In the previous post, we discussed identity as being the idea we hold of our self. We also discussed the concept of the Eidolon and what that means. If you haven’t read it yet, be sure to look it over now.

I also left you with a two-part exercise. Part one, list traits that would be in a class that defines yourself. And part two, propose the most elegant solution to a difficulty that you experience. Jot these down on a sheet of paper. We do this to get a high-level view of where we are starting. Next, we are going to discuss how assessing the self-image, internal narrative, experience of life, and behaviors we want to see expressed in our self can get us closer to being that person.

The Eidolon Process

Self Image

First, we’ll begin with self-image. This is simply a question of how you see yourself. It is very important to have a positive self-image. A negative self-image is draining and causes us to turn inward harmfully. With life as stressful as it is, we certainly do not need the added burden of seeing ourselves in a poor light. Positive self-image, on the other hand, is a motivating force and allows one to more fully access their own potential. We will choose an archetype to define ourselves by, or enhance an archetype that may already be applicable to us. Do you want to see yourself as a fighter? As a healer? What does it mean to honestly call yourself this thing?

Internal Narrative

Let’s move on to my internal narrative. This is perhaps the most difficult aspect to define or designate an identity around because it is so variable. Not only might I not hold the same narrative today as I might a year from now, but my conscious and subconscious chatter changes even minute-by-minute. This is because narratives are an aspect of stories, and stories change over time. Generally speaking, however, a story may hold a consistent theme and a consistent plot. In my head, what type of story do I want to live? A redemption tale? A heroic saga?

Experience of Life

Next, we continue by asking what experience I want of life. Suffice to say I would like it to be a good one. But what qualifies “good”? Since this is only about how I self-identify, describing a good experience through external objects and sensations is not very helpful. Rather, it makes more sense to discuss what I think a good experience is. Good is very subjective, and one’s way of life can easily shape what one calls good or bad. It can even help decide what one’s tolerance level is to a bad experience. Maybe I would be pleased to identify with a zero tolerance take on certain actions against me. Or maybe I would enjoy myself as one who finds happiness in meager situations.

Day-to-Day Behaviors

Finally, we can discuss behaviors. Of what I’ve discussed, behavior is the only one that has both an interior and exterior element. You own your behaviors, but others have to suffer them if they are poor. This makes things both simpler and easier than with the above because while behaviors are easier to define than the experience of life, they are very numerous. For simplicity sake, we’ll create a series of character traits and situations to bundle up our behaviors in. Something like “cool under pressure” which defines someone who isn’t just level headed, but specifically when it hits the fan. They might be a party animal or a panicky mess the rest of the day, but in that one situation, they have it all together. Do I want to be kind without pretense? Aggressive when confronted?

What This Looks Like

If you’ve been following along, you may have found it extremely hard to pinpoint exactly how you want to be in your Eidolon. In theory, if you could answer those question and live by the answers, you could train yourself into the type of person you’d like to identify as. That is much more easily said than done, however. Human life is far too varied to account for the twists, turns, and nuanced scenarios it would take to simply outline who you actually intend to behave and feel like. Life is just not ideal. However, our personal description is. What we’ve created is an idealized version of our self. This isn’t just whom we want to be, but since we are defining our identity as a spiritual element, it’s also whom we’re meant to be, and are truly intended to be.

Now I’ve had the opportunity to collect a series of ideas that supposedly point the person I want to become and the identity I wish to assume.

1. For me personally, I like to model my self-image after the term “warrior poet”. It is apropos since I still identify with my practices both as a martial artist and as a writer. More meaningfully it sings a song of balance between two types of temperance.
2. I would like my internal narrative to follow a theme of self-discovery and a solid plot based around a personal quest. This quest would determine my personal missions and my devotion. I’ll discuss with that devotion is later.
3. I want my experience of life to be filled with challenge, but not struggle. A sense of well-earned abundance that comes without guilt or entitlement.
4. In my behavior, I prefer discipline over spontaneity, gregariousness in social situations, compassion over confrontation, but courage in adversity.

What’s Next?

Still with me? We now have a good idea of what we want ourselves to be under perfect conditions, even though we fully you know that perfect conditions don’t exist. It helps to provide us some direction either environment we’d want to excel in. We may not be able to reproduce perfect conditions, but we can certainly stage the environment to be more similar to where our Eidolon would thrive. This series of conditions, along with the Eidolon itself, comprises of our personal ideology. This is the sum amount of ideas and ideals that guide us and our personal philosophy which can be codified and practiced. These precepts are key in manifesting the person that you want to become because it is, in effect, an unwritten manifesto.

I’ve made a lot of statements in the name of reinventing myself. It would be unreasonable to expect each of these to be maintained by sheer force of will. It is important to give flesh these out further and more fully visualize them. In the next post, I will investigate tools to both inform and reinforce the decisions I came up here. This will move us further toward embodying the traits we pick out when using this process.

Among one of the most important types of ideas that exist is that of identity. Identity is the idea that the self is or can be represented by a cohesive body of facts. The ways by which a person may identify, be identified, or otherwise answer “who I am” are vast. This lies at the core of the problem with identity, in that deciding what one uses as a foundation for how one self identifies has real implications on behavior. It is because of the power this particular type of idea holds that it is my favorite species of “idea”. It represents the most abstract image of the individual. In some ways, you could even say it is closely akin to spirit.

Gnōthi sauton is the Greek phrase that was said to be written at the Oracle of Delphi. It means “Know Thyself.” Self knowledge requires a “self” to know. This is the problem with identity. where does the self begin and end? Is the self actually an illusion? The conscious sense of “self” can completely vanish through states of flow or the use of psycho-active chemicals. Does that mean that the self is arbitrary? Even asking questions like if someone is the same person today as they were yesterday are philosophically vexing. I personally define myself around a suite of tendencies, and which tendencies are prominent under certain conditions. Lately, however, I’ve felt out of touch with and out of control of those tendencies. Recently after shutting down my business and some other events, I’m not sure what I relate to anymore.

Who Am I?

As I am writing this, I have no idea who I am. That is, I know how to identify myself by name, face, occupation, and a litany of government assigned numbers, but I’m not sure who all of these facts actually point to. To some extent, it does not really matter, but personally designing my sense of identity allows me to affect my self-image, my internal narrative, my experience of life, and my day-to-day behaviors. From a personal development perspective, and even just that of a human, that’s pretty huge. One could almost say that’s all there is.

The question is, who do I want to be? What would I label as my “true self?” I call this particular type of idealized self your “Eidolon”, which is a Greek word that means the true or perfect form of a thing. This ideal person encapsulates the seed of the idea of our perfect identity. Once we have defined it, we have designed a “self” to self-actualize. A series of steps can be laid out and intentionally taken to realize this imagined person into the real world. I suppose because of the non-arbitrary effects I noted above that identity has, I should start from those and work backward toward the center. I invite you to follow along to design your own Eidolon.

Discovering My Eidolon

First let’s make it perfectly clear that when asking our selves “who I want to be” or “who I am,” that doesn’t mean that anything needs to be changed, altered, or removed. You are always yourself, no matter what, so there’s nothing needed to create or discover. This is a self-development exercise specifically built to exemplify the parts you feel are most in alignment with your ideals. You can’t authentically become “more yourself,” but you can present and experience yourself in a way that is more fulfilling. You can be yourself in a way that tells your story more loudly and celebrates everything you are and respect. The Eidolon is about living with the best experience of self, not a critical one.

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Now that that’s cleared up, life is about change. Nothing stays the same, at least not for very long. Who I am changes slightly from moment to moment. The point of self-directed change, at least to me, is to have some say in the ways in which I am changed and that change affects me. Some things in our lives simply don’t serve us. Maybe they used to or maybe they never did. And maybe it’s time to make room for new experiences and behaviors. Either way, just like shedding is for trees, change is a very natural part of human existence. What’s key here is to worry less about adding or taking away traits, and concern ourselves more with giving greater attention to our favorite aspects.

What’s Involved

Much of this self-direction is achieved through my environment. By creating reinforcing structures and environmental barriers I can outsource the force of will needed to be the way I want onto the world around me with passive reminders. I always like to say that if you need to change the world, you should start by changing yourself; and if you want to change yourself, you should start by changing the world. Some of the best internal work is done external of us. Altering our physical conditions is a powerful and effective way to direct our growth and change. If you make the world reflect more of what you want to be, you will make yourself more like you want to be. I ask if my surroundings surround who I am, and act based on the answer. It’s really that simple.

Several years in software product development has given me a few key tools to help figure out who I am. For one, in object-oriented programming, you figure out how to designate a particular class of entity in code. For example, my class is “Human”, and I am an instance of Human called “Devon”. Devon gets all the properties of Human and some special ones, not least of which are my face and name. Confused yet? Well, if I were a class or type of being (like a Tigger), what ideally would that look like? This class is the Eidolon in a nutshell. Further, there are some concepts from design to consider. One is asking what problem exactly are we trying to solve? Which solution is the most elegant?

I’ll go more into this process in a future entry, but for now, take time to consider the questions above for yourself. If you were a class of being what traits and behaviors would you have, and what is the most elegant way to solve the most prominent difficulty you face in your life. Talk more in the next post.

I honestly expected that to be an easier question to ask myself. Human beings are not two-dimensional. Particularly not with our personal identity. We have nuance and complexity that makes us a roller coaster ride even to our own experience. On this ride, which peak or dip or twist or turn defines you? How do you even answer this question? Is there an answer?

It’s my opinion that people defy definition. That we can’t really be neatly summed up, at least not in our “natural state.” I feel it takes a very conscious exercise of will to decide and commit to who we are in any discrete way. Because of this, I thought to redesign the question so as to offload the weight from me to something else. I am now asking myself “What am I devoted to and will I dedicate my time and attention toward?”

This very different question changes the focus from me as a person to my effort as a measurable vector over time. The question of definition is hard to impossible because of what it actually means. To define implies finality. You draw a hard line with a definition. You simply say “this equals that” and set it in stone.

We are far too dynamic, robust, and obstinate for that. Personal identity is complex enough without shutting down the doors for change. Now, if I asked what I wanted my life to add up to, or where I wanted my presence to settle most, this is a question of desire and follow-through. Not only is it easy to identify, but it’s also easy to verify.

Serious Business

That all being said, I’m still not going to take this question lightly. This is about how I will view myself. Who I want to be and my relationship with that person. My personal identity isn’t just personal, it’s social and communal. I’d like to spend a couple of months very slowly yet deliberately answering the question of where I will place my time. I will ask how I want to be perceived by others, who my audience should be, and what any of this might look like.

I will spend a week outlining the broad idea of what I want my life to revolve around. Then I’ll create a rough strategy to accomplish that the next week. The third week will be spent doing research to validate the strategy. The fourth week I will outline a series of tasks to reach my goals. The month after will involve executing those tasks. My birthday is on July 11th, so that gives me just a little over two months to have designed moved into the lifestyle and career I decide upon.

Designing a Personal Identity

I’m essentially creating a career, brand, and image for myself professionally as well as declaring a cause I will devote myself to personally. This will ripple deep into my family, my finances, and my felicity, so I plan to be extremely thoughtful. Once I’m in I will be making decisions and creating structures and barriers to lock me into my decision. This has always been the way I try to operate, that way I only need to make big decisions once.

How do you define yourself? What do you devote yourself to? Have you ever asked yourself these questions? If you have, how did you determine the answers? Please share and let me know. I can use all the feedback I can get right now. It’s no small task to intentionally design one’s own life. I wouldn’t want to do it all on my own.