Experiencing Ideas as Authority or Terror

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anxiety problems, authentic self, Charles Williams, emotionally important ideas, existential angst, false persona, loss of self, religious beliefs

You must regard your own emotionally important ideas with the respect due to proper authority. To be authentic, you must live by these defining and guiding ideas. (Photo: public domain)

Charles Williams was a British polymath combining considerable skills as a poet, novelist, theologian, and literary critic. He was also a valued member of the famed Inklings writing circle and a powerful influence on Narnia creator, C. S. Lewis. Williams’ most famous biographer is Alice Mary Hadfield who, during widely spaced periods in her life, wrote two perceptive critical biographies filled with useful insights concerning his life and work. One of her most revealing penetrations has a bearing on existentialism.

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Imagination Can Stimulate Will

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authentic self, authentic will, emotionally important ideas, finding motivation, imagine freely, joy bliss delight and enchantment, mind's eye, pursuing self-realization

Imagination can illuminate buried, forgotten, or neglected sources of joy and energize your life by putting will back into the picture.

I have written several posts about authentic will and illuminated its roots in the psyche. As a way of discovering what you will, I have put forward the idea of employing resonance. That is, look around for those things that stir feelings of joy, delight, bliss or enchantment and there you will find what you truly want (will). This is so, because what you see or experience is resonating with (stimulating) your emotionally important ideas, the origin of will. Notice that, while your will comes from within, what I am suggesting relies on external objects, situations, activities, and so on.

The Ship as Metaphor for the Self

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authentic self, authentic will, emotionally important ideas, inner guide, making decisions, personal wisdom, self-discovery, self-realization

Functional aspects of the authentic self may be compared to the working parts of an old-fashioned sailing ship. (Image freeclipartnow.com)

The authentic self comprises the unique set of our most potent and precious emotionally important ideas. We acquire the basics of these mental constructs as children when, through our behaviour, our genes interact with our physical and social environment. Their uniqueness is what makes us all natural individuals. (Yes, without even trying, if we can stay out of our own way.) Unless we make them conscious – and we can – these assorted emotionally important ideas live in the unconscious where they generate our true will. We are all born with the urge for self-realization and the capacities we want to fulfil are an integral part of the authentic self.

An old-fashioned sailboat or square-rigged ship makes a useful metaphor

How Creative People Think

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associative thinking, emotionally important ideas, flexible thinking, generating insights, hidden reality, logical thinking, personal worldview, selective thinking

Creative people are both more flexible and more selective in the way they think.

Highly creative people are different from the average person. It is not that the typical man or woman on the street is not creative. It is just that the quality creator functions at a greater level of sophistication and (often) output.

Three factors make these creators stand out.

First, such people possess the ability to think profitably by a variety of means.