The Search for Authenticity Begins Within

With recent events in Haiti, there is a tendency to see the collective behavior of its residents as a robust example of human nature. Here is one person's feeling on the matter:

It's during the worst trials and tribulations you see how human-beings REALLY are. That's when they reveal their REAL disgusting behavior. In times of good it's easy for everyone to be a good person. It's in times of hardship you find out the truth about humans.

I would like to address this sentiment.

First off, if my "real" self were present only during dire circumstances, I think I would prefer a shitty life because it would at least be true. Perhaps I would crave suffering for the sake of authenticity. Fortunately, I do not agree that the one who suffers most is any more real than the one in a comfortable lifestyle.

To play devil's subtle advocate, I do think the common truism to which I refer does have some merit, that its error lies only in it being poorly expressed. When people say that disaster brings out the real image of another, perhaps they wish to express the knowledge that a person can't be limited to present circumstance lest we dampen our ability to adapt to changes in others', or our own, behavior.

It is an awareness of the endless possibilities of behavior, recognizing that in the dynamic nature of personality, a shift in circumstance will result in a shift in behavior. Despite how the truism may sound when taken at face value, because it is indeed not the most semantically sound way of stating things, it does, however, also confirm that there is no fixed self. Or so it seems to me.

Also, there is a feeling directed within that detects a more basic self that exists beyond mere reactions. It is the source of creation rather than the reflection of the created, yet it is not the "doer" in consciousness at all. This, I think, can't be denied if you've actually experienced it.

This isn't to say that it actually is more authentic, or that it must be the singular method of self-definition, but various spiritual practices can make it apparent that it is entirely possible to enter the state of the observer, which can feel far more real than everyday tendencies to be fully engaged in a continuum of knee-jerk reactions.

Ultimately, however, this self is not separate and by its very nature it does include all other states as a mode of itself. It is always present, even if not the star of the show, so we are never any less or any more real than any other time.

But I want to acknowledge that sometimes we do feel more authentic, that sometimes we do feel as if we are going with or against the grain of what we intuit to be a healthy coexistence with our environment. The trick is to do what feels real without punishing yourself and alienating yourself from any manifestation of your being.

I enjoy meditating, through the observer, on all possible selves, including them all in the loving folds of self-identity. This means the good, the bad, and the fugly. I try to always show compassion, but I also know that I am capable of terrible things given the proper circumstance. And that would be real too. Like Sartre said, "existence precedes essence." Or as someone else said, "real is as real does."