For over 20 years I taught a university course in introspection and reflection. When I first taught the course, someone asked me, since it was not a traditional kind of course, how long it had taken me to put it together. I said, “30 years and four hours”. 30 years of my own life experiences and thinking about what was missing from school and university curricula and what might add value for students, and then about four hours to sit down and translate my thoughts about this topic into a coherent college course structure to help people be introspective and reflective.
The course begins with the simple axiom that dates from the Oracle of Delphi in ancient Greece – ‘Know Thyself’. Sounds pretty simple, doesn’t it? Know thyself. Of course we know ourselves. But do we? How many of you have taken the time or committed the energy to consider who you are, what you want to be and do, what your strengths and weaknesses are, your priorities, values, dreams, desires, foibles, challenges? How you want to learn, grow and develop into a “better person”? How do you even define “better person”? Where and how do family, work, friendships and spirituality fit into your life priorities? Do or how do you want to contribute to making the world a better place?
And further, have you set goals for yourself? Have these goals evolved with changes in your life? Have you written them down? What are you doing to achieve these goals? Are you making progress? Are you, or how are you, measuring your progress? When was the last time you sat down and just thought introspectively and reflectively about YOU, and these questions?
In my experience, the answer from most people is “well, I really haven’t taken the time to address these kinds of questions, at least not in a systematic way. I’m just so busy.” That’s why I put together the university course; to give people an excuse, an impetus, a reason, an opportunity and a structure to help them figure out who they are – to respond thoughtfully to the advice from the Oracle of Delphi to ‘Know Thyself’. I want to encourage and stimulate you to not only think about yourself and to know yourself, but to consider how you can CREATE yourself, going forward, as only you can do.
There is a great deal of discussion these days about searching for and finding ourselves and about the importance and value of ‘self-discovery’. ‘Searching’, ‘finding’ and ‘discovery’, though, all connote a sense of uncertainty about the process and the need to have some level of luck or revelation in order to achieve the desired outcome. Think about it. We need to find ourselves – as if we are lost or we need to be looking under rocks? I ask you to consider something that is fundamentally different and more expansive than such a ‘searching’ process. I ask you to consider a willful, proactive and intentional process that is within your purview, power and control. I am asking you to consider creating yourself. Creation doesn’t depend on serendipity or luck or uncovering the right rocks – creating yourself is a deliberate act that you are fully capable of, if you take up the challenge and take on the responsibility. And what is the result of such effort? You get to DEFINE yourself. Can there be anything more important, more stimulating, more exciting, and more invigorating than that?
Before we begin this discussion of the process of self-creation, I think it is important to recognize how fortunate we are, in the developed world, to be in a position to define and create ourselves. There are parts of the world, and I am very familiar with several of them, where people, of necessity, are so focused on survival, finding and keeping food and shelter, and just getting to and through the next day that spending energy on knowing or creating themselves is just not realistically in their field of vision. But we, those fortunate to live in the developed world, DO have this opportunity. Let’s not waste it through inaction, laziness, or lack of focus. Let’s capitalize on our empowerment.
A good place, I think, to begin our consideration of self-creation is with Viktor Frankl whose seminal book “Man’s Search for Meaning” details the author’s life in the WWII Nazi concentration camps. There are many, many important themes discussed and illustrated in this book including suffering, love, empathy, persistence, perseverance, motivation, hope, mental strength, spirituality and individual uniqueness. But to me, the two most powerful themes of the book are perspective and choice. Perspective – you think YOU have problems? Most every challenge you or I have in life pales in comparison to having to deal with being in a concentration camp. One of my students at the end of a semester when asked to name important take-aways from the class told me, “I say to myself about twice a week: ‘Christina; you’re not in a concentration camp! How tough can this problem be?” Exactly. There’s nothing like a little perspective when things seem to be getting difficult. Whatever is going on, you’re not in a concentration camp. Be thankful for that.
But as important as the concept of perspective is from Viktor Frankl there is an additional theme that speaks even more directly to our topic of today. The theme is CHOICE – bolded, capitalized, italicized and underlined. Choice. While chronicling his time in the Nazi camps Frankl very well describes the horrors, the destitution, the perversity, the miserableness, the absolute deprivation of the place. But amidst this impoverishment Frankl was able to make this statement, “…everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
Think about that. In the midst of the worst of the worst of the worst of humanity, the Nazi death camps, Viktor Frankl was able to choose to find a positive meaning in life, to not be defined by his circumstances or his tormentors, but rather to choose to have a positive attitude and to find a way to survive.
Wow. We get to choose who and what we want to be? We get to create ourselves however we want, whatever our circumstances? How empowering is that? If Viktor Frankl can choose a positive attitude in a concentration camp, what does that say about human capability, about OUR capability, to define and create ourselves in a positive way?
It’s at about this point that one of my student’s invariably says, “But, Glenn, it’s not that simple or easy.” My response is, “I didn’t say it was easy or simple. I said it is something we are capable of — defining ourselves, creating ourselves – if we accept the challenge and the responsibility.” Responsibility is key. Either we accept the responsibility, or we don’t. If we don’t, then we let circumstances define us. And that’s a choice, in and of itself – a choice to be defined by events and circumstances in our lives. But why would we make such a choice? Only, in my opinion, if we are too lazy or fearful to accept the responsibility. I have seen, and you have seen, many people who let their circumstances dictate their attitude and define them. I urge and encourage you to do the opposite, to take the opportunity that you have in front of you – to create yourself. You are a distinctive individual with a unique set of life experiences. No one else, thankfully, can invent, design, or construct you. But YOU can. YOU just need to be proactive and energized – and take up the challenge.
So, how do we begin this process of self-creation?
We begin simply by deciding to DO IT – and then starting the process. Procrastination seems to be a very human characteristic – almost all of us, when faced with a difficult challenge, put it off. So it is important to launch into the process willfully and intentionally. I first thought about how I wanted to create myself, going forward, when I became a new parent when I was in my late 30s. I did an exercise that I found in Steven Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Effective People — I wrote down what I wanted people to say at my funeral, hoping, of course, that it wouldn’t be needed any time soon. Doing this exercise helped me focus on what was really important in my life and this was a very good starting point for my work at self-creation. I encourage you to do something similar.
For me, there were five things – and one added later – I wanted people ultimately to think and say about me at the end of the day – at the REAL end of the day:
1. He was a good father and a good friend, or at least he tried to be.
2. He made a contribution to education, in various ways.
3. He read many books, and learned a great deal from them.
4. He helped people along the way who needed help.
5. He saw the world and had a hellofva good time.
6. (Later) He was a pretty good pickleball player, even if he may have been overly aggressive!
Writing this down helped in two ways. First, it takes thought to put something in writing; you have to really think about what you want to say and what is important to you when you put pen to paper. These points emerged after about a dozen iterations of deliberation. And second, I have constantly, for the last 30+ years, come back to this simple list to help me stay focused and grounded. When I have found myself spending time on things that didn’t relate to these priorities, I have made an effort to get refocused. This has been very helpful to me in my own self-creation process.
I encourage you to do a similar exercise, or in some way to focus time, energy and attention on thinking about who you are and who and what you want to be and do. What do you want to be remembered for? As most of us have learned in other phases of our lives, it is hard to accomplish objectives if we haven’t in the first place articulated what they are.
After completing this exercise, it is a matter of focus and follow-through – actually being intentional and DOING what you say is important to you. There are always challenges and distractions in life; that’s the way life is. But don’t be defined by the challenges and distractions. DO yourself purposely; create yourself before it’s all over and you’re looking back saying, “I wonder where the hell all the time went – and what did I accomplish?”
Keep in mind psychologist Carl Jung’s illustrative quote: “I am not what happened to me. I am what I chose to become.” Create yourself, intentionally. No one else is going to do it for you.
Good luck.
Glenn Detrick
www.gdetrick.org
Glenn.Detrick@gmail.com