Self-realization is not a luxury. And not a distant goal for vacation or retired life. Do not underestimate the danger of self-betrayal, like most people do. Every little hiding of your self, every pretense, every visit to a dead church, every admiration of a work of art you find ugly lowers another veil around your soul. You develop an alien personality that you soon mistake for your true self. Not only for others, but also for yourself, you become invisible. And you can hardly recognize the world anymore. You need stronger and stronger stimuli for the kick. You can no longer find the Blue Flower.
You will never find the Blue Flower
Parrhesia, the truth about ourselves, is not a steam engine that pushes itself to the fore. “Perhaps truth is a woman who has reasons for not letting us see her reasons?”, Nietzsche supposes. We Cynics are convinced: Our self is good by nature, because we understand nature, our nature included, as divine. But it does not follow that we find our nature so easily within us without seeking and realizing it. The Blue Flower stands for the fact that the beautiful truth hides, since the Enlightenment more than ever. She is a delicate slightly fragile being. And if, instead of seeking it, we still undertake the opposite, practicing self-denial on a daily basis, it will become increasingly difficult for us to find it. “He who pursues science without romance finds only dirt,” says Novalis. And that’s also the danger of self-deception: you’ll soon mistake every garishly blue shining plastic garbage for the Blue Flower. You are lost then.
Various forms of dangerous self-denial
The occasions for denying one’s self rather than realizing it are plentiful. Here are just a few examples:
Showing off: You don’t think of yourself as sufficient, valuable, lovable. Therefore you have to adorn yourself with borrowed plumes. You are name dropping, using quotes from famous authors only so that people will think you are smarter than you think you are…. An enhancement of name dropping is plagiarism: you pass off borrowed thoughts as your own in order to be admired for your cleverness. You tell people that you are doing very well, even though you are sad, so that people envy you. You buy yourself many things so that others will think you are wealthy.
Hypocrisy: You agree with others, even if you have a completely different opinion. You tell the boss or your partner what he wants to hear in order to please him. You go to a dead church, mindlessly say some formulas, worship a god just for show. You smile kindly at people when greeting them, although you would rather not see them at all. You eat something you don’t like at all so that the cook won’t be offended. You answer your partner when he tells you that he loves you, that you love him too, although you don’t feel any love for him at all.
Cowardice: You only work because you are afraid of being left without money. You don’t leave your partner only because you are afraid of being alone. You hide your erotic preferences for fear that your partner will reject you for them. You agree with the prevailing opinion, so that you are not condemned as a racist or sexist, for example. You do not speak freely, but darkly and carefully, for fear of rejection.”
Fear of missing out: You have to constantly pursue some activity, you need variety, even in your partnerships, make a career, for fear of having lived an unfulfilled life in the end. You look for the truth in the stars instead of in yourself. You are ashamed of your loneliness, enter into a relationship, have children, just so that your life – apparently – is full.
Altruism: Wanting to help selflessly is perhaps the most dangerous of all forms of self-betrayal. Altruism is the revaluation of all values by (post)-christianity. You are good if you do not love yourself. This poison was mainly brought into the world by Kant. You are good only if you act out of duty. If you take pleasure in helping, then that is immoral. Moral is only acting without any inclination. Beware of altruists. If you meet an altruist: take to your heels so that you don’t catch it.
I could list more examples for days. All such actions contribute to you losing more and more access to the truth of your self and thus to God. In the end you are a soulless larva. You are just vegetating. You live in hell. Like most people. That is the danger of self-betrayal.
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