To Know Oneself

To Know Oneself

To know oneself is not like spot welding, choose an instant of time, and presto, you have learned about yourself.  In my humble opinion, it is a continuing process. When the process starts one does not know when it would stop, if ever. This was brought in clear relief in the movie Conclave by the character Cardinal Bellini when he lamented ‘To be this age and still not know yourself’” (The Guardian, Nesrine Malik, September 29, 2025). 

I have searched the Net to find out what was the age of this fictional character in the movie; no success. But, knowing that none of the Cardinals of the Conclave could have aged beyond 80 years, I know I am not too far from that age to regret, a la Cardinal Bellini! I do not want to, though.

I am a candidate, not for the pope-electing Conclave, but for drawing the parallel between my age, my maturity, and when I came to a definitive level of knowing myself.

I wish to define, for myself, what it is, “to know oneself”.

It is like coming to a fork in one’s life, and take one path without looking back to see if anyone else is taking the other path(s). Is it like the Buddha, coming out from under the Bodhi tree not looking back to see, not only to know whether anyone else is coming after him but also if others are following the other path(s)?

That was “knowing oneself”, with others and their choices not making any dents in his/her choice. Could I say this about Emperor Asoka, after the Kalinga war? I would only imagine so, definitely far from being certain.

For me, the above happened, not once, but many times since I was 27 or 28 years old. Travelling along the path I took at the first fork, I came across, successively, multiple forks each offering different paths to follow. And, I believe I am telling the truth when I say that not once, not along the multiple paths I took, I violated the principle that guided me on that first path. Likewise, upon encountering another fork, I have not violated any of or all the principles, one each at each fork, at which I had already taken a decision.

I have been a staunch non-believer in God and religion; though I have argued vigorously with religious people, I have not assailed them; I have a set of morals and I try my best not to infract them internally; I try to avoid situations in which my personal morals go against community ethics (sometimes by ignoring them or showing superficial agreement); I have not discriminated against anyone on the basis of caste, colour (I am in between fair and brownish), social status; against the rich or poor; against people who act in ways that could rub me the wrong way; any disability including deafness (very difficult to discern) and any other disability. It is not impossible that I am lacking in other things. But, I am confident I would correct myself if I realized it myself or someone showed me.

The above, I feel, is my knowing myself.

Raghuram Ekambaram