FIVE
During and after this assessment of the subpersonalities one realizes that the observing self is none of them, but something or somebody different from each.
—Roberto Assagioli
In Chapter 2, we saw how Laura was able to relate to her Little One subpersonality, to take responsibility for this part of her, and finally to heal and nurture this part. Then, in Chapter 3, we followed Ellen as she moved through the painful disintegration of who she thought she was toward a completely new sense of herself. Finally, in Chapter 4, Mark began a session believing that he was a worker in conflict with a problematic subpersonality, but then he discovered that he had a Worker subpersonality who was in conflict with a Lover subpersonality.
It is clear that there is a someone in all of these cases who has the ability to move among these various personality patterns and is therefore somehow distinct-but-not-separate from them. There is a someone who can relate to the Little One, who can emerge from Ellen’s seeming total disintegration of identity, and who can disidentify from the Worker and Lover subpersonalities and work with them.
This “who” is assumed by many different psychological approaches, from the psychoanalyst asking us to observe and describe our inner-mind stream, to the cognitive-behaviorist encouraging us to notice and manage our feelings and thoughts, to the humanistic or transpersonal therapist inviting us to engage and express our authentic experience. Western psychology has implicitly recognized this “who” in terms such as Freud’s (1978) ego splitting, Anna Freud’s (1946) endopsychic perception, Richard Sterba’s (1934) therapeutic dissociation, Assagioli’s (1965a) disidentification and, more recently, Arthur Deikman’s (1982) observing self.
Furthermore, many spiritual practices of both East and West assume this same distinction between the essential person and the contents and states of consciousness. Such practices involve sitting quietly and simply observing the flow of experience without becoming caught up in this flow. This ability to assume a stance of inner observation is, for example, fundamental to Western contemplative prayer, as well as to Eastern approaches such as vipassana meditation and zazen.
It is fascinating that such seemingly dissimilar systems—secular and spiritual, East and West—all carry the assumption that we are not identical with any particular content or state of consciousness, and that we are in some way distinct from these. All of these different approaches thus constitute unifying centers that see us as distinct-but-not-separate from the contents of our experience; they, to a greater or lesser extent, mirror the someone who exists among intrapsychic processes and who can observe and choose in relationship to these processes. Within the “gaze” of such unifying centers, we discover the ability to put our awareness where we will, whether in service of describing inner events, affecting these, or simply remaining uninvolved in them, as in meditation.
. . . the inner experience of pure selfawareness, independent of any content or function of the ego in the sense of personality.
—Roberto Assagioli
A DISIDENTIFICATION EXERCISE
Take a moment right now to explore this “who” for yourself by carrying out the following experiment:
1. Close your eyes and become conscious of your physical sensations, the sounds you hear, your breathing, sensations of hot and cold, tension and relaxation. Notice that these sensations come and go in your awareness. Then ask yourself, “Who is aware? Who am I who remains among this change, who is somehow distinct-but-not-separate from this change, who can be present to each changing sensation as it arises?” The idea here is not to find the answer in an intellectual way but merely to pose the question and let go of it, allowing your own direct experience to respond.
2. Then become conscious of your feelings. How do you feel right now? Calm? Excited? Irritated? Sad? Happy? Notice that feelings can change continually in quality and intensity, coming and going in your awareness. Again, ask yourself, “Who is aware? Who am I who remains among this change, who is somehow distinct-but-not-separate from this change, who can be present to each feeling as it arises?”
3. Next, become conscious of your thoughts. Notice how thoughts and images come and go in awareness in a constant flow. Your mind can think of this, then that, then be reminded of that, then conjure up images of what was and what may be. Now once again ask, “Who is aware of this constant flow? Who am I who remains among this change, who is somehow distinct-but-not-separate from this change, who can be present to each thought and image arising?”
4. Last, choose to become as conscious as you can of your right foot. Concentrate your awareness on your right foot, noticing as carefully as you can its position, the sensations of sock or shoe, whether and how it meets the floor, the bend of your toes, the feel of your instep, and any cool or warm sensations.
Then move your consciousness again and become aware of your left knee. Notice if there is clothing around it, if you feel pressure at various points, at what angle it is bending, or if it is comfortable or uncomfortable. Take some time to become fully aware of your knee.
Then move your awareness once again to become conscious of your right hand. Concentrate your attention on how your right hand feels right now, whether relaxed or clenched, hot or cold, touching and being touched, and how your fingers are being held.
Now ask yourself, “How did I just move my awareness from my right foot to my left knee to my right hand? What is this ability I have to place my awareness where I want it?” Again, let your experience respond. You might explore this further by moving your awareness at will. Focus inwardly, perhaps, on things such as your breathing and bodily sensation, or focus outwardly, on different objects in your environment. Practice moving your consciousness wherever you choose. How do you do that?
This ability you have to direct your consciousness, to place it where you wish, is what Assagioli calls will.
In psychosynthesis, this essential “you” who can be aware and who can make choices is termed “I” or personal self and possesses the two functions of consciousness and will. Let us look more closely at the nature of this mysterious “I” who seems able to be conscious of and to dynamically interact with the various contents of the personality.
EMPATHIC “I”
Think of times you have spent with a close friend, someone who knows you well, accepts you, and with whom you feel free to be yourself. Notice that in the presence of this friend you can, for the most part, allow your spontaneous inner experiences to be felt and shared. You can be relatively nondefensive and unguarded, can feel safe being happy or sad, angry or hurt, serious or playful. The two of you can relate spontaneously and authentically, talking about virtually any topic that comes to mind and perhaps laughing good-naturedly at the foibles of your humanness.
In moments of such intimate empathic connection, you are profoundly seen, heard, and met by the other. Your friend does not see you in a limiting or constraining way; you are not expected to fulfill a role, maintain a particular belief system, or express a particular emotional tone. Your friend, acting as an authentic unifying center, sees and accepts you with all of your different parts.
This empathic relationship, in turn, allows you to be empathic with your-self—you are free to allow all parts of yourself to come and go, to be aware of all of them as they arise, to move easily among them, and to express them at will. As psychosynthesis therapist Chris Meriam (1996) puts it, “Empathy begets empathy.”
DISIDENTIFICATION
This empathic experience with your friend also can be called an experience of disidentification. That is, you are not stuck in, identified with, any particular pattern of feeling, thought, and behavior but can shift and move among all of them. You are clearly distinct-but-not-separate from the various contents of your inner world, that is, disidentified from them all. You are someone who, because distinct from the contents of your inner world, can potentially interact empathically with any and all of these contents.
In other words, here there is an emergence of the essential empathic you—“I”—with the functions of consciousness and will. This meeting with your friend might be diagrammed as in Figure 5.1.
FIGURE 5.1
The seeing eye illustrated at the right side of Figure 5.1 represents your friend and the empathic gaze with which you are seen. Note, you are seen—the horizontal dotted line is focused directly upon “I,” not on any one particular content of experience (thoughts, feelings, sensations, subpersonalities, etc.). You are not seen as this or that content but as the one who is experiencing these various contents.
The changing contents of our consciousness (the sensations, thoughts, feelings, etc.) are one thing, while the “I,” the self, the center of our consciousness is another.
—Roberto Assagioli
Furthermore, all of the contents (shaded circles) that move into awareness also are seen and accepted by the other (an acceptance represented by the two broken lines radiating from the eye). This empathy allows the contents to then flow freely into and out of your field of consciousness and will, with no need to censor or control them. You—“I”—remain disidentified from any particular content and are free to relate to all of them. This diagram thus represents an openness to—and a full engagement with—your ongoing, spontaneous experience as it arises in the moment.
(In an empathic relationship, this empathic gaze often is reciprocal, each person functioning as an authentic unifying center for the other. We have, for simplicity’s sake, only illustrated one side of the relationship.)
Note that you do not experience “I” as simply another content of your awareness. “I” is not another shaded circle of which you can be aware. In fact, you do not experience “I” at all! While you can be aware of a thought, an image, an intuition, a feeling, or a physical sensation, you cannot be aware of “I” in the same way; you cannot experience “I” as an object of your awareness, any more than you can see the back of your retina. “I” is ever the one who is aware, the experiencer not the experience.
To put it another way, you do not have an “I.” You are “I.” You, “I,” are the someone who experiences all of the changing contents of experience, moves among them, and affects them. From this point of view, “I” is not a “self” or “an I” at all but no-self, no-thing.1
IDENTIFICATION
The above experience with a good friend is quite different from one in which you relate to someone who does not see and accept you but who is open to only a limited range of who you are.
In the case of Ellen in Chapter 3, for example, it is clear that for most of her life she had been seen simply as the role she played in her family, not as someone with a life of her own. Within the nonempathic family environment, she developed a survival personality that was motivated to ignore her own needs and to serve other people.
Over the years, Ellen became identified with this survival personality, believing that this was who she truly was. She was not aware of her personal needs, passions, pain, or anger—all of these were kept out of her awareness by the identification with the survival personality. This type of nonempathic relationship is illustrated in Figure 5.2.
FIGURE 5.2
The eye depicted on the right side of Figure 5.2 now represents the nonempathic mirroring from Ellen’s family system—the survival unifying center—which does not see Ellen (“I”) but rather sees only the self-effacing survival personality (the horizontal broken line from the eye reaches only the survival personality, not “I”).2 Here “I” is identified, embedded within the survival personality; Ellen can only use her consciousness and will from within the world of the quiet, dependent, helper role.
Note that “I” is not free to move spontaneously throughout a natural range of experience. Contents of experience that are not consistent with the survival personality (the small circles) are blocked from entering Ellen’s consciousness (the unbroken lines radiating from the eye are barriers). For her to be aware of contents outside of the self-effacing identification—her own needs and passions, for example, or the guilt and shame directed at these—is simply too dangerous, as this places her, in effect, outside of her role and thus outside of the family. To the extent that she breaks her role to engage these forbidden contents, she will experience psychological isolation and abandonment by the family—an unthinkable prospect for a child.
. . . self-consciousness is generally hazy, because of its many identifications.
—Roberto Assagioli
This situation is, of course, what we have been calling primal wounding, the wounding caused by not being seen as who we truly are. Ellen is not seen, so she must dissociate certain parts of herself. Later in her life, when the bounds of her survival personality are breached by her experience with her boss, she confronts this wounding in a journey toward wholeness and authenticity.
Survival personality is held in place even after childhood, because the survival unifying center is internalized. This survival orientation is further reinforced, because it guides the selection of career, friends, romantic partners, and spouses. Survival personality builds a lifestyle around it, creating a life that reflects the early environment in subtle and not so subtle ways.
THE TURMOIL OF DISIDENTIFICATION
There is a further important insight about disidentification to be gained from Ellen’s experience. While disidentification can be associated with experiences of freedom, peace, and serenity (e.g., Mark in Chapter 4), Ellen’s experience reveals that it may just as easily involve turmoil, inner conflict, and anxiety. That is, on the surface she was much more serene while she was still identified with her survival personality. She was relatively content, experiencing little or no inner conflict; her inner world, though severely contracted, was at least stable and secure.
. . . the last and perhaps most obstinate identification is with that which we consider to be our inner person.
—Roberto Assagioli
However, when she was passed over for the promotion, the contents from outside of her identification became so energized that they burst into her consciousness in a very upsetting manner. She entered a crisis of transformation. No longer the eager helper with no needs, she found, to her distress, that she was feeling pain, rage, and an impulse to violence. This was a bursting of the bounds of her survival personality and led to her moving forward in her growth by expanding the range of her personal experience to include much of her hidden heights and depths.
Thus for Ellen disidentification was not a calm, quiet, centered experience. Quite the contrary, in disidentifying from her calm, quiet, survival personality, she found herself plunged into the intense, tumultuous experiences so long hidden by her chronic identification. She began grappling with the unconscious inner structures that had been conditioning her sense of identity all of those years. Disidentification simply moves us toward a deeper experience of our existence, and this may or may not be serene or even pleasant.
THE IDEALIZATION OF DISIDENTIFICATION
Unlike Ellen, on the other hand, we may indeed have a particular experience of disidentification that feels liberating, gives us a sense of serenity, or allows a feeling of expansion. Such experiences will occur especially when we disidentify from patterns that are oppressive, chaotic, or constricting. But it is important not to make the mistake of then equating disidentification with these particular experiences.
That is, we must not then assume that disidentification is an experience of liberation, serenity, or expansion. As Ellen discovered, disidentification can just as easily mean engaging difficult experiences as well.
If we confuse disidentification with any particular type of experience, there is a danger that we will begin to confuse “I” with particular types of experience: “When I disidentify, I feel _______, therefore, ‘my true I’ is _______ .” The problem here is that “I” is becoming objectified. “I” is understood not as who we are but as a psychological place, an attainment, a certain type of experience. In other words, “I” is misunderstood as a potential mode of consciousness rather than as the one who experiences all modes of consciousness.
Confused by this objectification, we may make statements such as: “When I am identified with my I, I feel free,” or “I feel serene when I am in my I,” or “I feel expanded and enlarged when I am in the I-space.” But then, who is this “I” who “identifies with my I,” or “is in my I,” or “is in the I-space”? Suddenly there are two “I”s running around here. Befuddled by this misunderstanding of the nature of disidentification and “I,” we may then begin to seek these freeing or serene experiences and to ignore less pleasant ones, thinking that these pleasant experiences constitute who we essentially are—and thus we begin to form a survival personality based on acquiring and maintaining these experiences.
Ironically, of course, you can never become “I,” identify with “I,” or move toward “I,” because you always are “I” and cannot be other than “I.” Whether feeling liberated or oppressed, serene or conflicted, expansive or contracted, identified or disidentified, on the heights of a unitive experience or in the depths of despair, merged with the Divine Ground or experiencing the Void, you are “I.” To think “I” is a place to get to or a goal to attain completely misses the essential nature of “I.” Again, “I” is not any particular experience but the experiencer. You are already, right this instant and forevermore, “I.”
THE TRANSPERSONAL IDENTIFICATION
It is important to understand that there can be many different levels of disidentification, that we can be disidentified at one level yet identified at another. This is seen quite clearly in cases of transpersonal identification, identifying with aspects of the higher unconscious while remaining largely dissociated from other dimensions of the psyche-soma. Such an identification can be developed after powerful peak experiences, immersion in religious and spiritual study, and/or in becoming adept at practices such as prayer and meditation.3
Within a transpersonal identification, we may, in meditation, become masters of allowing all thoughts, feelings, and sensations to pass through our awareness without becoming caught up in them—we are disidentified from this flow of inner experience. However, we may find that even with this acute ability to disidentify, we are nevertheless controlled by unconscious structures within us. For example, we may yet be caught in destructive addictions, dependencies, and interpersonal styles that cause difficulties for ourselves and for those around us.
In these cases it is quite true that we are observing the flow of inner experience, that we are disidentified from these contents. Yet we are, at the same time, observing through the colored lens of a transpersonal identification that is preventing a direct, unmediated engagement with other levels of us. Jacob Barrington, a Buddhist priest who entered Al-Anon, a twelve-step program for those dealing with the painful effects of relating to alcoholics, says:
In the two years since I joined Al-Anon I’ve experienced more healing and personal transformation than in my 17 years of pre-Al-Anon Zen practice.
In all my years of sitting zazen, I got pretty good at forgetting the self, at letting go. Pleasant and painful memories, fear, nostalgia, anger, resentment, joy, worry, delight, jealousy, longing, sadness, would all arise in my mind as I sat, and I let them go with the greatest of ease. They didn’t matter, I knew. They were only illusions. Ironically (and not coincidentally), however, this was exactly the message I had received from my parents growing up—that what I felt and thought and wanted didn’t really matter. What I was doing in meditation wasn’t letting go at all, it was repeating the denial I had learned as a child—and denial of my real self was the root of my sickness. (Barrington 1988)
While Barrington was clearly adept at one level of disidentification, this disidentification was itself conditioned by a deeper identification. In his case, a transpersonal or spiritualized identification kept him from fully engaging the nature and impact of his wounded childhood. We see a similar dynamic in Jack Kornfield’s account of his return to the United States after five years of practicing as a Buddhist monk in Asia:
What I found upon my return is that there are compartments in the mind. Although I worked well in certain compartments, when I got into an intimate relationship again, I was back exactly where I had left off: I was saying and doing the same old things. What was horrifying and interesting was that I could see it very clearly. Things that had been themes in my life—loneliness, fear of abandonment—were very, very visible. The same issues and fears not only remained but came back in spades. (in Simpkinson 1993, 37)
Of course, as practitioners of meditation and contemplative prayer know, these practices may, in many cases, take us to deeper levels of disidentification and to an encounter, for example, with our primal wounding. Psychotherapist James Finley says, “The contemplative attitude involves a weakening of one’s defense mechanisms, not a strengthening of them” (Finley 1988). This is similar to Jack Engler’s statement that insight meditation functions in some ways like an “uncovering technique,” as found in psychodynamic therapies (in Wilber, Engler, and Brown 1986, 34) and Mark Epstein’s (1995) recognition that meditation can reveal early wounding.
Yet this mindful observation of the inner flow of contents, while clearly a functioning of “I,” may remain at only one level within us. We may be truly disidentified from the contents of our awareness yet still quite identified with, and controlled by, deeper structures of the personality that organize our experience. But then we encounter troublesome compulsions or addictions, problematic intimate relationships, or profound life crises that impact aspects of ourselves beyond the range of the present identification. Such crises of transformation will call us to disidentify from the former level of disidentification and expand the range of our experience to include these new experiences. We here, with many others, discover that we are far more than we thought we were, that the world is far more than we thought it was.
SPIRIT, SOMA, AND PSYCHE
As we observed in the exercise above, we are distinct-but-not-separate from physical sensations as well as thoughts and feelings. This points to a distinction between “I” and both soma and psyche, both body and soul.
“I” is distinct from the world of soma or body, that is, from the public world of the physical body and outward behavior. This means simply that “I” cannot be reduced to any aspect of the physical organism, nor to any patterns of observable behavior. We might put it this way: “I am distinct, but not separate, from my physical experience.”
However, “I” is not only distinct-but-not-separate from soma but from psyche or soul as well. That is, private inner events such as feelings and desires, images and thoughts, dreams and visions, and peak and abyss experiences are distinct from “I” as well. We might say, “I am distinct, but not separate, from my soul experience.”
Again, you can verify this distinction between “I” and psyche-soma or soul-body by noticing your own experience. There are times when you are acutely aware of your physical presence within the immediate physical environment and less aware of your inner experience. For example, when attempting to learn a physical skill or to perform a precise movement, you may be focused on these and relatively oblivious to your inner feelings. But then, at other times, perhaps listening to music or watching a film, you are more aware of your thoughts, feelings, and images than you are of your physicality; you may even forget where you are in physical space-time and be transported to a realm of fantasy and feeling. We are distinct-but-not-separate from our soma and our psyche, so we are able to move between these two realms of experience or, if we wish, to experience them simultaneously.
The “self,” that is to say, the point of pure self-awareness, is often confused with the conscious personality . . . but in reality it is quite different from it.
—Roberto Assagioli
“I” is therefore different from the Freudian ego when defined as “a coherent organization of mental processes” (Freud 1960, 7), because “I” is distinct from any “organization” or “mental process.” Neither is “I” to be confused with the ideas or images we have of ourselves, whether we call these self-images, self-representations, or I-thoughts—“I” is distinct from ideas, images, and thoughts. This notion of “I” also is different from Fairbairn’s (1986) central ego or I, which is seen as comprising elements split off from the original ego; from Winnicott’s (1987) concept of True Self, which is defined as “the summation of sensori-motor aliveness”; and from Kohut’s (1977) idea of nuclear self, which is thought of as a “structure” made up of “constituents.” “I” is to be thought of as distinct from any summation of parts, from any sort of structure fashioned from contents or processes of either soma or psyche—otherwise we cannot conceptualize the fact that “I” can move among all such contents and processes.
This view would thus hold the human being not as a soul with a body, nor as a body with a soul, but as a living spirit immanent within both the body and soul. Human spirit is one and the same event embodied in two worlds: body and soul, soma and psyche.4
TRANSCENDENCE-IMMANENCE
Given our discussion so far, it seems obvious that “I” is highly elusive and difficult to conceptualize. While it seems safe to say that “I” has the functions of consciousness and will, there is yet a mystery surrounding this human spirit. This mystery revolves around the seeming paradox that we have the ability to observe and to engage in the same moment. That is, we can disidentify, realize that we are distinct from content and process, but by this very ability, we also embrace a far greater range of content and process than when identified. Our very ability to transcend particular identifications makes us able to be present to, to be more engaged in, areas of experience beyond that identification.
A term that holds this paradox is transcendence-immanence (Firman 1991; Firman and Gila 1997). That is, “I” is transcendent of content and process (the root of transcendent means “to climb over”), but by this transcendence, “I” can be immanent within content and process (the root of immanent means “to remain in or near”).
Of course, transcendence and immanence are terms commonly used to refer to God, Spirit, or the Divine. However, it seems that the common usage of these terms often is misleading. For example, a “transcendent God” often is thought of as being far away, while an “immanent God” is thought to be close at hand.
But from our experience of disidentification, we see that this is a false dichotomy, because transcendence and immanence go hand in hand: to the extent that “I” is disidentified from a particular pattern—is transcendent of a particular pattern—“I” is more able to engage both that pattern and areas of experience beyond that pattern, that is, “I” is more immanent. Transcendence and immanence are not separate poles but appear together, two sides of the same coin, two descriptions of the same reality—the human spirit, or “I” (and as we shall see later, these terms describe deeper Self or Spirit as well).
The Supreme Value, Cosmic Mind, Supreme Reality, both transcendent and immanent.
—Roberto Assagioli
TRANSCENDENCE-IMMANENCE APPLIED
So, for example, Laura (Chapter 2) discovered that she was transcendent of her Little One subpersonality, and so she became more immanent—opening herself up to an adult perspective that could care for the Little One. Or Ellen’s journey (Chapter 3) made her realize that she was transcendent of her survival personality, so she found herself immanent within a whole new range of experience. Mark, in the previous chapter, came into psychosynthesis therapy identified with the Worker subpersonality, eventually realized he was transcendent of both the Worker and Lover subpersonalities, and thus he was able to be immanent within both.
Staying with Mark’s situation a moment, note that his original identification with the Worker subpersonality can be called dissociation, because he is relatively oblivious of the experience contained in the Lover. Dissociation—a nonempathic relationship with an aspect of ourselves—is a function of identification. In contrast, disidentification (transcendence) will create more empathy, more of a connection with the parts (immanence). Dissociation is a function of identification, not disidentification.
Within the ongoing empathic holding of psychosynthesis therapy, Mark initially disidentified from the Worker and thus became more directly aware of the Lover. But going further, he eventually found the inner space to reach beyond an identification with either subpersonality, and in so doing he was able to more fully engage each of them. (This disidentification was illustrated in Figure 4.4.)
When this center has been experienced . . . then it is possible to synthesize the different aspects from which one has dis-identified oneself.
—Roberto Assagioli
From this new inner stance, Mark could embark on an in-depth exploration of both subpersonalities. He discovered that the Lover had feelings of shame, isolation, and grief from early childhood; he also found the Lover’s sensitivity, humor, and play, which had been repressed in the higher unconscious. Exploring the Worker, he discovered the wounding that he had received from his father; he also began to contact the personal integrity and self-respect hidden within this part. So, clearly, Mark’s transcendence here allowed a full immanent experiencing of, and empathy with, both of these parts of himself. Transcendence and immanence occur together.
IDENTIFICATION VERSUS EXPERIENCING
It also is important to notice that when Mark was identified with the Worker, he was not only dissociated from the Lover but from the heights and depths of the Worker as well. This may seem strange, because one might think that to identify with something would mean to fully experience it. But no, identification is a technical term in psychosynthesis, meaning that we are trapped unknowingly within a pattern and believe the pattern to be all that we are; it does not mean that we are fully experiencing the pattern.
Quite the contrary, identification actually limits our ability to experience the pattern with which we are identified. Identification kept Mark trapped in a single, narrow sector of the Worker, unaware of the brokenness and gifts hidden within this part. But disidentification meant that he could fully enter into the experience of the subpersonality, to connect empathically with the hidden heights and depths therein. In other words, transcendence implies immanence.
On the other hand, Mark’s work also illustrates how immanence implies transcendence. As he moved more deeply into the experience of each, realizing more immanence, his sense of transcendence increased as well. That is, his full exploration and experience of both parts led to a sense of being distinct from the parts—he could better observe them, empathically connect with them, and eventually guide them toward fulfilling their potential. Although it is true that entering into the direct experience of a particular pattern is an important aspect of increasing disidentification, we probably should avoid the word “identification” to refer to this direct experiencing.
The fact that immanence generates transcendence, and vice versa, helps demonstrate that transcendence and immanence are one, that they are simply two descriptions of the same human spirit, of “I.”
TRANSCENDENT-IMMANENT MIRRORING
For disidentification to take place, we need authentic unifying centers that can mirror the transcendence-immanence of human spirit. We need some inner or outer context—whether a person(s), a natural setting, an art form, a psychology, a philosophy, or a sacred tradition—that can reflect back to us who we are, that can hold our essential selves. It is within such empathic environments that the transcendence-immanence of “I” emerges.
However, if Mark was continuously seen by himself and others as the Worker and nothing more, he would have had little room to discover that he was identified with the Worker. Such nonempathic mirroring ignores that Mark is distinct from—transcendent of—his experience. Here, as with any survival unifying center, there will be pressure to remain identified with a single, limiting way of being, until perhaps a crisis of transformation breaks the identification and a new unifying center is found.
This objectifying misperception of each other is, of course, endemic in daily life. We see people as stereotypes, as their roles, as objects to be used or discarded; we often focus not on the person who experiences but only on particular aspects of the person. In other words, we ignore that people are distinct but not separate from their psyches and somas.
But mirroring can become just as nonempathic by ignoring that we are embodied and engaged—immanent—within our lived experience. Here a unifying center may misperceive us as only pure essence, as a disembodied spirit, as an entity not essentially related to psyche-soma existence. An example of this was recounted by Prilly Sanville (1994) during a diversity presentation: a Caucasian woman told her African-American friend that she simply liked her as a person and did not even think of her as “black”—thus offending her friend, who said something like, “But I am black!” Another example of ignoring immanence can be seen in the following conversation between a recovering alcoholic and a friend:
Friend: Why do you call yourself an alcoholic—that’s so limiting and negative. Can’t you just disidentify?
Recovering alcoholic: But I am an alcoholic. If I don’t recognize and accept this fundamental fact about myself, I will live a life of bondage.
But do not statements such as “I am black/white,” or “I am an alcoholic/addict,” or “I am gay/lesbian,” or “I am a man/woman” represent identifications that keep us trapped in a narrow range of experience? Quite the contrary, more often than not such statements indicate basic truths that form our authentic personality. These truths are not all that we are, but they are certainly integral to who we are. So no, these statements need not point to identifications that limit our authentic experience; instead, they may be important personal truths whose recognition is fundamental to an authentic life.
For us to treat such statements as being in any way less than integral to the person constitutes an empathic failure, for example, “I don’t even see you as black, as an alcoholic, as religious, as gay, and so on.” Here we fail to mirror the person in his or her full transcendence-immanence. You cannot see me if you do not see that I am embodied in my grief and joy, my thoughts and beliefs, my body and gender, my disability and language, my family background and age, and my ethnicity and values. These are not irrelevant to who I am but integral aspects of my being in the world, of my transcendence-immanence. In a very real way, these are who I am (though not all I am).
Transcendent-immanent mirroring is a recognition of each other as distinct-but-not-separate from, neither different from nor the same as, our manifestations. We are seen as transcendent-immanent human spirit, as “I.” In turn, this mirroring allows us to realize that this is indeed who we are.5
TRANSCENDENCE-IMMANENCE EAST AND WEST
Transcendence-immanence is recognized in many spiritual practices from different traditions. Note the similarity in the following two quotations, one from the East and the other from the West:
Having the semblance of the qualities of all the senses,
Yet freed from all the senses,
Unattached, and yet all-maintaining;
Free from the Strands, yet experiencing the Strands (of matter).
(Bhagavad Gita, XIII.14)
For we are not discussing the mere lack of things; this lack will not divest the soul, if it craves for all these objects. We are dealing with the denudation of the soul’s appetites and gratifications; this is what leaves it free and empty of all things, even though it possesses them. (St. John of the Cross, “Ascent of Mt. Carmel,” Ch. 3, No. 4)
The words of the Bhagavad Gita, “free . . . yet experiencing,” and St. John’s, “free and empty . . . even though it possesses them,” imply only a distinction—not a separation—between the human spirit and contents of experience. We are not told to get rid of all contents of experience but to realize that we are not identical to these. It is the identification with them, the attachment to them, that is addressed here. Taoist Lao-tzu follows suit:
Hence always rid yourself of desires in order
to observe its secrets;
But always allow yourself to have desires in order
to observe its manifestations.
These two are the same
But diverge in name as they issue forth.
(Lao-tzu 1968, 57)
According to Lao-tzu, realizing that one is distinct from desires is “the same” as having desires, that is, transcendence and immanence are one. These two concepts are contradictory notions that seek to model aspects of one paradoxical phenomenon. Again, we have the ability to be aware of psyche-soma contents and processes but not to be caught up in them—that is, disidentification. We are transcendent-immanent.
TRANSCENDENT-IMMANENT WILL
In the purity of formal disidentification practices such as meditation and contemplative prayer, it can appear that “I” is consciousness alone. We just sit, observing the contents of consciousness flow by, and we experience simple, pure consciousness of the moment. However, we are choosing to maintain this focus of our consciousness. And, in fact, we may need to bring our consciousness back to the present moment after becoming lost in a tangential train of thought or a vivid flow of imagery. In other words, “I” is not simply consciousness but has a dynamic function as well. “I” can choose to constrict consciousness, expand consciousness, focus consciousness, and even alter consciousness. “I” has both consciousness and will.
I am a center of awareness and of power.
—Roberto Assagioli
Thus the realization that “I” is distinct from psyche-soma contents and processes often is accompanied by an increased experience of freedom—if we experience ourselves as being distinct from sensations, feelings, thoughts, images, and so on, we are not only more aware of each but are potentially less controlled by them as well. Assagioli writes:
We are dominated by everything with which our self is identified. We can dominate and control everything from which we dis-identify ourselves. (1965a, 111)
His use of the word “dominate” here is unfortunate, in that it mistakenly may be read to mean a forceful, repressive type of inner control—not what he means at all. Rather, Assagioli is attempting to indicate the freedom that can emerge when we are not identified with the limited perspective of a single part of ourselves.
For example, Mark’s disidentification from the Worker and Lover allowed him the freedom to draw on either in response to life’s changing circumstances. We are more able to experience and express the richness of our multiplicity rather than limit ourselves to one aspect of our personalities alone.6
Again, this disidentification is not a dissociation nor a “standing back and deciding what to do” (although one may be free to do even this as well!). Rather, this is moving naturally and easily as “I,” as that “who” not limited to a single part of our personality, who can thus potentially engage them all. Here it is clear that we are not identical to any one part, or even all parts together, and so we are able to engage the whole—we are transcendent-immanent. This inner freedom, the freedom to express more and more of our inner resources in the world, is will. Will often is experienced as a graceful inner freedom and empowerment derived from an openness to all that we are.
Therefore, Assagioli’s idea of will should in no way be confused with the harsh repression of aspects of ourselves represented by the puritanical or Victorian notion of “willpower.” This latter is not emanating from I-amness; it is a force wielded by one strong aspect of the personality against others:
The Victorian conception of the will . . . [is] a conception of something stern and forbidding, which condemns and represses most of the other aspects of human nature. But such a misconception might be called a caricature of the will. The true function of the will is not to act against the personality drives to force the accomplishment of one’s purposes. The will . . . balances and constructively utilizes all the other activities and energies of the human being without repressing any of them. (Assagioli 1973a, 10)
Having said all of this about the freedom of will, we must point out too that this increased potential for freedom at times can mean an increased experience of weakness and helplessness—we are free to accept such abyss experiences as well. There are times in life that call us to accept our very real human limitations, to come to grips with the fact that we are far less in control of ourselves than we would like to think that we are.
For example, many of the deeper layers of our psyche contain wounds from traumatic experiences of helplessness and victimization. Thus when these levels within us begin to reemerge and to disrupt our lives, it often is necessary to enter into a full experiencing of the powerlessness characteristic of the original painful events. In this way we can accept these experiences and begin to heal them. Plumbing these depths shows true disidentification, because here we actually may choose to give up for a time any sense of independence and freedom in order to embrace and redeem wounded aspects of ourselves.
If during these times we attempt to maintain a centered, choosing, self-actualizing persona, we are, in effect, dissociating from the depth of our own humanness. And this is dissociation, not disidentification; it is an identification with survival personality. If, on the other hand, we accept such helplessness, we can then disidentify from survival personality and move toward a deeper experience of ourselves—we “lose self to gain self.”7
The conscious and purposeful use of self-identification—or dis-identification—is basic in psychosynthesis.
—Roberto Assagioli
In conclusion, we can say that “I,” or human spirit is distinct-but-not-separate from—transcendent-immanent within—all contents and processes of the psyche-soma, and that it possesses the functions of consciousness and will. “I” is who we are in essence and thus can neither be sought nor attained.
At this point, we may well ask, “If ‘I’ is who I am, and so I can’t reach toward this because I already am this, how do I discover or develop myself?” The next chapter will address this question at some length. The key is recognizing from whence “I” comes, how “I” is held, and so, how “I” flourishes.