To Thine Ownself Be True
It was the summer of 1987, I was stationed on The USS Salt Lake City fast-attack Submarine. Chief Harper, we’ll call him, stepped aboard. He was assigned to our boat (submarines are known as boats in Navy lingo) to take over the kitchen as chief mess steward. Everyone immediately liked him. Chief Harper was soft spoken, had an Oklahoma accent and he was there to serve, everyone. The Chief took no notice of military hierarchy. The lowest Seaman was held in the same esteem as the Captain of the boat. The Chief possessed the rare ability to maintain a peaceful and pleasant demeanor on a regular basis. He was a much welcomed addition to the crew as we began training opts off the coast of San Diego in preparation for our deployment overseas in the upcoming spring. Shortly before we deployed a new crew member, let’s call him Kevin, reported for duty. He was fresh out of Submarine school and eagerly jumped into learning the ropes of submarine life. One of the first responsibilities of a new recruit to the ship is qualifying subs. This entails completing an extensive qualification process that lasts about one year and covers virtually all of the submarine’s systems.
There was something oddly familiar about Kevin. He too possessed a soft spoken Oklahoma accent and looked like a miniature version of Chief Harper. There was much talk amongst ourselves about who Kevin really was and we couldn’t help but assume he was the chief’s son. We found this rather strange because they did not share the same last name. Moreover, ever since the Sullivan brothers in World War II it was uncommon for family members to be assigned to the dame ship.
For us enlisted, our duties on board began in the kitchen. We normally have 90 days of kitchen duty before we begin in our designated department. Kevin, started in the kitchen working for Chief Harper. We all noticed a dramatic difference in they way the Chief treated Kevin from the rest of us. Chief Harper was very demanding of Kevin, he was critical, and became explosively angry towards him. He would not even call Kevin by his name. Kevin didn’t appear to be phased; he pushed himself and did everything the chief asked of him. Not only did Kevin look like the chief but he also pursued the same profession. He came aboard to be a cook just like Chief Harper. During Kevin’s first few months aboard the Salt Lake City he and I became friends. At first he never talked about his relationship with the chief nor the way the chief treated him. This went on for several months until Kevin could no longer take it. I remember the conversation when Kevin finally explained the relationship between him and the chief. The chief was in fact Kevin’s biological father. Chief Harper had a brief relationship with Kevin’s mother and then disappeared from her life. The chief knew he had a son however he had never attempted to contact Kevin or his mother. That Kevin’s biological father was stationed on a sub was one of the few facts Kevin had about his father. He had attempted to contact the chief with no success. He then took the extraordinary step to petition the United States Congress for permission to be assigned with his biological father on board a submarine in hopes of developing a relationship with his dad. This unusual request was voted on and approved by Congress.
Kevin remarked that he would have done anything to have a relationship with his dad but only when he actually came aboard the ship did he realize he alone could not make this relationship happen. He said, “I don’t know what I was thinking in trying this. My dad is at home with my mom and he has been a great father to me and this guy is nothing more than my biological sire.” Kevin did not remain assigned to our ship much longer, he requested a transfer and was gone within a month.
Kevin was in search of filling a void. He believed he would fill this void when he found his father and got the relationship he had always wanted. I suppose Kevin is not that different from anyone of us. Who would not want to know his or her real parents? Which one of us would not want to fill that emptiness we often experience? In our present age and culture the zeitgeist (spirit of the age) tells us to seek our worth and fulfillment outside of ourselves. Kevin was looking for it in his father. This movement hit high gear in the 1960’s and has not slowed since. The present name given is “Self-Esteem”. “We must at all cost possess good self-esteem or we will never be happy”. And so the story goes, it is necessary to be involved in this group or that group, to play this sport or that sport and you will find happiness. Strangely, when one looks back on earlier generations they went through the same phase but did not suffer from the lack of self-esteem that we do. What has happened? Maybe we are so technologically advanced our hard wiring is just different, our nature has evolved now and the simple fulfillments of yesteryear no longer applies. There have been Ph.D.’s working on this problem and many programs have been introduced in schools and social organizations for children to help them build self-esteem. Since these doctors have failed they now try to change the environment in order to ‘save’ the individual from suffering a loss of self-esteem. Such practices as the following have been introduced: All people are treated equal, no one is allowed to fail, competition is rarely done, children don’t have honor roles, everyone gets a trophy, award or certificate, no score is kept on games for children under a certain age etc. Why can’t we seem to find the answer to the emptiness? I mean we now have our iPods, cell phones, Blue Rays, Computers and so on. Technology surely can fill this void can’t it? These things must not work to fill the void because nearly all of the young ladies I work with have had these items but still suffer from low self-esteem.
In order to address this problem we have to abandon modern thinking. We have to purge ourselves of THINGS and rest our hearts on a simple phrase written many years ago by William Shakespeare, “This above all: To Thine Ownself Be True.” What does it mean to be true to oneself? Well, we must act according to our nature. Regardless of our creativity in technological advances we continue to posses the exact same fallen nature as those who ran to our Bless Lord for healing. These technological wonders of our modern age do nothing to change our human nature weather or not we wish to acknowledge it, the truth is that our nature is not the sum total of our successes or failures.
In addressing the question of self-esteem we must look at the premise of this modern movement. They tell us self-esteem is a person’s positive or negative feelings about themselves in relation to the world around them. And so we each petition our own congress in our own way to find that one place that will completely fulfill us and allow us to be happy. Yet we, as Kevin, request to be reassigned over and over again.
At the heart of the matter the question of self-esteem is a very real and serious issue. The quest by parents and children alike really is not after self-esteem but rather affirmation. This affirmation is a fundamental human need. Affirmation is rooted in affectivity which is our capacity to be affected. Affect is a state of being and our affect is harmonious or at peace when we know we are valuable, lovable, joyful etc. in who we are. A child that has been affirmed grows up KNOWING they are valuable and worthy.
The confusion arises when we as children are ‘pseudo affirmed’ (as Dr. Conrad Baars calls it) through effect instead of affect. Effect is a state of doing. Effectivity is motivated by utilitarian motives. Utilitarianism is the use of others for our own selfish gains. Therefore a child reared through this effective state grows up believing they must seek their approval and worth outside of themselves.
When understood in this light one can clearly see how our culture is driven by this effectivity which is translated into ‘pseudo-affirming’. Dr. Baars states, “Professionals, educators, parents etc. can be so busy ‘pseudo-affirming’ others that they fail to recognize, respect or be genuinely moved by other’s goodness as they are. So treated, the other may come to believe that their personal worth lies in their achievements, productivity, activity, or usefulness and not their intrinsic goodness.”(The Nature and Tasks of a Personalist Psychology p. 120).
Kevin came to his father to be affirmed. He desired for his father to accept him for exactly who he is, even though Kevin sought affirmation through effective rather than affective means. He believed if he DID exactly what dad DOES he will then be accepted and in return affirmed and the experience will raise his self-esteem.
Reflecting on this topic reminds of me of the great patriarch, Moses. When Our Blessed Lord called him to his work he was out tending his flock and noticed a contradiction in nature. He observed a bush burning without being consumed by the flames. Like any man he headed over to check it out and then fix the problem. When Moses arrived our Lord spoke to him and said, “So indeed the cry of the Israelites has reached me, I have truly noted that the Egyptians are oppressing them. Come, now! I will send you to Pharaoh to lead my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt’. But Moses said to God. ‘Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and lead the Israelites out of Egypt’? He answered, ‘I will be with you; and this shall be your proof that it is I who have sent you: when you bring my people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this very mountain. But, Moses said to God, ‘when I go to the Israelites and say to them. The god of your fathers has sent me to you, if they ask me what is his name. What am I to tell them’? God replied, ‘I am who am’ Then He added, “This is what you shall tell the Israelites: ‘I AM sent me to you.’ (Exodus 3:9-14).
If you notice our Blessed Lord did not tell Moses: “I DO WHO DOES sent you.” The primary nature of God is not a doer but rather He IS the very nature of ‘ISing’ so to speak. God is the fullness of being, complete with nothing lacking. We share in this divine image. We are created in His image and likeness and through the redemptive work of Christ we are grafted onto His divine nature. Therefore our primary mode of operation is not to DO but rather to BE and so we find our fulfillment, our worth, our value as a person in the God given dignity we possess within ourselves and not in seeking other’s gifts to make us feel better about ourselves.
Another point our Lord made to Moses in giving His name, is that God is a God of the present, the God of NOW, I AM WHO AM. We can take from this that we only exist in this moment and we are only given grace to live in the moment in which we exist. Therefore, it is impossible to receive fulfillment from future or past events, people or situations. We are created to operate in this moment and no other. This may mean we simply live out what we are called: Human Beings who BE, we are not called Human Doings who DO.
Dr. Baar explains that real and authentic affirmation is rooted in intellectual, moral, spiritual and emotional strengthening and there must be a balance between all four. It is crucial that children be taught rational as well as spiritual truths. The primary way children learn is through example or modeling along with the words spoken. In order to model to others the educator (parent) must be living the truths he or she teaches. This requires self-restraining love or again being true to oneself, not living a contradiction, in which we say one thing and do another. Another important point Dr. Baar makes is that children should not be given what children are not ready to accept. They must be allowed to develop and grow. Parenting implies protecting the child from learning too much too quick. The age of maturation is growing. Men and women used to be considered adults in their late teens and early twenties, now research is showing maturation is not reached until mid to late twenties and in many cases individuals never mature and remain stuck in emotional, intellectual and spiritual immaturity. The inability to mature creates a society of boys and girls pretending to be men and women.
Since we are taught that our self-esteem is sought through doing we are a society that ‘lives to work’ instead of ‘working to live.’ We believe our children must excel at all cost in order to gain their true selves. This mindset drives a wedge in the parental relationship with the child because the child then becomes a tool for mom or dad to obtain their own selfish need. How often have we heard about a father driving his son away because he expects him to excel at football to get into college? If the motives were to be searched it would not surprise me to find that dad really wants his son to make up for what he could not accomplish himself or expects him to perform the way dad did. Therefore he is living vicariously through his child to fulfill his own selfish interests, for his own “self-esteem.” If children learn from our modeling and example they will do the same thing the parents do. Which begins the exhaustive quest for self fulfillment “and, unaffirmed or inadequately affirmed persons are likely to seek the experience of being loved and lovable in many self-defeating ways.”(The Nature and Tasks of a Personalist Psychology p. 125). Does this mean we do not challenge and inspire our children? No, however it does mean, as parents, we strive for our motives to be pure and objective and it is not our own self needs being met as we parent our children. We are called to accept each child as a unique, precious, unrepeatable gift and help them become who God created them to be rather than whom we or society tells them they must be. We must affirm our children and stop trying to parent them out of our own selfish wants which leads to ‘self-esteem’ issues. If we ‘need’ to help them with their self-esteem we have already failed and we need to go back to the drawing board for a new look. Remove the blinders and see, maybe for the first time, the gift of this child standing before us. To obtain this goal we must throw off the stain of the modern mindset and return to a truthful and objective view of the human person. “This above all else: to thine ownself be true.” Let us reflect on who we are, accept our own giftedness and do the same with those around us, most especially the little souls entrusted to our care.
I often wonder what ever happened to Kevin. Did he continue in the Navy? Did he ever attempt to reconnect with his father? Did he ever come to understand that the quest for self-esteem always ends in disappointment and heartache? I hope Kevin has accepted who he is and has worked through the hurt and trauma caused by his father abandoning him. I also hope Kevin realizes he has everything within his reach to heal the wound within and as William Shakespeare states:
“Neither a borrower not lender be:
For loan oft loses both itself and friend.
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all: to Thine Ownself be true;
And it must follow, as the night the day.
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Farewell: my blessing season this in thee!”
(Yet Here, Laertes, William Shakespeare 1564-1616)
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Justin D. McColl (J.D.) MA, LPC, Clinical Director, Therapist at Trinity Teen Solutions
Licensed Professional Counselor # 957
M.A. Christian Counseling from Franciscan University of Steubenville
B.A. Philosophy
Specializes in EMDR and trauma work
Certified in Equine Assisted Psychotherapy
Member of American Counseling Association
Psyche Assistant for assessment firm
Four Years United States Navy Submarine Service, Good Conduct Medal
Missionary work throughout United States and Mexico
Business owner and operator
Manager in Security Firm for Fortune-Five-Hundred Company
Experienced cowhand and rancher
7 + years experience working with at risk youth
Husband and father of 3 children
