There is a saying that is used frequently these days by spiritual teachers belonging to different traditions, or at least claiming their filiation to a spiritual tradition or another. It seems to be a kind of new “sesame” to help one to reach total freedom. This saying is : “Be yourself”. In a world where individualism (even though the term is highly misunderstood) in the form of the fulfillment of the individual has become the ultimate social achievement, it is no wonder that presenting the spiritual path as just being “oneself” is magnetically appealing. But is it really what true and genuine spirituality has to offer ?
All the spiritual teachings from different traditions, begin their teaching by informing us that in some way, there is something “wrong” within ourselves that is the main cause of our suffering. And they all agree with their own words that this cause is what is commonly known today as our ego or personality or “me”; in short : “oneself”. This “oneself”, this “me”, is exactly what one has to work on if one wants to realize who or what one really is and get rid of one’s suffering. In this light, it seems that the “be yourself” advice can lead to a huge confusion and misunderstandings about the actual spiritual path and consequently bring even more suffering. Even tough following a genuine spiritual path will lead one to be oneself ! (There is no spirituality without paradox)
Before being oneself, one needs to sort out what really is this oneself one takes for granted. Is “oneself" this collection of contradictory opinions, full of pretence, self-conceit, self-satisfaction, that gets upset over nothing and is always up to judge, to criticize and to give opinions about all and everything when in actuality one has no idea about what one is saying and is just repeating like a parrot what one heard or read somewhere and that was fitting with the mood of the moment ? Is this really “myself” ? Well if this is the case, what a piece of crap !
