This process reflects processes we have experienced in our lives, but because we have internalized it, we see it and feel it as just and fair. It forms a central part of the "every negative thought and feeling you had about yourself . . ." complex meaning perspective. A personal arrangement we would like to convert into something more useful and less painful. This makes quite a picture when we question and reflect on it critically. The "Self" does all the work, makes all the effort, takes all the chances, and suffers from any loss or pain encountered in the process of living every day. The “I”—what does that guy do for a living? Not much. The “I” just judges, and all the judgments seem foregone conclusions. Whatever the "Self" does, the “I” finds lacking. This strikes me as a very, very bad deal for the Self, and it’s equally bad deal for the “I”. This rift in our being, this other and unnecessary and untrue dualism, sounds like and feels like one of the loneliest and saddest places in the world. When we consider that the defensive ego gets involved and uses this negative dialogue as a source of pride and self-justification, we can see how bad a deal it becomes.
Another element of the whole being that we can see, if we can get past this obviously negative material, is how much we do get done in spite of everything. It's like the resiliency of the human body. We can and do punish our bodies in many ways that can and does do harm to its natural and healthy functioning, yet it still goes on working remarkably well. As a whole being, we get on with living and acting in our lives remarkably well in that same, resilient way in spite of everything we tell ourselves, in spite of how we talk to ourselves. That resiliency may well come from Frankl's defiant human spirit or from what we have identified here as the becoming self.
I talked to myself in such a way for a very long time and used far more degrading language I would not use here. You may know what I mean. In fact, I talked to myself in a way I would not have talked to anyone else, including people I didn't like very much. When a very young Gavin broke a glass, I spoke to him kindly. I worked at encouraging him to feel better about what had happened and find ways to avoid experiencing such an accident again. For Gavin, my compassion was easy to call on. If I broke a glass, my "I" would tell my "Self" the following: "Why are you always so stupid and clumsy (a question which was a statement if I ever heard one)?" "Can't you get anything right (I exclude the more colorful language along the same lines)?" These comments and others like them preclude the idea that I can avoid such a difficulty because of my own, ingrained incompetence. This monologue from the "I" to the "Self" never reflects any compassion or communicates any possibility to learn from this mistake or even to learn that what happened wasn't a fault but really an accident. The only learning comes in reasserting my divided and damaged self.
I have discovered, after a rather stunning number of years and endless divided-self monologues, it doesn't have to happen like this. This meaning perspective doesn't have to prevail. We can make choices that will move us away from this perspective and establish a pattern of transformative learning and transformed thought and action. We can actually create some balance in our internal conversation and heal the divided self. I may not have done so perfectly, but I don't demand perfection of myself. That demand speaks as the meaning perspective that expects the unachievable—control over ourselves and our lives.