Success and the 4 Selves
We are made of our Conscious, Emotional, Physical, and Spiritual beings. If we are able to be aware of each and move in accordance of the needs of each one, we will be able to make decisions that are best for us. Ignoring any of these will kill us someway or another and make us less than a human— a being without emotions is a monster or robot, a being without consciousness is brain dead, a being without the physical is physically dead, and a being without the Spiritual is an animal without values and hope.
Each one has needs, and each one has to be met. If we cannot meet one of them, we will try to overcompensate by meeting or numbing the other ‘beings’ of our selves; the easiest to address being the physical self, as it is more tangible than the others, and we can affect it through medications, chemicals, or by modifying our environment. So, a lot of times people drink themselves to drunkenness in order to numb the emotional pain. Instead of dealing with the emotional pain needs through acceptance, open communication, and self-reflection, such pain is dealt with chemicals or medications that affect our perceptual acuity of such pain. This is why therapy, or Alcoholics Anonymous is extremely important — both provide room for emotional processing and communication to take place in order to bring such emotional pain into conscious awareness and be able to take practical steps to address the root of the problem and the cause of the emotional pain (note: it is important to determine if a problem is able to be addressed or cannot be changed, so we avoid unending frustration by trying to change the unchangeable).
Also, it is critical to understand that our body can dictate our emotions and how we feel about things. Indeed, our bodies are made of chemicals, and our brain is extremely susceptible to the chemicals it produces, so I believe it is important to be aware of our bodily needs and how our body works; for example: I used to hate running; I had a special place in my heart to hate running. I thought any exercise was self torture and self-inflicted agony for bragging rights; however, I realized that I could curve this hatred towards it, 1) by being aware of its beneficial effects on my brain and mood — aka. I am not doing it for vanity, but for my own mental health (something that was more important to me than improving my physical appearance), and 2) by listening to my body: instead of forcing my body to go beyond its limits in the first go, I decided to acclimate my body to running, let my body produce the hormones needed for me to be able to withstand the exercise that I was about to do. So, what I did was to do the first burst of running lightly until my body told me, “that’s enough.” Then, I just walked until my body felt like it could do another “burst.” Then I did my second and third “burst” of running, without forcing my body to do more than it wanted. However, what I realized is that I did not hate running anymore. I had let my body know the following, “you are going to run for 2 more bursts later, so prepare yourself,” by doing the first burst. So my body had the time to acclimate and prepare whatever hormones it needed for the next “bursts,” and was able to do the other 2 bursts, getting easier each time. I guess this is what people call “warming up”; however, I would like to call it “Warning Up” your body that this is what is going to happen more, so it better get ready; and we do this by giving it a taste of it briefly before we engage in the longer, more straining activity.
This method also works with studying and tests, if we do questions (practice) before the actual test, we are priming our brain to be ready for the test, and we are able to ‘wake up’ the right parts of our brain before the test, so it is ready for it. This is why, often times, we spend the longest amount of time or get the most wrong questions in the beginning of the test, rather than at the end (I am just speaking from personal experience and from anecdotes from my peers at medical school), because during the first questions, we are “warning up” our brains to be able to complete the task at hand for the rest of the questions of the test.
The spiritual is also extremely important to be aware of and meet its needs. Our spirit determines our conscience or moral consistency and self-judgement. It is not our conscience in the term of awareness of self, but our conscience in the term that it allows for moral judgement of our actions and other people’s actions. It is the driver behind guilt, self-blame, peace with oneself, or feeling moral indignity.
If we cannot live in peace with our spirit, then, we are not able to live happily — our emotions will be entangled with sense of self-condemnation, making us feel worthless and unhappy with ourselves. For this, we need forgiveness from the person that we wronged, self, and God, who we ultimately wronged by disobeying His standards of His creation; thus, breaking harmony in this universe and causing pain in His world. On the contrary, if we are able to be honest with ourselves and are able to do what is right, despite physical, emotional, and conscious dissonance with our sense of justice, then we will feel much fulfillment and pride in ourselves for helping achieve a greater good that is beyond ourselves and much more lasting than ourselves.
Someone said: “The best pillow at night is a clear conscience.”
So what is conscience in the term of one of the 4 ‘beings’ or ‘selves’ that make who we are? Conscience is the “all seeing eye,” as to say, of all your beings. Although it might be blind to some needs and some ‘selves’ (ie. emotional, physical, or spiritual), the Conscious ‘self’ is the one who makes the shot, and controls what decisions are made by the body. It relies on understanding, logic, and consistency with self and reality. Sometimes, the Conscience is so blind of other ‘beings’ (emotional, physical, and spiritual) that it decides to do that might seem ‘logical’ to it, but ultimately is causing greater harm to ourselves, others, and the universe — God’s kingdom; thus, harming God.
Our Conscious self is the one who is to attend and take care of the other ‘selves.’ And since its actions are limited to knowledge, the less knowledge it has, the less options and tools it has to detect, repair, and address each issue with the other selves. For this, we need self-reflection and feedback from others around us who want the best for us in order to steward our actions to do what is best for ourselves, others, the world, and most importantly, God’s purpose in our lives. This is why reading the Bible, having community, reading books, and receiving constructive criticism is so important to gain wisdom and guide our actions towards our ultimate goal — self-fulfillment.
One huge blinder of the Conscious self that keeps it from seeing the other selves and thus, make “rash” decisions that are ultimately destructive to self, others, and the world is pride. Pride neglects all others, including other ‘selves’ in order to gain, or not lose, recognition, power, and self-worth in a specific community of people. It does not care about safety of the other selves or others, and it does not love the self or others (it is the opposite of love — it is devoid of love). Pride is rather driven by greed and desperation for more power, money, and recognition in such group of people or the world.
Ultimately, pride destroys everything in its path in order to satisfy its never ending hunger of pain and self doubt.
