Tangibles

Last updated Aug 15, 2023

• Source: Atlas/Maps/DLQ 10 MOC
• Keywords: Cards/permanent notes
• Relevant Notes:
  • Module 1A
    • Cards/Problem versus Mystery: If we treat the question “Who am I?” as a problem, we answer with our tangibles. But if we treat “Who am I?” as a mystery, we acknowledge that there is more to us than this constructed persona
    • Cards/Absolute Certainty versus Wonder: wholely defining ourselves according to our tangibles comes from a reductionist mindset.
    • Cards/Order and Chaos: To live a good life, we need to learn how to treat our tangibles like advisors instead of dictators. This requires a balance between order and chaos; the former gives us the direction we need while the latter teaches us adaptation.
    • Cards/Perfectionism: Perfectionists create avatars of themselves with their own tangibles.
    • Cards/Desire: Tangibles, at their core, reflect desires
  • Module 1B
    • Cards/The First Principle and Foundation
    • Cards/Discernment:
    • Cards/Desolation:
    • Cards/Consolation:
    • Cards/Disordered attachments
  • Module 2
    • Cards/The Divided Life: a life dictated by personas created from tangibles.
    • Cards/Brokenness:
    • Cards/The False Self
    • Cards/Self-rejection

• Who am I? is a hard question to answer because we are complex and constantly changing

• We all have an Instagram avatar: an embellished online version of one’s self normally constructed using the hgihlights of one’s life.

  • 1-dimensional, low-resolution
  • There’s always a level of curation
  • We tend to compare our reality to other people’s highlights, even in real life.

• According to Henri Nouwen, we define our identites according to our tangibles.

  • These are what we use to create a certain avatar that we present to the world.
  • These aren’t bad; they’re all necessary.

• Tangibles are concrete and measurable, but they are also fleeting and unreliable.

  • A life dictated by tangibles is a life of mere survival.
  • This is what Parker Palmer (in Images of Integrity / Across the Great Divide) calls Cards/The Divided Life

• Oftentimes, the problem is that we treat the tangibles like dictators instead of advisors.

• Richard Rohr gives a distinction between Cards/The False Self and Cards/The True Self; the former is our shell, while the latter is our core.

• When the tangibles are gone, what will be left of us?
  • If the tangibles make up Cards/The False Self…
  • …perhaps Cards/The True Self is what remains