WHY THE SELF IMAGE OBSTRUCTS TRUTH AND FAIR PLAY ?

                                                                      

                                                                         

"Reality is merely an illusion

albeit a very persistent one."...............Albert Einstein

The Borrowed Mirror: Why the Self-Image Obstructs Truth and Fair Play

Every man has an image of himself, but unfortunately, that image is not true. It is essentially based on “what others think about you.” The self-image you carry is rarely drawn from direct perception. It is a composite sketched by other people’s eyes.

The Western Mirror: Sociology and Existentialism

Charles Cooley called this the “looking-glass self”: we imagine how we appear to others, imagine their judgment, then feel pride or shame and call that feeling “me.” The image is second-hand data, hearsay, not direct knowledge. Jean-Paul Sartre sharpened the point. Under the Other’s gaze, you are reduced from subject to object, frozen into labels like “timid” or “brilliant.” Once accepted, that label becomes bad faith, a lie you tell yourself to avoid the anxiety of freedom. You become an actor protecting a role instead of living a life.

G.H. Mead split the psyche into the socialised “Me,” which is just the sum of attitudes you’ve absorbed from family, culture, and peers, and the spontaneous “I,” which acts but is constantly censored by the “Me.” Most people live as the “Me” and forget the “I” exists. So the image feels like the whole self, when it’s actually just social residue. Erving Goffman showed that we are always performing, managing impressions to keep the social script running. To protect the image, you curate reality: hide losses, exaggerate wins, avoid risks that might crack the mask.

The Eastern dissolution: Buddhism and the Upanishads

The Buddha’s doctrine of "Anatta" claims there is no fixed bearer of traits at all, only shifting processes of body, feeling, perception, mental formations, and consciousness. Your “image” is just Sankhara, mental formations, heavily shaped by praise and blame. Clinging to it is " Dukkha", or suffering.

The Upanishads name the image-maker Ahamkara, the “I-maker.” It appropriates experiences and says, “This is mine, this is me.” The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad gives the antidote: neti, neti, “not this, not this.” You are not the body, not the thoughts, not the roles, not the reputation others assign you. Each label is subjected to negation until nothing remains that can be objectified. Atman is the seer itself, which can never become an object of perception or social judgment.

The Chandogya Upanishad declares, "Tat Tvam Asi",, “That Thou Art.” The “Thou” is not the biographical personality built from others’ opinions. Adi Shankara clarifies: it is Atman which is identical with Brahman, the infinite. The image is Nama-rupa, name and form; something temporary and social fiction. To identify with it is Avidya or ignorance. The Katha Upanishad uses the chariot analogy: the senses are the horses, the mind is the reins, but Ahamkara is the charioteer who thinks he owns the chariot. When you drop the image, you drop Ahamkara. Without ahamkara, there is no one to be offended, no brand to protect, and therefore no motive to cheat the game.

Why does the image corrupt fair play

An image does not sit idle. It legislates. If your image is “winner,” you cannot afford to lose honestly, so you tilt the board. If your image is “victim,” you cannot afford to win, so you sabotage the game. In both cases, the image becomes the player, and you become its servant. Nietzsche called this ressentiment: living reactively, defining yourself against others rather than from your own will. Heidegger calls us Dasein, a being whose nature is possibility, not definition. To nail yourself to an image is to trade possibility for predictability. Heraclitus reminds us you cannot step in the same river twice, yet the image pretends you are the same person you were when the label was first applied.

The way out: Image-less living

The Mandukya Upanishad points to Turiya, the fourth state, which is pure witnessing consciousness. In Sakshi-bhava, the witness attitude, you watch thoughts, roles, and social reactions arise without claiming them. The Isha Upanishad opens with "tena tyaktena bhunjithah" or “enjoy through renunciation.” Renounce the image, and you can engage the world without attachment to outcome. When you drop the image, three things happen: 1. Perception clears: you see others without filtering them through your need to be seen a certain way. 2. Action liberates: you can fail, change, or excel without betraying a brand. 3. Fair play returns: because the game is no longer about defending a fiction, it is about meeting what is, moment to moment, without a script. Anything that has no fixed identity cannot be defeated.

So the image is static while you are processing, second-hand while you require first-hand knowing, and socially useful while truth requires useless honesty. It is a name tag, not a biography. "Satyam jnanam anantam brahma" or "Brahman is truth, knowledge, infinite". Anything finite, labelled, and borrowed is Asatya, not true.

Keeping an image about self is always an obstruction in the path of Satya. And truth mirrors nothing.

( Avtar Mota )

CHINAR SHADE by Autarmota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.
Based on a work at http:\\autarmota.blogspot.com\.