Search for Identity

In his autobiography Confessions, Jean Jacques Rousseau speaks of his cathartic journey to reach his real self. What we avoid facing, we don't address. Thus, we have to embellish the truth and selectively present what might please others or make us more acceptable in their eyes. Wade through all those feelings - between the nice and bad, ugly and beautiful, kind and harsh, jealousy and pain - unpeel the layers to get to the core. Write down what you've done and the feelings that motivated it. From the negatives and the positives, we get to the basics. In doing this, you will get to the truth, your truth, your real self.

The search for authentic identity, Self, also involves rejecting false personas and inauthentic behaviours, a principle described in the Upanishads as Neti Neti, neither this nor that. It involves eliminating what one is not by systematically rejecting all the finite attributes and delving into deeper layers of existence. It shows us how the mind eventually gets tired of putting on labels and slides into deeper modes of seeking. To know who you are, you need to know who you are not. The function of Neti Neti is to remove the obstructions produced by ignorance.

If not this and not that, then what? If we don't know, then there is a possibility of knowing, and in this possibility, we find our authentic Self.