UNDERSTANDING YOUR SELVES

Have you ever noticed that you show a different part of your self to each person you meet depending on his or her status, power, ability to help or harm you, and your personal history with him or her? Even with the same person the things you say and do to him or her depends on your mood, the setting, previous happenings, and a host of other factors. At times you wonder who or what is the real, the basic you. I believe that humans are more REactive, that is, they react to each situation, rather than they are PROactive, that is, plan and are prepared for each person and event they meet. As I wrote in CREATING YOUR GIANT SELF, humans are "defined" by the people, institutions, and events in their lives. Because of this humans find that they must have an army of "selves," a host of faces that they put on to fit various people or situations. It is necessary and VERY useful to do this.

Kaleidoscope

I see this as similar to a Kaleidoscope. Shake it and it gives you one picture or face. Shake it again and a new one appears. Of course, there is much more predictability with humans as they often follow predictable patterns dependent on the stimuli. I use the metaphor of a kaleidoscope to identify some of the major faces each person uses to varying degrees dependent on the person or persons and situations. In the process of naming or labeling them, the person can begin to feel in his body and in his mind what is happening to him in his relation with that person, institution, or setting at that moment. The label gives him a tool to better understand his REactions so that he can have greater CONTROL over it! He can then make better CHOICES.

A Workbook

UNDERSTANDING YOUR SELVES is a workbook for children and adolescents to help them better understand how and why they show these different faces or facets of themselves. In the process they understand the feelings and thoughts that seem to come unasked into their minds and bodies. Instead of creating students with seeming multiple personalities, they grasp that it is normal to seem like each is a spectrum of people. Instead of each "self" splitting off and, at times, taking over, they realize that each is an appropriate or inappropriate TEMPORARY reaction of an integrated person! The labels are valuable in group or individual discussions as they explore their behaviors.

Example

Parasitic Self. A parasite just TAKES without giving and can even damage or kill its host. Whereas a symbiont gives as much as it takes. After we explore this "self" the students use this label to make each other aware when one is just "using" or taking advantage of another. The workbook exercises also help them design a "good" mother, father, friend, mate, teacher, and "self." It gets them to think of what is and what is desirable or possible.

FREE in PDF form.