Finding the authentic self

Animals know how to be who they are, instinctively, and move towards satisfaction and away from pain without needing to be taught right from wrong. Human desires, though still motivated by the same principles, are filtered through cultural beliefs, family values and the personal preferences of people who are significant in their lives.

Many of the beliefs about what makes a ‘good’ human being are communicated unconsciously: through stories, facial expressions, the way we are treated, rewards and punishments. For example, a look from a parent to a child can stop it in its tracks without a word being said. The expectations other people have of us are often passed on without question, from generation to generation, as objective truths. This conditioning is complete by the time a child is seven.

Learning who we are

It starts at birth. A newborn baby thinks she is everything until food or warmth fails to arrive at the instant it is needed. Thus begins the bliss and frustration of being born into the material world. The infant begins to realise there is an ‘other’ who doesn’t always give her what she wants when she wants it and her experience of being in a relationship begins. Our first sense of self emerges from the way we are touched and fed: is the carer hurried, tender, anxious, absent or preoccupied? Is the infant kept at the breast, fed on demand or by the clock? The way our needs are met gives us a sense of our place in the pecking order. If the beliefs formed around this time are not made conscious, they continue to be acted on, as true, into adulthood.

How to be ‘good’

Most of us have to leave the Garden of Eden, where we can do no wrong as, gradually, we are taught how to behave. Natural rhythms like sleeping, eating and excreting need to be controlled and adjusted. Impulses such as making noise, moving in certain ways and playing have to be contained until the right time and place; feelings, such as anger and grief, are rarely referred to and a child is left to deal with them as best they can. For example, one minute an infant might be enjoying the satisfying sensation of rubbing mashed potato into her hair when, out of the blue, she’s in trouble, “No! That’s naughty,” says a voice. She discovers that instinctive impulses can lead to rejection and cannot be trusted as a guide. Love, it seems, is conditional on ‘good’ behaviour.

None of us are born wanting to upset the people who keep us alive, yet motives and characteristics are attributed to children based on their early behaviour, even when they are unaware of the difference between eating dinner and playing with it. A mother in a group I worked with told us how her son was difficult from birth. She was horrified when, at four-years-old, he’d dragged a chair over to the cooker and tried to boil an egg. His behaviour, though possibly in need of some loving guidance, could have been perceived as clever or helpful. Instead, he was judged as deliberately challenging authority and blamed for his mother’s uncomfortable feelings.

Developing character

Children believe that the evaluations adults pass on to them are who they are: I let them down, I’m not good enough, I’m the clever one, it’s my fault, boys don’t cry. I will be loved if I am perfect, strong, successful, and so on. These beliefs are not necessarily what the conscious adult intended to transmit. They are childlike and literal and, from my experience as a psychotherapist, most people continue to act on these beliefs these into adulthood. Even positive judgments can come between children and their creativity. The difference between feedback and evaluation, encouragement and pressure to conform, isn’t always understood.

As well as being told who we are, at some point, we also discover that we are considered responsible for another’s feelings, a belief which gives a child a distorted and overwhelming sense of their power over others.

The feeling of being watched pulls a child into self-consciousness, too, a process often referred to as a loss of innocence. When children respond to being observed, at one end of the spectrum they become what is called ‘attention seeking’ and at the other, ‘shy’.

The split

We begin to create another self. There are different names for this part of us: the introjected self, the ego or super-ego, or the conscience. It is a kind of inner parent that tries to keep us out of trouble: the voice in our head that tells us what we should or shouldn’t do. For example, to avoid conflict and rejection, rather than ask directly for what is wanted, the ego will figure out an indirect way of meeting needs in order to avoid being criticised for asking: I believed, until I was in my thirties, that if I asked for something directly, it wouldn’t be given to me on principle. People give attention to others in the hope of getting back the attention they themselves crave. When the needs of the authentic self are different from the objectives of the ego, a split develops. The greater the contradiction between the two, the greater is the psychological suffering and confusion.

It may appear that a society which cultivates obedience and controls instincts has created a way of living together in harmony and respect. However, negative value judgements and logical demands of behaviour put people under pressure. When natural impulses are despised and suppressed, they tend to go underground and leak out sideways in the kinds of behaviour, often hidden, that cannot be controlled by reason: war, greed, cruelty, passive-aggression, addiction , depression, anxiety and dissociation. These behaviours can be viewed as evil, neurotic, aberrant, praiseworthy or as an unchangeable aspect of an individual’s personality. In reality, they are compulsions which arise when needs are un-met and expectations, such as celibacy are impossible to live up to.

A polarity is created between points of view: right must prevail and ‘wrongness’ must be eradicated. The other side must be shouted down, humiliated even – so that one’s own side, which is right, wins. Individuals are disempowered because it is believed that only the successful or the educated have the right to define reality. Even rebellion is only the opposite of conformity.

Integration

To find one’s authentic self requires trust that it’s worth it and the courage to accept the fact that, like everyone, you aren’t perfect. Also, a willingness to understand what is being expressed instead of classifying and evaluating it. This begins with attending to the many ways your organism communicates with you: longings, emotions , sensations in the body, illness the need for movement and creative expression.

Though the baby who thought she was everything has grown into an adult, she isn’t always clear where she ends and another begins. A friend of mine was astonished, and almost offended, when her son didn’t like porridge, her favourite breakfast. She couldn’t see him as separate from herself. We need to understand who we are in relation to others, the differences and similarities and where our responsibility begins and ends.

Behaviours need to be educated rather than evaluated as ‘good’ or ‘bad or ‘male’ and ‘female. Boundaries need to be negotiated with respect for both points of view. Like tools on a rack, each type of behaviour is necessary sometimes, even selfishness. Rejecting selfishness as ‘bad’, leads to some people who rarely, if ever, allow themselves to be put first and others who always do.

Acceptance and compassion for one’s own limitations and desires is the start of compassion for and curiosity about others - even those who bring us face to face with the depths to which humanity can sink. Censure of and protection from such people is only half the story. We need also to understand how they came to be the way they are – how the whole fits together. To begin this process of integration, it is simpler and more likely to yield fruit, if you start with the self rather than with society.

To become mature adults, people need to disentangle themselves from the rules and beliefs they took on unconsciously, in order to find their own truth and self-respect. If a dog has been kept on a lead all its life then it will be uncontrollable if suddenly released. It needs a contained space to learn how to keep itself safe, find boundaries and engage with others. It is the same with human instincts. They need to be identified and explored in a space free from judgements and rejection. This is where therapy is useful. It is a place where the meaning of emotions and desires can be explored in a spirit of curiosity and support. An exploration based on the reality of relationships instead of rules invented to make the lives of others easier and idealised virtues that many cannot live up to.