I believe I know now the reason for my stagnation. I had the pieces, just need to fit them together. I chose the selves of others over my own when emotions conflicted for so long, I had buried my own self. The self cannot be buried alive for long though, and it soon withered under the incidental repression of not choosing my self. Eventually, whether through numbness or ignorance, it dies trapped behind the masks that now replace the authentic persona of me. I have spent some years now scaling my way back to the place of self, but I’ve found little but fragments, wishes, desires, and fears. These are the building blocks, but because I had ravaged my own mind for regulatory order over the peace of mind of an integrated and indignantly proud self, I have not but these blocks with which to maneuver my own soul. Fragmentation via existential supposition, of my self with that of the secret wishes of others whom I was aware and sensitive enough to see and value, much to my own detriment. Perhaps, I am over-estimating the value of strong pride, but I doubt it. What drove me to replace my living with that of others is inconsequential now. Those motivations no longer hold sway, and only the habitual pattern of self-sacrifice remains, thankfully. This has been at base the weirdest developmental process I have ever undergone, yet there seems to be something still sacred or truly powerful in learning how to destroy an ego.

Self-destruction could be a profane indulgence, a vain attempt to achieve some allegedly holy emptiness or raw authenticity that only the least burdened of souls can reiterate in their personal expression, but in wishing to redeem that darkness, I find a way in which the dark of mystery, vagueness, chaos, and elimination can be the material substance of a redefinition that yet becomes self-determination, self-definition, the freedom to be. I only hope that upon redrawing the borders of my mind around the hearth of my soul, I do not find myself to be wanting, still broken and unamendable, cowering around a pathetically weak spark of life which never grew to supplant the will of others who impressed upon me with my own pyre. A pyre, yes, because I believe that every light fades, so it would be in sheer foolishness to think that I could, from suicide, create an everlasting self. I do not need my destruction or my soul to be the catalyst for a greater evolution into something transcendent and eternal. I only need it to be and to be mine.

Perfectionism and pretentiousness often go hand in hand, as they are both inclined to prop the self up as definitely worthy of esteem by right of accomplishment or natural superiority. Similarly, both are inclinations towards a failure of or frustration in development. They are destructive impulses in the mind, rather than constructive, and aim the energy of motivation and impetus at internal regulation by use of force against the psyche rather than more cooperative adaptations that do not contrast with the natural expression of one’s will. The Will is like a force of soul that moves outward, energizing action and discernment, judgment and commitment. It utilizes cognitive structures to orient the mind towards further development and expression of the Will, hence why its repeated denial and suppression creates a habit of psychic suicide.

It is also already enough that I exist — feel free to say the same for yourself. The task lies in allowing myself to exist, ironically allowing myself to fall, fail, and continue to limit my ego as I had done and likely may do again. It’s a great power that allows for the self-governance of a living soul, and it should be considered — because it is true — vital to the integrity of a human person, ethically, spiritually, and physically. You do not want to lose your ego nor do you want to lose control of it. Many people propose that the self can be somehow self-manipulated as if it were the tool and the hand that wields it, yet this only perpetuates the perfectionism and pretentiousness identified as slopes to slip down. Humility and faith in Truth are essential to one’s well-being. Not all dangers exist in the world of practical material, so to say. While the fault of Denial is practiced through behaviors reinforced by repetition in our respective times of being — these lives — it stems from the refusal to dare to be you. Not you in some crystalized essence, for that is a self-idolizing aesthetic you aspire to and desire, but you as you became, as the thing that now finds itself. And this entails daring to be compromised, to be insufficient, to be imperfect, to be inefficient, to be failing, to be dying, and to be lying when all such things are themselves the truest expressions of yourself. It is manic delusion and again denial to pretend that darkness cannot touch you, or that it has only evil to share. The ego extends from the self as its envoy and representation; it is like the hand, but more in the way that the hand and the tool are at once the substrate of the Will of your living Self. There is a strength to be had in ego, just as a hand worthy of manipulating tools must itself be a worthy tool for the will of the being that grew the hand and demonstrate the skill of creation & change, accepting the limits of truly living. It’s just that people don’t typically stake their pride in their hands.