Your personal experiences have taught you, among other things, to be guarded or free with your emotions, which affects your willingness to label an experience of someone as love. You’ve learned what love means and looks like in your culture. So, when you think, “I love my partner,” it’s an interpretation of feelings-physical signals from complex biological processes-based on to the way relationships work in your culture and your personal history. We engage with the social world in much the same way. Highlighting something and dragging it to the trash is just a representation of a much more complex set of processes. When you put an item in the “trash,” the little icon isn’t moving into a trash can. It’s like the little icons on a computer, our user interface if you will. Think of it this way: when we engage with the world, we do so in a way that makes sense to us without needing to understand the incredibly complex processes taking place inside us or the equally complex interactions between us and the external world. But when we take a closer look at the idea of the self as a person inside us, cracks start to emerge. You are always in there somewhere, thinking and feeling, directing action, like a little “you” managing the controls. I assume you feel the same way: you know that you are you, a bundle of experiences, wants and needs, actions taken and avoided, all made coherent because they flow from a single source: you.Īs we go about our days almost nothing feels as immediate, as wholly our own, as our selves. I feel completely whole, able to move through the world and interact with others, or not, as I see fit. And you are having your own experience as you read these words. I am certain my self-not you, not anyone else-is having this experience. Right now, as I search for the words to express my thoughts to you, I alternate between feelings of frustration and ease. Reprinted courtesy of Harper, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. Excerpted from the book: SELFLESS by Brian Lowery.
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