Adaptive Freedom

Do you think you would notice if someone you were giving directions to was suddenly replaced by someone else? Yes? Perhaps not! 

The life you experience is the aggregate of what you pay attention to. To live authentically is to live in complete awareness of the present moment—that slice of time which is your conscious existence. Authentic living is conscious living. 

Many people are simply surviving: surviving work, surviving unemployment, surviving the weekend, surviving Monday, surviving relationships and breakups, surviving parents and children. When you start to live authentically you stop surviving and start thriving. You become honest with yourself about yourself – you get real about what works for you and what doesn’t. This requires getting a handle on what you value in life and what you are prepared to commit to. Because a coherent, authentic life involves commitment, control, compassion and connection with others. Authenticity is about making choices and far more about saying ‘yes’ to committed living than saying ‘no’ to what you don't want. To thrive is also to strive – to make an effort to live a better, richer, fuller life and in the process come into full possession of your unique authentic nature. And the wonderful thing is that just making the choice is often enough to get you there.

There is an authentic self—an ideal you—inside you waiting to be revealed and those who are close to you and who care about you are well placed to help you realise it. Therefore the exploration of the ideal you is not a solitary act or wholly within your own control. Environmental and interpersonal forces help with the sculpting process. Parents, friends, teachers, and colleagues all play a part. Role models are also a vibrant source of aspirational fuel. But few sculptors are likely to exert as powerful an influence on you as those of your close partners in life – and you can do the same for them. 

‎"Most of us miss most of our life!" This stark comment is from the Zen Psychologist, David Brazier http://dld.bz/bgbjH It passes by as you busily fill-up your days with hurry and bustle—doing things, being active and productive, or alternatively just being bored! To be adaptive, free and living authentically you require perceptive awareness. This includes heightened levels of attention, clear perception and awareness formed by your intuitive and analytical minds working in harmony. To be aware is "to be conscious of" what is happening in the present moment. It simply means that you know your thoughts and actions. You are aware of yourself and your situation. Awareness has its roots in two Latin words conscious and scire 'to know,' and is synonymous with consciousness. This 'knowingness' is a state, an outcome or result of increased attentiveness. It is brought about through the processes of attention and perception. Read more athttp://dld.bz/bgbjJ 

To have a vision is essentially to know—deep down—why you are doing what you do. This is well illustrated in the story of the Italian stonecutters told by the psychotherapist Roberto Assagioli. A visitor to a stone quarry asked a stonecutter what he was doing. "Don't you see," he replied a little sourly, "I'm cutting stones," thus showing his dislike of what he regarded as unpleasant and valueless work.

The visitor passed on and put the same question to another stonecutter. "I'm earning a living for myself and my family," replied the workman in an even tempered way that reflected a certain satisfaction.
Further on, the visitor stopped by a third stonecutter and asked him: "And what are you doing?" This third stonecutter replied joyously: "I am building a Cathedral." He had grasped the big picture. This potentially tedious and demanding task was part of the great vision for a Cathedral. His efforts were as necessary as the architect's, and carried equal value.
Therefore, he was performing his work not only willingly, but with enthusiasm. If you keep your focus on the big picture—the long term vision—then the cares of today will take care of themselves.

The challenge for each of us is to embark on a personal journey of establishing what it means for us to live an authentic life. We must be responsible for our own life rather than responsive to what others say our life should be. Rather than lament the passing of stern leadership and the imposition of ethical standards from on high we can see this era as the next stage in the maturation of humanity. We are no longer children or adolescents but have come into adulthood and must now shape our world with the tools of reason and intuition, science and tradition.

This requires clarifying and testing our personal values in the fire of our lived experience; coming to terms with our personal power and defining what it means to achieve success and wellbeing in life. We are called to face the challenge of simultaneously living our life and exercising our freedom and power in accordance with those values.

We have become accustomed to taking our values and ideals much like our breakfast cereal—out of a box. The box is that of culture and tradition, family and tribe and nowadays the social conditioning peddled by a voracious media under the guise of ‘public opinion.’ The surrender of so many leaders to the alleged primacy of public opinion has been a central feature in the collapse of credible leadership at all levels in society. To be authentic is to have a belief, a position, a view and then to stand-up for that view until convinced by others that it is misguided or there is a better alternative.

The challenge for a free and authentic person is to create your own vision or ideal of what a modern, valuable and authentic society might be, and be willing to stand-up for it. And in the process, not to be unduly swayed by what the media present to you as ‘truth.

 

The philosophy of Adaptive Freedom highlights 7 Qualities of Authenticity. The first is Control:

Self-control is the quality of self-mastery aligned with self-reliance. It arises from self-awareness. When you are self-aware you are focused and attentive to what is happening in your world, and you see events and people accurately with clear perception. You are aware of your needs, you know your priorities and you are able to avoid distractions and focus appropriate energies on achieving your goals. Self-control requires that you become aware of your intuitive nature, have the capacity for introspection, be open to positive feedback and be willing to look for new perspectives in every situation. This paradoxically allows you time to be original, spontaneous and free.
Each of the 7 Qualities of Authenticity is linked to one of the 7 Pillars of the Freedom Code. Control is linked to the 1st Pillar: Perceptive Awareness.

The psychologist Carl Rogers believed that at the root of all the problems people presented as the reason for seeking counselling was just one. They are desperate to become their real selves, to be allowed to drop the mask they present to the world or feel the world demands of them.

Beneath all the zealous pursuits of our lives—our desire for love, happiness, wealth, power, success and status lies a deep unfulfilled longing. Beneath all the myriad hopes and wishes that consume us and are often left partially unsatisfied, lies a more fundamental and ultimately more rewarding search—the quest for our authentic nature.

What is that authentic nature? How can we define authenticity? The truth is that it is beyond definition. There can be no general, all embracing account of what it means to live an authentic life since that can only be decided in and through your experience of life itself. Authenticity is uniquely personal and experiential.

Authenticity is measured not in terms of an objective inventory but in your way of “being what and who you are.” This echoes the French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre's slogan that “existence precedes essence”—you come to be authentic in the way you live your life.

At the core of our need to be authentic is a deeper and more fundamental desire to be the best we can possibly be. This is an urge to reach beyond the life we live to one where our full potential is realized—to where meaning, purpose, success and happiness all coalesce into one exciting, challenging, rewarding and utterly satisfying whole—where we are at peace with ourselves and the world. 

Carl Jung called this the search for “individuation” which Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow described as “self-actualization”or “self-realization”—an underlying and irresistible urge toward the fulfilment of our inherent and highest potential. Maslow defined self-realization as “the impulse to convert oneself into what one is capable of being.”

Whatever that may be Carl Rogers  is clear on what it is not. It is “not a façade of conformity to others, not a cynical denial of all feeling, nor a front of intellectual rationality, but a living, breathing, feeling, fluctuating process.”

This is a continuous process of emotional and mental growth, learning, maturing and change—an innate capacity for coming into being that can only be realized by our own action. It involves awakening the latent potential and power in our psyche.

Being You means taking the path to the summit of your highest potential. This is a challenging prospect for many of us because it implies that we must step out of the crowd and instead of conforming to what the crowd thinks and believes, we discover our own unique thoughts and beliefs.

This is a process that has been going on all your life. It’s the nonconscious process of personal development that characterizes every person. The difference is that we now put it up front as a distinct process—we transform it from a nonconscious to a conscious activity. This shift brings fundamental features of your nature and character into the light of day and requires you to make conscious choices about yourself that you may have never even imagined, let alone considered.

The process of shaping your authentic nature puts your identity as a person—your personhood—and your personality under the spotlight. The thoughts, emotions and behavior that make up your personality come into clear focus. You gain insight into the very core of your being. This is both daunting and exciting, and it is not for the fainthearted.

The result will be a level of understanding of what it means to be your ‘authentic self’ that far surpasses anything you thought possible. In turn this will make it easier—and imperative—to live according to that image. Being You—becoming your authentic self—is the journey home to the inner core of your nature.

Your authentic or aspirational identity is what you hope to make of your self, the type of person you want to become—the “ideal you.” It is a vision of the personality traits, values and patterns of behavior you wish to personify.
The ideal you is shaped and ultimately realized in the world but formed in your imagination. Your imagination is the ultimate source of your authentic nature. It is the expression of absolutely everything you wish to be.
The focus on what you aspire to be is more an activity rather than an end in itself. You are not trying to capture a pure, original or pristine identity that exists separately from the stream of your experience—that lies hidden waiting to be discovered.
The development of an aspirational identity in this context is what the philosopher Richard Moran has called ‘self-constitution.’ He believes that we are uniquely able to constitute ourselves. Therefore, you don’t search for your authentic self, it exists right here right now. You don’t discover your authentic self, you shape your authentic self in a way that gives meaning to the life you lead.
The philosopher George Herbert Palmer described the process by using the analogy of an elm tree. When the seed of an elm begins to sprout, it is adapted not merely to the next stage, but to every stage beyond that. The whole elm is already predicted in its genetic make-up when its seed is planted in the ground. For it to become an elm it must have a helpful environment, but still a certain plan of movement “elmwards” is already contained in the seed.
But what if the seed already knew the shape and size of elm it had the potential to become? Every time it sucked in moisture or basked in sunshine it would be gently adapting this nourishment to the fulfillment of its ultimate goal. It might be asking itself for example, whether the strength gained from the environment would be better sent to the left branch or the right.
Such an elm would be entirely different to its fellow elms in the forest. Because if it could envisage what it might look like as it grew to maturity it wouldn’t be an elm but a human person. Unlike the elm we are entrusted with our own growth. The basic plan is in our genes but the environment we inhabit and the choices we make ultimately decide what we become.
Your authentic or aspirational identity is what you hope to make of yourself, the type of person you want to become—the ideal you. It is a vision of the highest potential that you aspire to fulfil in your life—the true, free and authentic person you wish to become.