Understanding ourselves has a transformative and liberating power that is generally not understood

By Roberto Assagioli, Course of lessons on Psychosynthesis; Lesson XIII – 23 April 1933. From the Assagioli Archive in Florence, Doc. #23151. Original Title: Comprensione – Valutazione – Scelta – Piano di Azione. Translated and Edited with Notes by Jan Kuniholm
The practice of psychosynthesis requires — as we have seen — first of all, knowledge of ourselves, of our whole selves, and therefore also the exploration of our subconscious. We have also seen that to do this study, this exploration, well, an inner attitude of detachment from what we observe is needed.
We must remember another very effective means of knowing ourselves: it is to “test ourselves” in certain circumstances of life. This has been put to good use by Maturin, and I quote without fail what he says on the subject:
The great method of gaining any knowledge . . . is by experiment . . . there is nothing easier than to place ourselves in ideal states of mind — there is not more rude awakening than the facts which result from experiment. The first question put to Nature in the form of experiment has exploded many a philosopher’s dream, and one day’s experiment in certain unexplored regions of moral life has resulted in a rude but healthy awakening from dreams about oneself . . . The answers that such experiments give bring with them the conviction of truth and are often like rifts in the clouds that befog us, enabling us to get a true estimate of our strength and weakness. [1]
But it is not enough to simply collect the various facts we gradually discover. A mere list of the various heterogeneous and often contradictory elements that we have found to exist and stir in our souls would not serve us well; on the contrary, it would easily give us a sense of confusion, uncertainty, and bewilderment. Even in exploring an unknown region of the earth, it is not enough to collect specimens of flora and fauna, of different minerals and make an inventory of them. The importance of the collected elements results only from their scientific study done by competent people. The botanist may discover, adjacent to some well-known plants, a plant as yet ignored; the chemist in analyzing the various minerals may find among them one that conceals gold in itself, and this discovery may give the whole unexplored region a new and greater value.
All the more is this true for the inner regions of the human soul: for the fauna, the flora, the psychic terrains in which it may be said that everything depends on the appreciation one has of them and the use one makes of them. It is therefore necessary first of all to understand well what we have found in ourselves. Understanding has a transformative and liberating power that is generally not at all . . . understood. [2]
To understand means to realize the true nature of a phenomenon, its origin, its function, its limits, its possibilities, the gifts it can give us, and its dangers in relation to other psychic facts. Such an understanding, and that only, can show us the right attitude to take in the face of that circumstance, whether it is appropriate to welcome it and let it operate freely in us, indeed to foster its unfolding; or whether it should be guarded, disciplined; or fought against, and with what weapons; or transformed.
Understanding dispels pleasant and comfortable but dangerous emotional and sentimental illusions; it demolishes preconceptions, prejudices, traditional opinions accepted without reflection; understanding shows us the vanity of so many things to which we attach ourselves and which we take so seriously. It therefore requires moral courage, full sincerity toward ourselves and others. But it brings with it superabundant compensations. With every illusion that falls, a higher, broader, more fulfilling truth is discovered. Truly, as Emerson says, “When the half-gods go, the gods arrive.”[3]
But in the inner world, understanding not only unveils truth, but in a sense creates it. This creative value of understanding has been brought out very effectively by Keyserling in several of his works, especially in the one entitled, appropriately, Creative Understanding. [4]
To understand an affection or desire of ours in a different way means to transform it. Understanding can change fear into disregard, hostility into favor, passive acquiescence into positive action. Understanding implies an evaluation, a judgment, but not a judgment in the sense of condemnation, of exclusion; on the contrary, understanding makes one remember that there is nothing fundamentally “bad” or perverse in itself. We shall cite in this regard a testimony that certainly not suspect, that of Father Maturin:
Now, such a view of evil, as something positive, the fermentation of some evil substance or the possession of powers in themselves bad, is essentially unchristian. There is nothing, no substance, no power, no power in man that is in itself bad . . . Analyse the soul of the greatest sinner and the greatest saint and you will not find in the sinner any single element that is not in the saint. Compare the soul of the Magdalene or of St. Augustine before and after their conversion. There was nothing lacking in either after their conversion that was there before.[5]
Thus, evil consists not in things, in the forms that are in us, but in disorder, anarchy, and lack of discipline, harmony, or synthesis. It is therefore a matter of recognizing the true place and the right function of every living part of ourselves, and this can be summed up in one great word: wisdom. The Wise One is the complete person who understands all, who possesses all: true strength, true efficiency — not clamorous, but steadfast, working subtly, calmly, but irresistibly, profoundly, surely, lastingly. How does one acquire such wisdom? With the spiritual vision of Life, given by the discovery of one’s own spiritual Center; by careful, disinterested observation of all life in us, in others, throughout the cosmos; from life experience.
* * *
Self-knowledge and understanding must be followed by an inner plan of action. We must decide what we want to do with ourselves; what we want to become; what attitude to take in the face of all that we have discovered in our soul. Here a choice, indeed a series of choices, must be made. The fact that everything has its function does not mean any kind of “indifferentism;” it does not mean putting everything on the same level. The less good must give way to the better.
But that is not enough: choices must also be made among things of equal value. One cannot do many things at once. The pieces of glass in a kaleidoscope are relatively few, yet they can form a variety of combinations; but each excludes the other. If a blue piece is at the center of one cluster, it cannot simultaneously be at the periphery of another. So with the elements that make up our personality: if they come together in a given order, they cannot come together in another.
There are also energy limits and time limits. One often feels a painful conflict between the infinite possibilities [that are available] and the ability to implement only one or a few of them. But this is the law of life in this world and must be accepted without regret. On the other hand, we can concentrate all the strength, life, and love that are in us in a single manifestation.
This choice can be compared to the pruning by which the farmer makes the lifeblood that would have been distributed among many flow into one or a few branches. Thus, instead of much foliage with small fruits of little value, he obtains many large and tasty fruits. Similarly if we disperse our energies, we can do many things, but all of them of little value. It should be noted that this law is sometimes known and followed more by men of action than by certain idealists. This should not seem strange, since men of action are more immersed in the game of active life, and therefore know and accept its rules. First among these is that in order to achieve a goal one must “pay for it in person.” Much unhappiness and various nervous and mental disorders can be, and are sometimes, caused by not wanting to “pay.” Instead, “paying” is the law of simple justice. We must “pay” to life, to God, [for] everything from life we demand and as naturally as we receive. But we often fail to see the link of cause and effect and are reluctant to pay! A small but significant example is the bad mood with which we pay taxes! This bad mood stems from the fact that the benefit of taxes paid is not as visible and immediate as that which comes to us from an item we buy and collect immediately. This is a material symbol of the . . . taxes one has to pay to Life, to God.[6] Life gives to us generously, superabundantly, and we must give back with equal generosity.
We must therefore resolutely choose one or a few inner and outer tasks, renouncing without hesitation many others that would also be possible — and once the choice has been made, we must have no more regrets, but resolutely concentrate all our energies toward the achievement of the chosen goal.
[1] Maturin, B.W., Self Knowledge and Self-Discipline, London, Longmans, Green and Co., 1909, pp. 37-39. Taken from the original English publication, available online at https://archive.org/details/selfknowledge00matuuoft. —Tr.
[2] The ellipsis in this sentence is in the original typed manuscript. —Tr.
[3] These are the concluding two lines in Ralph Waldo Emerson’s poem “Give All to Love.” The Complete writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson,New York, Wm.H. Wise Co. 1926 p.861. Modern recent editions are available.—Ed.
[4] Assagioli cites the German edition of philosopher Hermann Keyserling’s book Schopferische Erkenntniss, Darmstadt, Reichl, 1926. The English edition was published by Harper & Brothers, New York, 1929. —Ed.
[5] Maturin, op.cit. page 51. —Tr.
[6] The ellipsis was in the original manuscript. —Tr.
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