The work at self -development is a path able to bring the practitioner towards the realization of his intimate nature, the essence of what he really is. This seems to be well understood from many readers of this blog.
What seems to produce some confusion, at least considering the emails received from some of the readers, arises when we begin to speak about a fragmentation of personality, false self and essence, and especially, in the sentence “a human being in its ordinary conditions has no identity”.
What could result is the obvious deduction that if we haven’t an identity, then we don’t exist. Is it possible that we have no “I”, that we have no part of ourselves that could be stable, permanent, at least enduring for the whole duration of our lives?
And, if this is correct and true, then what gives us the perception of witness, at least partially, to the events which happen in our lives? Is all this merely an illusion?
The answer of many practitioners involved in a work of self development is probably “yes”, and the question is closed. But it’s not so. Things are slightly different and more complex that what would seem at a first glance. The problem is that, without an effective, devoted and long practice, it’s impossible to understand the real meaning of the sentence “in ordinary conditions we don’t exist”, “We are not”.
The first question one should make to himself, if he is really interested in understanding this topic, and not to blindly repeat what he had read or heard from a teacher, is what “I” is in question or, better said, are we sure we are speaking about the same thing?
Indeed, the character “A” understands information in a way that is surely not the same as that of character “B”; and both characters “A” and “B” understand the same information in a totally different way than character “C”.
So, when we speak about the concept of individuality in the field of self development, what are we speaking about?
What should be understood is that every human being is composed of a personal field and a transpersonal field, and this is usually ignored, even by the “insiders”.
Personality belongs to the personal field and, ordinarily, all what we think we are is related with it. We are totally identified in personality that, as explained in previous posts, is totally . The quality of this field, in an ordinary state, is that it is totally imaginary and impermanent and effectively unreal: it’s a reflection of what we have acquired during our life as conditioning from the outside, without  direct experience or, if so, through an experience harmed by the previous preconceptions caused by conditionings. We feel, live and feel joy through this field. For the reason that this personality is composed from many different parts, many “I’s”, it can’t be considered unified. Part of the work for self-development is just centered on constructing a stable and conscious “I” that could represent a new, conscious personality.
But, there is another part of us, that is often mentioned, but usually less experienced; and it’s a pity, because this is the real part of us, the only part that we could say is effectively permanent. This is what we really are: the essence. This is the “I really am”, the “Me”.
This field belongs to us from the moment of our birth, and it’s the transpersonal field mentioned above. Self consciousness corresponds exactly to the realization of who we really are.
So, there is an “I” and a “Me”. In the field of personality, we are not unified. We can state that there’s no effective I, there’s not one ego, but many of them. But this doesn’t mean that we are totally deprived of an individuality. We have not realized it, we don’t live through it, so we are unaware of this individuality. We are not conscious of what we are, so we are not aware of ourselves. That is the main meaning of this term.
Of course, even what is written here, are just mere words,so probably, not part of the experience of the reader. But it is useless to take blindly the statement that we have not an individuality as an absolute. The true individuaity exists in everyone of us, but it has to be discovered, experienced and developed… trained as a muscle that for too long has not been used, so it has atrophied, and it’s functions have to be recovered.