October 6, 2019
Who do you think you are?
The starting point for transformation is identity—who you think you are. Most of the time, most of us are identified with one of the roles we play, with one of our feeling states, or with one of several reoccurring thought patterns about ourselves. At any given moment we might be identified with a professional role, our social self, our taking-care-of-others role, or a “being nice” persona. Other times we might be caught up in our angry self, ambitious self, fearful self, craving self, insecure self, confident self, anxious self, and on and on. When we are identified with any of these, we tend to see the world through that lens. Before long, though, another one of our identities comes forward and replaces the previous one, and as that one becomes the center of attention, we see the world and ourselves as colored by that state.
Beyond these constantly changing identities, though, there is a sense of “me”–a sense of who I am behind my personas, thought patterns, and feeling states. This “me” is everything I consciously think about myself, both good and bad. In mainstream psychological terms this is the ego, and psychology is mostly about helping a person develop a healthy ego, one that is neither narcissistic, grandiose, overly self-critical, nor that feels unworthy. A well-developed ego has a healthy sense of “me” and can bring that identity forward whenever one starts getting caught in an unhealthy persona, idea pattern, or feeling state.
Dwell for a moment with that thought, for this is precisely the first step toward self-awareness—to realize you have several different ways to think about and experience who you are, and that your “ego me” has some choice in this matter, has some choice about how you will see yourself and to which identity you will give energy and attention. Developing this kind of awareness is not easy, and many people do not go very far along this path. But to recognize that you have a choice about how you understand who you are means you are no longer the prisoner of each thought, mood, or feeling state that comes along.
Stepping beyond the ego
As your ego develops a certain level of ability to manage the identity you will experience (at least part of the time), the next step is to realize that there is the possibility of an even larger identity—one that the wisdom traditions suggest—an identity beyond the ego. It is called by different names, and how it is defined varies, but all the traditions say there is something to which we have access that is beyond our personas, moods, feeling states, and recurring thoughts about ourselves. Something that lies even beyond the ego. They say that “something” exists with which we can learn to identify that is greater than the “me” we grew up viewing as who we are.
Once you become aware of this possible, larger self, you will find that examples arise wherever you look: History is full of stories of people who had spontaneous experiences of a larger self. They occur in many circumstances—walking in nature, meditating, listening to music, during a crisis, on retreat, praying, traveling, doing extreme sports, participating in dangerous adventures, under the influence of drugs, during passion, in near-death experiences, and on and on. These moments, however, are not transformations. They are momentary experiences. They give a glimpse of the possibility of a larger identity, but they do not establish one’s identity there. For that, transformation is necessary.
Healthy transformation, then, is about learning to shift where you are identified, about learning to live from a new center of gravity. Spontaneous experiences might open the possibility, but only practice can move you along on a path to a true transformation of your very being. The steps are: 1) recognize that a larger identity is possible, 2) make a conscious choice to try to move toward that larger identity, 3) choose a method of moving toward it, and 4) do the work.
The crucial thing to recognize is that you have the power to choose which identity you will occupy, which aspect of yourself you will be centered in (sometimes, at leastvery few of us can do it all the time). Ultimately, you have the power to identify with something beyond the ego, and perhaps to rest there perpetually.
A modern wisdom tradition
Transformation was of central importance to all the ancient wisdom traditions, and it has been a key feature of religious, spiritual, and self-help movements through the ages. One of the best examples is Transcendentalism, which grew up on American soil around 200 years ago. Its vision of the possibilities of transformation is inspiring and invigorating. The central figure in this powerful movement was Ralph Waldo Emerson, born in Boston in 1803. He was educated at Harvard, from which he graduated at eighteen. He taught school for a while, and then started writing and lecturing.
The roots of Transcendentalism can be traced back to Platonism, Kantian philosophy, and Romanticism, and it was clearly influenced by ideas from the East that were making their way to American shores at that time. Transcendentalism held that each of us has the capacity to transcend “petty fears and petty pleasures” (as Emerson’s student Henry David Thoreau called worldly attachments), and to transform ourselves so that we can live from a “higher order of being.” By aligning with the deep sacred currents all around us, we can learn to live in harmony with the good, the true, and the beautiful—and with love.
Transcendentalism had a profound effect on American culture as soon as it began, and its influence is still very much with us today. (Ideas it championed—an equal role for women; equal respect for people of every religion and race; encouraging people to be spiritual even if they were not religious; that each of us can and should get in touch with true virtue even if it goes against cultural norms; to live from love and compassion rather than simply functioning as an “eating, drinking, counting man.” It also put forward educational ideas that are surprisingly relevant today.
One of Emerson’s core ideas was that the average person “does not, as we know him, represent himself, but misrepresents himself.“ The average person lives from a “façade,” a persona or narrow self-image that misleads others, and even misleads oneself. Thus, few people know who they really are. Behind all that, however, Emerson beleived a human being is “a temple wherein all wisdom and all good abide.” The deepest truth about us is that: “We lie in the lap of immense intelligence,” and if we will do our work, we will be “receivers of its truth and organs of its activity.” If we will but open our minds, there will be revealed to us “the laws which traverse the universe.” When we open ourselves to and live from virtue, “a sweet and overpowering beauty” will appear. We will learn that “our being is without bound; that to the good, to the perfect, we are born, no matter how much we might now lie in evil and weakness.” Crucially, whatever we venerate can be ours, “though we have not realized it yet.” (A powerful incentive to be wise about what we focus our attention and intention upon.)
Emerson recognized and spoke about many of the themes of modern psychology, naming things that Freud and Jung are credited for elucidating. For instance, he clearly saw and articulated long before Freud that we have many unconscious forces at work within us. Anticipating Jung’s idea of our many different selves, Emerson gave vivid language to the complexes which Jung later delineated. For instance, Emerson said: “We live in succession, in division, in parts, in particles.” And along with Jung, he believed there was much more to us than that. Emerson went on to say: “Within man is the soul; the wise silence; the universal beauty, to which every part and particle is related; the eternal ONE.” Sounds much life Jung’s “Self.” In fact, Emerson used that capitalized word “Self” much as Jung did—a hundred years before Jung wrote. (Both, of course, borrowed it from the Hindu tradition).
To get a sense of how committed Transcendentalism was to transformation, and how much it has to offer us today, simply reflect on the following Emersonian quotes:
”Just as the ocean receives different names on the several shores which it washes, all things proceed out of this same spirit [which is differently named love, justice, temperance] and all things conspire with it. When a man seeks good ends, he is strong by the whole strength of Nature. Insofar as he strays from these ends, his being shrinks, he becomes less and less, a mote, a point, until absolute badness is absolute death.
“The dawn of the sentiment of virtue on the heart gives the assurance that Law is sovereign over all natures; and then, worlds, time, space, eternity, do seem to break out into joy.”
“This sentiment is divine, and deifying. It is the beatitude of man. It makes him illimitable. Through it the soul first knows itself. It corrects the capital mistake of the infant man, who hopes to derive advantages from another. But when love warns him, and he chooses the good and the great deed, then deep melodies wander through his soul from Supreme Wisdom.”
“What is the aboriginal Self on which a universal reliance may be grounded? This inquiry leads us to that source, at once the essence of genius, of virtue, of life. In that deep force, behind which analysis cannot go, all things find their common origin. The sense of being which in calm hour arises in the Soul, we know not how, is not diverse from things, from space, from light, from time, but one with them, and proceeds from the same source whence their life and being proceed. Here is the fountain of action and of thought. Here are the lungs of inspiration which giveth man wisdom.”
“The perception of this law of laws awakens in the mind a sentiment which we call the religious sentiment, and which makes our highest happiness. Wonderful is its power to charm and to command. It is a mountain air. … It makes the sky and the hills sublime, and the silent song of the stars is it. By it is the universe made safe and habitable, not by science, or power.”
“In the sublimest flights of the soul, love is never outgrown.”
“Crossing a bare common, in snow puddles, at twilight, without having in my thoughts any occurrence of special good fortune, I have enjoyed a perfect exhilaration. I am glad to the brink of fear.”
“In the woods, we return to reason and faith. There I feel that nothing can befall me in life—no disgrace, no calamity—which nature cannot repair. Standing on the bare ground, my head bathed by the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite space, all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eyeball; I am nothing; I see all; the currents of Universal Being circulate through me; I am part and parcel of God.”
In meditating on these images from Emerson, keep in mind that millions upon millions of people have experienced moments like this throughout human history, in every culture and in every age. They are a fundamental part of our human possibility. But they are only open to you if you make room for them in your life, and you can only live in relation to them if you do the work of transforming yourself.
Reflection: Spend a little time noticing that there are several different roles you play, different emotional states you can be in, and different ways you think about yourself. Especially notice that how you understand yourself and the world is different in each. Then notice that there have been times (when out in nature, meditating, undergoing a great challenge, on retreat, traveling, listening to music, or during a crisis, etc.) that your normal sense of self expanded and seemed larger, included more, just as Emerson suggests. Now, be especially aware that you have the power to choose (at least at times) which of these different ways of seeing yourself and the world you will occupy—that you can choose which aspect of yourself you will identify with and give attention to. Recognizing that you have such a choice is a crucial step in healthy transformation.
Have a good week,
David