Autocide

Luke 17:33 "Whoever seeks to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it.*

Autocide. Not the killing of your Volkswagen.

The purposeful changing of self to the extreme extent that you are, for all intents, not the person you were before.

Can therapy -- or analysis -- achieve that? Do you think it is possible for a human to undertake such a deep understanding and reworking of the self?

This must sound insane to those who doubt the validity of psychiatry, specifically talk therapy or analysis.

Do we have the ability to, of our own volition, remake the self?

I don't think so. Not of volition.

But I believe the trauma of change, whether externally- or internally-provoked, can be the abrasion that sands a soul smooth. And that reaction to, and impact of, daily life then causes a new entity, like callus, to form over that naked surface of being.

As I write this, it sounds crazy and glib. But this process is death-dealing, on more than one level.

To lose your self is a grieving, painful, painful process. And the rebuilding is a hesitant, chancy endeavor that means living in fear a great deal of the time. Fear of more loss, fear of not regaining any semblance of what was lost.

But, if a human comes to this point in life, for whatever reason, autocide was not a choice. It was an imperative.

And you very much want to live ... with the consequences.

photo © c-lab 2007
* a quote abused completely out of context