Essence and Personality

The title of this article belongs to a well-known phrase by the Persian poet Rumi. When I first read it, it really resonated within me, it sounds paradoxical, doesn't it? But what did this noble and wise poet want to metaphorize with this profound question?

Let's restate it: Do you visit yourself regularly?

To deeply understand this expression, I want to tell you about two terms that are a core part to understand the essence of Transpersonal Psychology. Perhaps only one of them is known to most: Personality and Essence. The term Personality is familiar to us, but... and the Essence? Have we forgotten it? If Personality is familiar to us, has the Essence been left too far behind?

There is in each of us a pure, innate, unconditioned core, not subject to the laws of time or matter. It is a portion of the Whole that inhabits and energizes each human individuality. The phrase "We are all One" symbolizes that we are all made of the same energy, the same raw material, but each human being will manifest it according to their uniqueness and life project. Some wisdom traditions call this portion of the Whole "Soul", others "Being". Transpersonal Psychology names it "Essence". Different names to name the same thing: the permanent behind the impermanent of our Personality.

Our Wise Unconscious

This "Inner Center", which we can also name as "Wise Unconscious", belongs to the deepest layers of the unconscious that Freud spoke of (where traumas, conflicts, repressed desires, etc., are located). This "Other Unconscious", luminous and not "deceptive" like the one investigated by psychoanalysis, contains the most valuable information about ourselves. Information that has nothing to do with the knowledge of the mind but with the intelligence of the immanent, in tune with the laws of the Universe. These laws are not those that govern matter, nor those agreed upon by men. That's why there are things in "this" life that are hard for us to understand, precisely because they are not from this plane, but correspond to an energy that transcends us, that includes Everything and that we do not have to understand with the mind, but understand from the depth of the Essence.

This Essence, which constitutes our most primordial matrix from which everything else stems, comes to this life to experience, evolve, and manifest itself. It will seek and find ways to do so. We will see this later on.

From Essence to Personality

When we are born, we are Essence in all its splendor. This quality is expressed as children, as free, innocent, defenseless, authentic, spontaneous beings, connected to this Whole that dwells within us. Operating from there, we feel no fear, we trust and love.

After a while, we begin to perceive ourselves as beings different and separate from our mother, and soon realize our absolute state of dependency on our caregivers. In this state of vulnerability, we recognize that if we are not loved, if we are not accepted, there will be no one to take care of us. The food, shelter, necessary attention to survive in this world will depend, at this stage of life, on there being Others, who provide and assist us. From then on, the main concern will be: "ensuring the presence of our caregivers". Otherwise, we will not survive. So, we conclude that if we manage to be loved and attract the attention of others, there will be someone to ensure our life. Discovering this magical survival strategy, we go after it!!

After this recognition, the child, like a radar, begins to observe his surroundings and learns everything that is expected of him. "His unconscious records and archives, records and archives". And he starts to respond to everything he supposes is expected of him. This search for external recognition is subject to the promise of love from his parents.

His parents through upbringing will mark what is right and what is wrong, rewarding and punishing, denying and giving. If the love received is too "conditional", in the way of: "If you do this, I'll give you that". The child will learn that he is more valued for what he "does" than for what he "is". And that he will only be loved if he meets expectations. This, of course, will have consequences in his adult life if he does not review, over time, these rigid and so limiting equations.

Now then... And the Essence we were talking about at the beginning? That so own part? Surely it will have been left "far away...", behind all the conditioning and external learnings... How about in your life today? Wouldn't it be good to ask yourself that?

The Personality

All the conditioning we were subjected to and which we responded to in order to adapt to that family first, then to our culture and society, have built a pseudo-identity, called Personality.

Personality, then, is what we construct on top of our Essence and has served to keep us alive until now. Personality and Ego are used interchangeably, and aptly so, Ego = means Shield, nothing more appropriate! It protects the vulnerable Essence of our beginnings.

The problem lies in the fact that we are so accustomed to functioning this way... we "believe ourselves to be" that Personality, when it's only our clothing. Our true identity is the nakedness of the Essence, which we have relegated to the depths of our interiority, becoming almost inaccessible, suffocated and smothered by so much external garb.

When Rumi says: Do you visit yourself regularly? He is actually referring to making contact with that part of the Self (as Carl G Jung spoke of), with that portion of the Whole that comes to live its experiences and that almost without realizing it... like in a kind of hypnosis and consenting sleepiness, we impose a life on it that is not its own, which does not arise from our deepest desires, but as a result of what we suppose others expect, or what directs the herd and blindly we follow! Faithful to the masses seeking guarantees of happiness and belonging. The price of belonging has the highest cost: ceasing to be who we truly are.

Thus, belonging: first to the family, then to the group, and finally to society, implies losing contact with the Being, with our deepest Essence, with our most own part. This, of course, will not be without consequences... remember that the Essence, as we affirmed when describing it previously: "comes to manifest itself." That energy that dwells in each one of us will seek a way to (ex/press itself): to escape from the prison of the Ego/Personality. If its unfolding is hindered by the mandates and conditioning that gave rise to our temporary identity (for a time in our life), it will make itself heard. How? There are many ways: from symptoms to more serious illnesses, through anguish, discomfort, vital and existential crises, or a feeling of alienation with one's own life. When malaise takes over our life, the Essence is whispering in our ear: "things are not going that way." And with this, I am not asserting that there is "only one path" and that if we err a step we are condemned to unhappiness and dissatisfaction... Don't be discouraged, we are many! It's not so much about rethinking our entire life... Although, it's worth clarifying: in some extreme cases, this may be indispensable because the shot has been very badly missed and the life that has been built turns out to be totally alien to its true author. Without reaching these radical terms, what I refer to on this occasion, is the case of many of those who are reading me and resonate with these written words.

From the surface of the Personality, we will go through life anesthetized and in automatic pilot mode "ticking off" what is done: studying, getting a job, getting married, having the first child, then the second, maybe the third, then...then...with frustrations and anger towards circumstances if something fails to be ticked off and happy every time we sing in the naval battle "sunk!" This continues until...the list is filled, with luck and not always nor in all people, the questions arrive:

"What for? And now what?" Blessed questions because if they are well directed, it will be a new opportunity to contact that deep part of oneself and be able to access living a life with Consciousness and Meaning. Otherwise, if these questions are not asked or we do not attend to this call that comes from within, we will continue ticking off the list until reaching the last step "die". It is in this decisive instance where we can experience something like an inexplicable feeling of vast nostalgia... As if a part of oneself, is left with the taste of the "not lived". Sometimes, this sensation is confused with what was left to do, what was left to know...but it is much more than this! This helps to clarify why some people having much less than others, accessing fewer pleasures and opportunities, achieve a more blissful and fruitful life.

From the depth of the Essence: we will go through life unfolding, evolving... Evolution that has nothing to do with obtaining titles and ticking off arbitrary lists. This will be important, of course...but not the only thing nor the central one. The fundamental here will be to learn and capitalize on experiences. Moving from the mode "Why me?" to "What for me?" Maintaining this last question even in the face of the most painful we can live, is to become wise and understand life as a school. To achieve this, it will be nodal to remember that the laws that govern the Essence are not the justice of men but of the Universe that includes everything and transcends us. Living from the Essence is to FEEL life, not to question it or try to understand it from the mind that judges.

FEELING from "meaning" and feel from being porous in body and soul so that energy can circulate. Nourishing ourselves with that energy, reconstructing ourselves each time as a better version of oneself. Being artisan and craftsmanship of this divine work that was given to us, which is to live one's own life. Contributing to the Universal Source from where everything arises, what belongs to it and to which we belong and from where we never left...although sometimes we forget and need a bucket of ice water to wake us from the collective and massifying sleep in which we all fall and not always all manage to get out. The invitation is that now that you know that there are two ways to live life: from the Essence or from the Ego, you dare to start "choosing", instead of passively submitting to the mandates of the Ego.

Visiting oneself regularly is to make "space" and give the opportunity for the Essence to filter through the walls of the Ego and guide us in life, in our decisions, in our journey, marking the pace, perhaps not always the path. Since it's not about arriving but about how to transit. What we sometimes call "intuition", responds to the voice of the essence.

The more porous we become and the more bridges we build from the external to the deepest within ourselves, the more congruent we will be between what we feel, say, and do. And surely when we leave, we will have another taste of self and life, without feeling "anything pending" because that pending was not pending to do but to be born, and we have given birth to it: our Essential Being.