mechanisms, stand in for true self-knowledge. They allow us to navigate life with a comfortable illusion of self-worth, protecting us from the jarring realization of our own inconsistencies. Were these buffers to suddenly dissolve, we would likely crumble to psychological dust.
It is only through the gradual erosion of these buffers, facilitated by the persistent work of the Observing ‘I’, that we can begin to see ourselves with greater clarity. We begin to recognize the “dark side” of our being, those aspects we instinctively shun from conscious awareness. Thus begins true self-change, the dismantling of the Imaginary ‘I’ and the acceptance of what we are.
We are too quick to judge, to separate ourselves from the perceived flaws of others. “Thank God, I am not like that person,” we proclaim, clinging to the illusion of our own superiority. But this is the voice of False Personality, the master of self-deception. We are all, in some measure, that person. To deny this is to deny a part of ourselves.
The path to self-acceptance is not an easy one. It requires courage to confront the uncomfortable truths that lie hidden within. But it is a journey towards wholeness, towards a greater understanding of ourselves and our place in the world. It is a journey that begins with the unwavering commitment to self-observation and culminates in the radical acceptance of our own flawed, contradictory, and ultimately, human nature.