As we age, we are more likely to ask, “How did I get here?” Many of us had at least a vague idea of how our lives would go. Most of us didn’t expect to be where we are as we look back on the last 20, 30 or even 50 years. Life itself provides changes and events that we could not anticipate. But there is within all of us something vastly unknown but powerfully influential in our life experience.

Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung and others in the world of psychology have recognized the existence of the unconscious in the human experience. By definition, what lurks in our unconscious is not immediately available to our awareness. We don’t know what we don’t know about what is deep inside us. Accessing this material gives us the opportunity to make better choices about how we will experience and live our lives.

We are creative and resourceful beings. We have adapted to change and learned to survive and sometimes thrive. But our response to circumstances in our lives can be maladaptive. The defenses, fears and hopes of yesterday can become obstacles today.

Evolving from the thoughts and writings of a Jesuit monk, Thomas Merton, we learn about the concept of false and true self. False self has to do with the ways we have learned to behave and think that are in opposition to our deeper true self. As we develop, we learn how to present (perform) in order to avoid rejection and gain acceptance or power. We learn ways to avoid pain, repress fear and circumvent impediments to the accomplishment of goals; social, economic, relational, and even political. All these are attempts to feed and protect our self-esteem. These ways of coping come from the modeling of parents and the influence of culture and peers. But all of this can be at the price of becoming who we are deep inside, the people we were created to be.

A whole nation can lose its way, its soul, when it is swept up into crowd mentality. From this societal scale to the internal workings of our unconscious, we learn how to adapt, please and control.  When we live out of false self, no matter how successful we may appear, there is an anxiety and unrest in us that haunts us. This false self may show itself in our dreams or in unexpected behaviors that break forth, surprising even us. It can appear as anxiety, depression or defensiveness. Another manifestation of false self is addiction in its many forms. Addiction can distract and dull our awareness of the real problem within. Our addictions and distractions will not bring us peace, nor establish a firm ability to live through the joy and pain that is a part of life.

We can endure, avoid, and get by in this false self-persona. Many of us are not motivated to do the excavation and work of discovering who we are and what motivates us. More often it takes an event; a failure, a tragedy, a breakthrough of some sort before we consider there might be a better way and a need for deep change. When such an intrusion comes in our lives, we are presented with an opportunity to discover who we really are. This requires giving up old ways and the behaviors that have supported them. The transition is not easy. While the old way may have led to its own pain, we did at least know how to live in this manner. Change means confusion and sometimes painful discoveries. We often prefer control, even if it means suffering, even to the point of death (the choice of many addicts). We are told that the truth will set us free (John 8). It is important to realize that it is not the truth itself that is painful, it is our smashing of the false ways, the delusions of the past, that cause our pain.

Now on to the True Self.