How to "Know Thyself" - Like Socrates

The Perils of Self-Understanding

Composition X by Wassily Kandinsky (1939)

As some of you know, many of my conversations on In Search of Wisdom include a question about knowing yourself. Something like, “Is it possible to know thyself?” Or put another way, “How does one begin to know themselves?”

Know Thyself?

In my conversation with Skye Clearly (the author of How to Be Authentic), I asked: “How about self-awareness or this maxim of Know thyself? Is that possible?”

Cleary explained,

“I think that this relates to the idea of being and nothingness; we are part of our being — we're always in process. So how can we know? If we're a rock? Maybe we can end up knowing a lot about ourselves. Maybe if we define ourselves by one particular label, then we can know ourselves. But that's not what human reality is.”

Human reality is always stretching; explained Clearly, there's constantly shifting. “I'm a philosopher today, maybe not tomorrow. So how do I become? How do I know myself? If I'm just sticking to the label of a philosopher?” It's important to understand who were becoming… It is important to ask — what “self” we are trying to be aware of; since we are always in flux or always changing.

“Only the shallow know themselves.” — Oscar Wilde

I recently read the above Oscar Wilde quote in Original Self (A Collection of 50 Short Reflections) by the psychotherapist Thomas Moore.

Moore writes,

During my years of doing therapy, it was not unusual for a client to say, “If only I could finally understand myself and figure out what I’m doing, I’d be a free person.” One of the great unconscious beliefs of our time is our trust in the mind. We try to understand every fragment …, celebrating discoverers, inventors, and researchers, and we apply the same passion to ourselves.

Who am I?

What if most of our “self-understanding” is hollow and superficial? What if we don’t really know ourselves at all? Moore observed that “I was struck by the hollowness of most self-understanding” in therapy.

Usually, we think of the self as an ego contained in the skin of personality, but a deeper self, a more original self, lies outside the time and space of our personal lives. “What was your face before you were born? the Zen Master asks.” This is an excellent question, according to Moore, because it has no definite answer.

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Contemplation: Some ways of knowing do not require understanding:

• Take a few minutes to listen to a great piece of music.

• Stare at a beautiful painting for an extended period of time.

***Does one need to understand to appreciate (to love)?

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The notion of self-awareness dates all the way back to Ancient Greece. According to the Greek writer Pausanias, there were three Delphic maxims inscribed in the forecourt of the Temple of Apollo at Delphi: know thyself, nothing to excess and certainty brings insanity. The ancient Greek aphorism “Know thyself” was made famous by Socrates (by way of his student Plato). Although, strangely, Socrates stressed,

“True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us.”

Similarly, the nineteenth-century philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche noted: “How can man know himself? He is a thing obscure and veiled. If the hare has seven skins, man can cast from him seventy times seven skins and not be able to say: Here you truly are; there is skin no more.”

What if authentic self-understanding requires the courage to accept the idea that we don’t actually know ourselves?

One of the food world’s biggest voices, Anthony Bourdain, the host of culinary travelogue Parts Unknown, may have said it best,

“Maybe that’s enlightenment enough: to know that there is no final resting place of the mind; no moment of smug clarity. Perhaps wisdom... is realizing how small I am, and unwise, and how far I have yet to go.”

We may never truly know ourselves, friends, or spouses, but we may eventually realize that it is enough to love ourselves and others without knowing what they’re all about. Moore writes, “Unconditional love means that we don’t love on the condition that we understand (ourselves or others).”

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Thank you for reading; I hope you found something useful.

Until next time, be wise and be well,

P.S. Expect a few more posts on self-awareness in the coming week. And as always, please feel free to comment, ask questions, or disagree!