Seek Others
We don't need to take care of ourselves, we need to take care of each other.
I’ve long been of the opinion that the general self-help platitudes and advice of “find yourself” and “seek the real YOU”, is a faulty compass. An errant path.
This advice extols us to peel away the onion. And if we do, we will then find deep within, some jewel, some truth, some authentic voice and self. I don’t think so. We will find nothing. But more likely than not, we won’t even get to the end, for the onion that is our self, is inexhaustible. Mirrors are not where answers are found.
Rather, I believe that one must turn away, be lost in order to be found. The fundamental problems of YOU are only solved by forgetting, by not searching but finding. By deflection. By looking aside. Why?
Well, fundamentally there is no problem. You are in your own way. And what it will take will be to move yourself away from thinking there is a problem. If you can’t do that, there will always be a problem.
In my life, if I want to be happy, I don’t try to be happy. I do things that will help me forget the problem of my being happy or not being happy.
It’s like when you want, need, must find your car keys, where you left them. The more you try to find them, the more you think and think and think, the less you’ll ever remember where you left them. Only when you take you mind off the problem of your keys, will the answer be revealed.
So - to the question I posed at the beginning. Do not try to find the real you. Rather, seek out other people. Immerse yourself in community, communion with your fellow man. Be a servant. And in that forgetting of yourself and being of and in brotherhood - you will simply BE the real you. You’ll wake up and be there. And you didn’t need to search - you just needed to get out of the way.
Yesterday, I read something by Timothy Leary online - Find the others, to this effect and it reminded me of a poem I wrote years ago on this theme, this problem. Here it is below. Thanks for reading.
Wholistic Therapy
You said you need to find yourself.
You said you want to know the real you.
You said you’ve been living a lie and
now it is time to find out who you really are.
I asked
”What you gonna do?”
You said,
”Read some great works of literature.
Visit museums and experience some great art.
Watch some movies that might swell my heart.
Spend some time in a cabin, alone with myself.
Perhaps I’ll find myself there.”
I asked,
”And if you don’t (find yourself)?”
You said,
”Well, I’ll just keep looking.
There must be an answer.
Life is a journey and you don’t arrive after
only a few days on the road.”
I asked,
”What if the answer is not inside you,
but out there?”
“What if the problem
isn’t you but that you haven’t found
the others that will make you whole.”
You said,
”I’m glad I found you.”