Professor Bruce M. Hood argues that there is no self as the self is largely
determined by those around us and
that the self is constructed over the course of childhood by the
powerful influence of our parents and those around us. Dr Hood wrote in his
book, “The Self Illusion” : “Nature has built into humans the capacity to
learn and to learn very quickly from others. It is not only doting adults who
focus their attention on their offspring; each baby is wired to pay attention
to others. It is how our species has evolved a remarkable ability to transfer
knowledge from one generation to the next and no other animal on the planet can
do this as well as humans. But do babies know who they are? Babies have
conscious awareness but does a baby have a sense of self yet? We cannot know
for certain but I suspect not. Beginning the process of creating the self
illusion requires early social interactions. ”
According to Bruce Hood, not only do we humans learn from others about the
world around us, we also learn to become a self and we come to discover who we
are through the process of
watching others and trying to understand them.
While we are our brains, which
create our sense of self , we readily conform to the will of the group of
people we mix with. The people we mix with are usually people we are attracted
to and we are attracted to people whom we think we share the
same values with . Our brains grow as we learn to cope and negotiate the best path
through the social landscape.
These days many of us enjoy being
on the Web and actively use the Facebook and Twitter to interact with others.
There is a certain degree of narcissism when we post our profiles. There are
also many who do not feel the need to surrender precious time, effort and
privacy to join online communities. Dr Hood wrote in his book “The Self
Illusion”: “ If the self
illusion is correct, social networking sites will continue to expand in
popularity and will increasingly shape the sense of who we are for the next
generation and those that follow. So long as we remain a social animal, social
networks in one form or another are here to stay. This is because most of us want
to be noticed….”
Whether or not we matter to those
who we interact with, it is important that we have a strong sense of self
in order to be reasonably happy in this fast moving world. We endeavour to establish our own identity among our
peers yet it is not easy not to succumb to peer pressures. We like our opinions to be validated by
others. But how often we find that our
views and values may not be shared by others or that we are often
misunderstood when we try to explain things or that we think we are being
objective and open-minded when we are not. After all, everyone is entitled to form their own opinions. There come a time when we will find that humans are
basically self absorbed and all
consumed with what they want for themselves and what they choose to believe and not believe in.
During my teenage years, I kept a
journal and there was this one time when I was in my early teens, both a good friend and I took part
in an elocution contest held by the school and the winner would represent our school to take part
in an inter-school elocution contest.
By a stroke of luck, I won the competition held at the school and this
friend came a close second. As we were buddies, I knew how badly my friend had
wanted to be the winner and take part in the interschool competition. To much
disappointment of my dad, I let this friend take my place. On reflection, the
cynic in the present me questions : Did I give up the opportunity because I was
too afraid to lose in the bigger sphere or that the competition did not matter
to me at all? I conclude that I was basically a slacker and in the face of a
rivalry or conflict, I chose to walk away. Maybe it is all of the above reasons not that any of it
matters.
When I read 'Tolstoy and the
Purple Chair My Year of Magical
Reading' by Nina Sankovitch, I could so relate to her concerns about what
examples she was setting for her
children.
One day, Nina went out to the
side of the road by her house and dug out a tiny maple tree growing up in the shade of bigger trees. She
dragged the tree and carried it home in a wagon and planted the tree beside her patio. The tree provided just
enough shade in one corner of the patio. Her children had asked her for the
reason of her action. Why had she not gone to the nursery to buy a nice tree
instead of doing what she had done?
She explained that the tree could
get bigger but was not going to get any bigger if it had stayed under the shade
of those big maples so she saved a tree that had a potential to grow bigger.
The sons offered different
explanations for her action amongst which “ You don’t have money for a new
tree?” “ You’re cheap” “ You love to dig” . Nina’s husband offered, “ Your
mother is crazy.”
Nina said “All of the above” and
“ I wanted shade on the patio.”
I like the little anecdote that
shows her mindfulness in bringing up her kids. Nina Sankovitch was reading to come to terms with the pain of losing her sister Anne –Marie who had boundless
energy and endless curiosity for new ideas and new ways of looking at things.
Buddhism holds that changes take
place all the time and the world is in a state of constant flux thus change is
the only constant. Nothing is what it seems. In his book ,“What Do Buddhists
Believe? Meaning and Mindfulness in Buddhist Philosophy” Tony Morris wrote “And Nothing is separate.
Everything is connected. People love to think of themselves as individuals. The
human ego seems to have a vested interest in bolstering the view of a separate
existence, a world out there! But nothing happens in isolation. Phenomena that
may appear distinct are, in fact, fundamentally connected.”
Tony Morris also wrote in his
book : “ In essence, the
Buddha analysed human behaviour in the way a modern psychologist might, identifying the drives, motives
and impulses which shape our perceptions and lead us to respond in particular
ways. As one commentator (Elizabeth J Harris) memorably puts it, ‘Buddhism sees human beings as verbs
rather than nouns.’”
We are matrixes of our minds and we define ourselves by our thoughts and perceptions. How often we find ourselves
incoherent individuals, our behaviour erratic and our attitudes changing and even our memories may become unreliable.