introduction to these four facets:
NORTH: THE NURTURING GENERATIVE ADULT. This facet is empathic, compassionate, courageous, competent, knowledgeable, productive, and able to provide genuine loving care and service to both ourselves and others. Through the North facet of the Self, we contribute our best and most creative parenting, leading, teaching, directing, producing, and healing. The Nurturing Generative Adult is resonant with archetypes such as Leader, benevolent King or Queen, mature or spiritual Warrior, Mother, and Father.
SOUTH: THE WILD INDIGENOUS ONE. Emotive, erotic-sexual, sensuous, instinctive, and playful, this facet is fully at home in the human body and in the more-than-human world. The South facet of the Self is every bit as wild and natural as any animal, flower, or river and experiences a kinship with all species and habitats. The Wild Indigenous One is resonant with archetypes such as Pan, Artemis/Diana (Lady of the Beasts), and Green Man (Wild Man).
EAST: THE INNOCENT/SAGE. Innocent, wise, clear-minded, light-hearted, wily, and extroverted, the East facet of the Self is fully at home with the big picture, light, enlightenment, laughter, paradox, eternity, and the mysteries of the Divine and the upperworld. The Innocent/Sage wants to lead us up to the realm of pure consciousness beyond distinctions and striving. In addition to the Innocent and the Sage, this facet is resonant with archetypes such as the Fool, Trickster, Priest, Priestess, and Guide to Spirit.
WEST: THE MUSE-BELOVED. Imaginative, erotic-romantic, idealistic, visionary, adventurous, darkness savoring (shadow loving), meaning attuned, and introverted, this facet of the Self revels in night, dreams, destiny, death, and the mysteries and qualities of the underworld. The Muse-Beloved wants to lead us down to Soul and wants us to be continuously dying to our old ways while giving birth to the never-before-seen. In addition to the Muse and the Beloved, this facet is resonant with archetypes such as Anima/ Animus, Magician, Wanderer, Hermit, Psychopomp, and Guide to Soul.
As you read about the Self in these pages, you’ll likely recognize each of its four facets as existing in (or as) at least one of your friends or family members, in certain public persons or celebrities, and in characters from myths, dreams, art, and literature. You might not at first recognize all four facets in yourself, but they’re all there; the “hidden” ones await their discovery by you (the Ego). By locating all four facets of the Self on a single map, we can explore their relationships with one another and with the Ego, subpersonalities, Soul, and Spirit.
In the following chapters, we’ll also explore why each facet of the Self is associated with its corresponding cardinal direction or, more precisely, with the qualities of the natural world we experience when we face that direction, and also why it’s associated with the related season and time of day. In other words, we’ll see how the seasons, the times of day, and the four cardinal directions of the natural world constitute the design pattern enabling us to grasp the nature of the Self.
While the Self exhibits these four facets, it’s best understood as a single, integral dimension of the psyche, not merely a collection of four voices. This is why I prefer to say that the Self has facets — as opposed to components.
In addition to having the attributes identified above, the Self, as a whole (a “gestalt”), is creative, intelligent, inquisitive, utterly at home on Earth, confident, and joyous. When we (our Egos) function by way of the Self, we instinctively recognize and honor our relationships with other people and all living creatures, things, and habitats — the Self, consequently, is ecocen- tric.11 We cooperate with others (including by way of mutually beneficial competition). We protect and enhance all of life.
Whatever we desire to do, we do it most effectively, aesthetically, imaginatively, fairly, and joyfully through the consciousness and resources of the Self.
THE SUBPERSONALITIES
And yet, one inevitable and heartrending feature of being human is that we do not live every moment from or as the Self, no matter how mature, gifted, or lucky we may be. Regrettably, we don’t always participate in life grounded in our innate human wholeness. All too often we’re in a fragmented or wounded state — physically, psychologically, socially, spiritually. Sometimes we find ourselves feeling unaccountably frightened, for example, or angry with nearly everyone, or unworthy, incapable, on a control trip, confused, subservient, or disconnected. The less healthy our families, communities, societies, and ecosystems, the more wounded and fragmented we tend to be individually. These wounded or fragmented aspects of our psyches are our subpersonalities, the subject of the second half of this book.
In Western and Westernized cultures (now widely understood to be not only adolescent but also pathological and growing increasingly so),12 most people seem to function more often by way of their subpersonalities than by way of their Selves. Western conversations often sound like two or more subpersonalities comparing notes about life from their wounded or fragmented perspectives. Subpersonality-identified Egos seem to be the most common protagonists in contemporary relationships, politics, news, arts, and entertainment, and the subject matter of most advice columns and pop psychologies. See if you agree as you read the following descriptions.
Subpersonalities might be immature and wounded, but they’re doing their best to help us. All four categories of subpersonalities, as we’ll see, are attempting to keep us safe (physically, psychologically, socially, and economically) by using the unripe strategies available to them.
Here’s an introduction to the four categories of subpersonalities and my names for them:13
NORTH: LOYAL SOLDIERS try to keep us safe by inciting us to act small (either beneath our potential or one-dimensionally) in order to secure a place of belonging in the world. They achieve this by avoiding risk, by rendering us nonthreatening, useful, or pleasing to others, or by urging us into positions of immature power over others (dominator power). Versions include Rescuers, Codependents, Enablers, Pleasers, and Giving Trees; Inner Critics and Inner Flatterers (the kind of flattery that motivates us to be useful and nonthreatening to others); Tyrants and Robber Barons; and Critics and Flatterers of others.
SOUTH: WOUNDED CHILDREN try to keep us safe by attempting to get our basic needs met, using the immature, emotion-fueled strategies available to them. They do this by appearing to be in need of rescue (Victims); being harmless and socially acceptable (Conformists); being coercive or aggressive (Rebels); or being arrogant or condescending (Princes or Princesses).
EAST: ESCAPISTS AND ADDICTS try to keep us safe through evasion — rising above traumatic emotions and circumstances and sidestepping distressing challenges and responsibilities. They do this through strategies such as addictions, obsessions, dissociations, vanishing acts, and delinquency. Versions include the puer aeternus and puella aeternus (Latin for “eternal boy” and “eternal girl”), Blissheads, and Spiritual Materialists.
WEST: THE SHADOW AND SHADOW SELVES try to keep us safe through the repression (making unconscious) of our characteristics and desires that are unacceptable or inconceivable to our Ego. Shadow characteristics can be either “negative” (what the Ego would consider morally “beneath” it) or “positive” (what the Ego would consider “above” it and out of reach). The Shadow is not what we know about ourselves and don’t like (or like but keep hidden) but rather what we don’t know about ourselves and, if accused of it, would adamantly and sincerely deny. Our Shadow Selves attempt to maintain psychological stability by briefly acting out Shadow characteristics and doing so flamboyantly or scandalously, but without our being conscious of what we’re doing — letting off steam as the only available alternative to complete self-destruction.
While the Self, with its four facets, is a single, integral feature of the psyche, the subpersonalities, in contrast, each function as separate and discrete versions of ourselves — as isolated voices. They are multifarious, fragmented elements of the psyche. This seems to be the case even when the subperson- alities join forces for the shared purpose of self-protection. For example, a frightened Wounded Child might plead that you not accept a promotion to the highly