A Newly Rich Life With Yourself, by Martha Nussbaum

ENRIQUECER NUESTRA VIDA INTERIOR

No le quites importancia a tu vida interior. Ese es el primer y más amplio consejo que te daría. Nuestra sociedad está muy enfocada en lo que pasa fuera: muy atenta a la última novedad, al cotilleo más reciente, a la última estrategia para ganar reconocimiento y estatus. Pero todos nosotros iniciamos nuestro camino vital como bebés indefensos que dependemos de otras personas para cubrir nuestras necesidades, para alimentarnos y sobrevivir. Y a pesar de que con el tiempo desarrollamos cierto grado de autonomía y destreza, como individuos nos mantenemos siempre tremendamente frágiles y necesitados; para lograr cualquier cosa dependemos tanto de otras personas como de las inestables condiciones que este mundo nos presenta.

A medida que vamos creciendo, y en respuesta a esas circunstancias, cada quien desplegamos un gran abanico de emociones: miedo a que nos sucedan cosas malas y no tengamos capacidad para prevenirlas; cariño hacia aquellas personas que nos prestan su ayuda y apoyo; tristeza cuando perdemos a algún ser querido; esperanza de que nos pasen cosas buenas en el futuro; rabia cuando alguien daña algo que nos importa. En nuestra vida emocional queda retratada esa condición de seres incompletos que somos, pues una criatura autosuficiente nunca tendría razones para experimentar ni miedo, ni tristeza, ni esperanza ni ira. Esa es la precisa razón por la que a menudo nos avergonzamos de experimentar emociones: porque nos ponen en contacto con la experiencia de carencia y dependencia.

[...] La gente no sabe cómo manejarse con sus emociones, ni cómo mostrarlas ante los demás. Cuando experimentan miedo no saben expresarlo, y puede que ni siquiera sean plenamente conscientes de que lo están sintiendo. A menudo vuelcan su miedo en ataque. Ocurre con frecuencia también que la pobreza de esa vida interior les conduce a experimentar depresión en el futuro. Todos nosotros vamos a pasar por enfermedades, pérdidas, y deterioro físico, y esta cultura que nos empuja a enfocarnos únicamente en lo externo y a medirnos en términos de las cosas que poseemos no facilita que estemos preparados para afrontar lo inevitable.

¿Cómo se soluciona esto? Pues desarrollando una clase de amor propio que no disminuye cuando percibe partes de sí que están incompletas o necesitadas de algo, sino que las acepta con interés y curiosidad e intenta desarrollar un lenguaje con el que poder comunicar sus necesidades y sentimientos. Las historias narradas desempeñan un papel muy importante en nuestro proceso de desarrollo. A medida que contamos historias sobre la vida de otras personas aprendemos a imaginar lo que puede estar sintiendo otro ser en respuesta a las diferentes circunstancias. Y al identificarnos con esa otra criatura, también podemos aprender algo sobre nosotros mismos. A medida que ganamos experiencia y entramos en contacto con historias cada vez más complejas – a través de la literatura, del cine, las artes plásticas y la música – vamos adquiriendo una comprensión mucho más rica en matices de lo que son las emociones humanas, y por tanto de lo que ocurre en nuestro mundo interno.

Así que mi segundo consejo, que tiene mucho que ver con el primero, es el siguiente: lee montones de historias, escucha toda la música que puedas y reflexiona sobre el significado que esas historias tienen para tu vida y la de aquellos a quienes amas. De esa forma tu yo dejará de habitar en un desierto; adquirirás una rica vida interior, lo que hará que aumenten tus posibilidades de establecer con otros una comunicación auténtica.

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Martha Craven Nussbaum es una filósofa americana que en la actualidad ocupa la cátedra de Derecho y Ética en el Ilustre Instituto Ernst Freund de la Universidad de Chicago. Reparte sus funciones entre el departamento de filosofía y la facultad de derecho. Su interés se centra particularmente en la filosofía clásica de Grecia y Roma, la filosofía política, el feminismo y los valores éticos, incluidos los derechos de los animales.

Martha Craven Nussbaum is an American philosopher and the current Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago, a chair that includes appointments in the philosophy department and the law school. She has a particular interest in ancient Greek and Roman philosophy, political philosophy, feminism, and ethics, including animal rights.

Seed Questions for Reflection

What do you understand by a self-love that does not shrink from the needy and incomplete parts of the self? Can you share a personal experience of a time when you discovered a newly rich life with yourself? What works for you in relating to yourself at a deeper level?

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23 Past Reflections

Amit

Sep 19, 2014

I was diagnosed with life style decease in 2012. Today I am healthy and happy. While recovering from the illness, I decided to stop working for earning. I started Enjoying(self loving) my life. For last two years, I have shared my past experiences and knowledge with many non-profit organizations and suddenly realized that a joy in sharing my knowledge with others is more satisfying than making money! Our needs, our wanting and possessiveness comes from ignorance of understanding our own self! Self-knowledge and dropping our ego will naturally turn our life at a deeper level to peace love and having less and less need.

Rebecca McCarty

Sep 12, 2014

It is indeed true that we are born into helpless, undeveloped bodies. This undeveloped body, is animated by living Being. The body in which living being takes form, is equipped with an essence, having tastes, preferences and tendencies, as well as a full set of undeveloped functions, the normal ones, instinctive, moving, intellectual and emotional, as well as some others, which are not commonly stimulated to develop by ordinary life. Our essence is designed to collect data to itself, the kind of programming it receives, tempered by its native tendencies determines the type of personality it develops.
If the programming we have received is contrary to the native tendencies in our essence, then the personality is in conflict with essence. This leads to suffering for the living being animating the body. Our culture programs us to think that the external material world, of material things, money, status...according to material possessions, compliance with the latest fashions, ability to exercise power over others, etc. has more value, than the development of the essence belonging to the body housing the internal living being. In this case, the personality plays the roll of a guard, holding the inner living being a prisoner in its programs, dictating to the being what it "should" do, think, act, feel, eat, etcetera. It slowly begins to control all the impressions the being could use for its growth, replacing the real impressions with "concepts", which at best are good translations of the real would of direct impression.
Yet, there is a part residing in the body, that, if stimulated, begins to question the validity of the acquired personality.
Under favorable circumstances this part can help us separate the life of the inner world, from that of the outer world, and that same part can help the living being realize its spiritual nature, and assist the being, which is our very life, to gain control over the "guard" and insist that the "guard" become the "guardian" of the living being, which is its correct roll in relationship to us.
If this happens, we truly begin to "REALize our "Self" (that's self with a big "S"), We then, begin to "become", to exist in higher states of waking consciousness. First, in short flashes, then for longer periods. If we focus our attention, and apply our will, to developing a new personality, one that is passive in relationship to the Living Being residing within our body, it becomes the servant of the "Self" and not the master, the good steward how does his masters bidding". This happens when we , the living Being, makes the effort to "BE" in the present. moment. To truly "see" with the eyes, color, texture, form, to hear with ears, not just having them hang around.

The beginning of a new relationship with the "SELF" begins with this process, where personality, conforms to the essence of the living being, and not the other way around. It is in this new order, that the Living Being begins to thrive, grow, and develop, the end product of that development of that development is an increased ability of the living being to sustain its consciousness on a higher level of being.

Life erroneously, programs us, to place value in external things, yet the death of the body, and release of the living Being from the form of our "Name sake", shows that the living being can take no "material thing" with it, only its real experiences, the wisdom it has gain in a life well lived, and an increased ability to maintain the "Self" on a higher level of being.

When this more spiritually inclined part of our personality begins to activate, it produces new thoughts, "who am I? Why am I here? Are my opinions and attitudes valid, or even my own?" It asks. When finding the answer to these type of begins to burn in our psyche, we search for them. If we imagine that the answers lie outside, we get lost in acquiring what we have been taught to believe will give us happiness, fulfillment. Yet the answers we seek, whose finding will bring true fulfillment, are within our own "Self". If we go inward, and find our true "Self", and awaken it, even for a moment, and we do this over and over. Gradually a new, relationship develops between our outer material personality "self" (with a small "s") and the living being who is truly our own authentic "Self".

When the outer becomes as the inner, we find what we have been looking for, we find our own Being, rich, Being filled with conscious life of a higher nature.

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Syd Sep 12, 2014

This is excellent Rebecca and I have question for you. Moving our state of consciousness into the realm of Essence is an enormous accomplishment and yet it is a false perception I am the source accomplishing anything. Essence is everything, and yet my mind defines objects and divides my experience into different categories This Essence is more about observing my consciousness and perceiving a living unity of everything unfolding. There is no doing or accomplishment, because everything is happening together. Essence and consciousness is observing the unfolding and everything passes through. There is no attaching identity to anything and is like the clarification of boundaries. My value is not based on a particular achievement, so is this consciousness melts down barriers and boundaries. This Center feels normal. How do you become aware of the quality of this Center, a deep transcendence and my identity IS, and hold this or incorporate this into myself?

I feel lost in this higher state of consciousness and I do not want to give you the impression I am in a state of enlightment.. There are big traps here with this Inner Work and you help is appreciated.

me Sep 12, 2014

Stay clear then of "big traps" . . . Hold tight to your center/normal. Be who you are. I will continue to listen.

Syd Sep 13, 2014

There is hidden depth in what you write and especially your words you will continue to listen. To listen appears to speak of your hidden depths, an opening, and a meaning beyond what you intended to create. To listen to your inner voice is talent and training. This is to say your message is valuable because you are an individual and a sharp sense of your uniqueness.

Always Sep 13, 2014

YOU ARE most valuable! Why? Because God says so! (And because I see it to so)
When God asks me to pay attention, I obey. I will pay attention!

Cindy Sep 14, 2014

Thank you for the reminder, which I need!

aj Sep 21, 2014

Rebecca, this is beautiful. Well thought and so true!
i have a brother in law, Jim, who by nature, is very "pliable". He married a woman he was "visually" attracted to and bought into "her story" with all he had in him. Throughout the course of his 10 year marriage with her, she "undid" him piece by piece . . . In essence, she had him brainwashed . . . He was "sleepwalking" to self . . . He was on "hyper-alert" to his (so called) wife.
As God's sons and daughters we have to have to be sharply aware of Him alone. I do not care to be used by another to fulfill their agenda. I'd rather be used by God to fulfill His plan and purpose for me in serving those around me.
i have learned a lot from my brother in law, Jim. Seeing what "power, manipulation and inflexibility" has done to him, makes me wary of anyone/institution who/that remotely "look like" her.
Not being true to YOURSELF and your Heavenly Family will lead to our personal destruction.
Always Love
Thank you Rebecca!

david doane Sep 23, 2014

Interesting what you said, AJ, that as God's sons and daughters we have to have to... That's double no choice, no freedom. I believe we are to be free.

aj Sep 24, 2014

That was a typo, David. You are so right in your words "we are to be free".
I am free to "choose Christ" (Father and Holy Spirit) . . . Thanks Be!

david doane Sep 25, 2014

We are all Christ, aj, if we choose that or not. We are waking up to realizing that all of us and all that is is sacred.

aj Sep 25, 2014

Amen David! True . . . True . . . True . . . True . . . True!
When Jesus knocks at my door and asks to come in, most often, I invite Him in. Because, I am a sinner (however) there are times He knocks and I do not acknowledge. In habitually choosing Him, He becomes more alive in me. (Kind of like I do with my husband, family, friends, special people, special causes . . . I need, regularly, commit myself to them as an outward reminder of their place in my life.)
David, in Christ, I can commit the sacred in me to the sacred in you. Always (trying anyway)!

Rebecca McCarty Sep 27, 2014

Syd,

I have given you question deep thought, drawing on my own experience.

Holding on to a higher state does not come automatically, it is a process which requires practice. First we must find our selves, what begins the search for the Self is mind, the Self is so used to letting the mind direct attention, that it forgets that it is the rightful owner of attention, and not the mind. When the mind touches the true Self with attention, attention "sticks" to the self, its rightful owner, and the Self "wakes up" momentarily, in a higher state of consciousness. This feeling of "lost" when entering such a state, comes from the mind, which being deprived of the ability to control attention, goes into mental confusion.

We have been so thoroughly programmed by our social/cultural upbringing to find our identity through the data collected over time by the mind/body, that this separation of attention's control from the mind, back to the true self, however brief, is an uncomfortable experience, being so unfamiliar to us, and also thrilling in conscious clarity, at the same time. A true paradox.

The state is so unusual, and certainly scary from the instinctive point of view, for the body and its functions produce the sense that they, and not the living being, are the producers of our life, when the attention is no longer under the control of the mind/body, and Self surfaces, then one is faced with the fact that the body is not immortal, that the death of the body is a reality, which it only fooled us into believing is not.

One must learn to endure this uncomfortable feeling, which lessens over time. The "big trap', is believing the mind/body's fears of death and impermanence are fears the Self "should" identify with and claim as its own. As soon as the living being, who is us, succumbs to this fear, attention attaches to it, the mind grabs back control, and we loose hold of the higher state. Practice is the key, which takes a keen desire to awaken and the exercise of will. Do not loose hope, look up, you are not alone, you have help, persevere and you will pierce the veil of eternity.

There is only one source of Being, and in so far as we partake of Being, we are that Being. Being IS, and will always BE. Fear of death is an illusion, as silly as a that of a drop of water, tossed high in the air by a wave, fearing falling into the great ocean, and becoming ocean.

Syd Sep 28, 2014

Rebecca,

Wow, your answer to my question is penetrating my superficial mind. From your words I recognize my trap of clinging to my mind as my world. And you are right I do feel lost moving into this higher consciousness. It seems this higher consciousness, this “Self”, does not need to cling to the endless activity of the mind. It feels like my mind has formed a shell around my innermost Self. It is like my mind is an identity I have used to stay in flight.

It seems Rebecca, from reading your post, my big trap is building my self up for the next catastrophe only by identifying with my mind. Yet because I seem to have some grasp of what you are writing I notice a part of me no longer wanting to cling to my endless activity of my mind as a source of identity and my orientation to the world. And just like you are expressing this feels uncomfortable, like a pioneer opening up on new land. Being a pioneer with my inner landscape faith appears to be clarification. It is recognizing arbitrary inventions of my mind, such as death, as you speak about.

The ocean, you write about, is a key for understanding the whole. This symbol truly requires a high state of consciousness and this ocean feels like this place of faith. For some reason there is turbulence of my emotions on this ocean water, yet something is finding a way to ride the current. I believe this is the higher consciousness you are writing about and it gradually moves into Being, and becomes one with the ocean. This ocean feels paradoxical, even an opening to hidden depths, and there is this unshakable confidence what is true here cannot be harmed.

Thank you deeply and the life-enhancing individual you are!

Abhishek Thaore

Sep 11, 2014

This passage was read after an Awakin where there are 3 of our young members who traditionally struggle with long silence but decided to give it a shot.....and it was so appropriate!

With most young people, there is the challenge of even pointing to their inward spaces....of course there are exceptions who are deeply anchored in their inner journeys. But for most part, requesting a group of restless youth to be in silence even for a few minutes (which I do before my sessions) is bound to be violated....and yet it is one of the most worthwile things to do with them :)

I think it is like any other place - you may find it initially very fascinating, then very boring and then you disover it in a whole new light....after that second deeper discovery, it is an endless rich tapestry of darkness intersperced with wonders :)

Always

Sep 10, 2014

We need not apologize for having weaknesses. God made each of us to be strong and to be weak in areas . . . Both being essential parts of our whole. (God has a plan!)
We were created to add, subtract, multiply and divide ourselves inwardly (strengths and weaknesses, as necessary) that we may be suitable partners in/with the world we are called to serve, teach and enhance.
As we cannot give what we do not have, it is essential we nurture/spend time with ourselves to magnify/align ourselves with/in Him (His mission/purpose/His love")

Syd

Sep 9, 2014

My story is filled with lots of self-hatred and self-contempt, feeling inadequate and defective, even this fear of being unimportant and undesirable. It is place I felt like a constant misfit. I escaped my inner pain by pretending it is not there. I gradually broke my denial, this inability to admit I was hurting inside, and I gradually let go of the inner chaos. I learned to nurture my own, true inner life. From there my inner landscape became this peace, like I was riding a bicycle on a beautiful day, enjoying everything about the flow of my life experience. This unfolded into serenity. I felt like self-possession and self-surrender together.

This last year I lost perspective, lost what I learned from life, and lost my beliefs. It felt like nothing true in the world, nothing true or valuable in which I could believe in. There was even a certain attraction to my inner darkness. Yet because was enduring my darkness, faith seem to be counteracting the terror and despair. My inner faith verified I needed to drop my story I had been telling myself a long time. This felt like I was leaping into “nothingness” or walking off the edge of the world. I felt completely empty, this inner void. Something from within, though, was making my faith leap into the unknown. It felt like a sunbather feeling the sun and it did not matter if I believed or not. This faith allowed an “opening,” which seemed to allow something higher and more essential touch my wounded self.

This essential that touched me appears to be the Essence of faith and appears beyond any beliefs and what I have learned. This faith is the recognition this Essence, like rays from the sun, offering support and presence. It is like my story is now at the point of faith within the Supreme Being and this Essence offers this unshakable confidence. And I realize this is not my whole story and maybe this is where the moment unfolds into this living Presence. It is just a place to begin.

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Love Sep 10, 2014

Syd, I met a person you describe and all I could see was BEAUTY. (I believe in All of Heaven, They help me (us) "to see" as They see. The truth sets us free:))

Syd Sep 10, 2014

There is a sense of wonder in what you write Love and in the nature of seeing. I wish I could see with innocent eyes, and yet maybe innocence is being fully and deeply human, simplicity of faith seeing itself. Thank you!

david doane

Sep 9, 2014

No person is an island. Fritz Perls taught that we are self reliant, not self sufficient. That means I can rely on myself to attain what I need that I do not contain within myself. Needy and incomplete are what I am, and self-love means loving all of me including my needy and incomplete. My understanding is that a self love that includes self acceptance and self confidence allows for self reliance, so I can rely on myself to reach out, say what I need and want, say what I don't want, say what I will do and won't do. I discovered a newly rich life with myself when I turned on to having an inner life and began to value and pay attention to it. What works for me is to be still, shut out the outer noise, and listen to my inner experience, that is, my feelings, my intuition, my inner voice and inner nudging. The author says to not despise your inner world. Indeed, what works for me is to revere my inner world and use it to express and g... View full comment

sandy

Sep 9, 2014

Life is an ever challenging adventure with detours that are not really detours, just part of the path of growth. I know some Indian tribe perceive illness as necessary for growth....so....let's continue, hand in hand, enjoying it all!

Kristin Pedemonti

Sep 5, 2014

A complete self love accepts what we may consider flaws or weaknesses. In April I fully accepted that I have Depression; it is one facet of me, it is not All of me. When I finally went public via a blog post about my challenges it was amazing the love and light that poured in from others. So many people began to share Their struggles and challenges and together we realized none of us are alone. We have each other to talk to, lean on and love. It opened up deeper conversations. It also made me feel a bit more free. As a Storyteller, I agree 100% that we are the Stories we share, tell, read, and discover. We can choose which stories we tell. And the Stories can help us to grow & learn. May we all love all ourselves; even the dark bits. HUGS from my heart to yours.

Cindy Sep 9, 2014

I, too, have so struggled with depression as I have aged. Younger family members are suffering difficult problems, and I want to help, but I feel so inadequate.