Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.

Carl Jung

 

This quote by Jung is reflected in Parker Palmer’s concept of knowing myself so that I may know others. Getting to know myself is a journey through life. This journey, however, is not an easy one, nor is it one that can be completed over a weekend of introspection. It is a journey of small successes and failures, but always moving forward. It is a journey in which I arrive at my destination only to discover that it is but the end of a leg - and another one yet awaits.  Michael Carey, in Heracletian Fire: Journeying on the Path of Leadership,relates this journey to Erikson’s model of therapy in which “human growth results from resolving each of a series of crises; in each case resolution necessitates a choice for development."  This choice is one of either remaining in a state of self-embeddedness (refusal to enlarge the mind and develop) or self-transcendence (growth leading to connection with the authentic self). Palmer describes this identity of the true self as “a moving intersection of the inner and outer forces that make me who I am, converging in the irreducible mystery of being human." So as I encounter forces both from within and from without, and as I discover the beauty of difference, and choose self-transcendence, I prepare myself to guide others on this same path of personal transformation.