Basic Fear: Of having no identity or personal significance
Basic Desire: To “find” yourself and your significance (i.e., to create your identity out of your own inner experience)
(Damaging) Self-Image: You are missing something that others have; you are more inherently “flawed” than others.
Level 1: Level of Liberation
Behaviors (outer): life-enhancing, redemptive, inspired, engaged, truly original, revelatory
Attitudes (inner): life-embracing, self-renewing, revitalized, spontaneous, connected, bountiful
Self-Actualization: Let go of your identification with a particular self-image, that you are more inherently flawed than others – that you are missing “something” that others have (which makes them happier than you).
The Fear that will kick you down to a less healthy level: Of having no identity or personal significance; having no qualities that are only yours and no one else’s.
The Counterintuitive truth that you have to face to move to a healthier level: N/A
Level 2: Level of Psychological Capacity
Behaviors (outer): sensitive, different, gentle, quiet, warm, unique, honest with self
Attitudes (inner): introspective, self-aware, intuitive, emotional, feeling-oriented, impressionable
Desires (why do you act and think these ways): To find yourself and your significance (i.e., create a chosen “identity” out of your inner experience)
The Fear that will kick you down to a less healthy level: You begin to fear losing touch with your inner states, your sense of self. You begin to think that turning your well-developed sensitivity to the outside world and other people will mean there is less available for the “interior journey,” leading to an almost imperceptible (at this stage) introverted shift, the beginning of a subtle withdrawal.
The Counterintuitive truth that you have to face to move to a healthier level: Let go of needing to be “different” in order to be valuable, to have self-worth. Practice celebrating the points you have in common with others. Focus on the “sames” not just the “differences.”
Level 3: Level of Social Value
Behaviors (outer): creative, personal-universal, expressive, subtle, humane, eloquent, witty
Attitudes (inner): self-revealing, accessible, emotionally strong, dedicated, authentic, inner-directed
Desires (why do you act and think these ways): To express your individuality to others (and to yourself), often (though not always) through the act of artistic creation
The Fear that will kick you down to a less healthy level: Your interior states begin to take more and more of your attention, and you fear that the changing vicissitudes of your feelings are not enough to sustain your sense of self and/or your creative output. Also, you increasingly equate your creative output with your sense of self.
The Counterintuitive truth that you have to face to move to a healthier level: Let go of the fixation to “express your individuality” (often through creative output) in order to be fully a person. Shift that focus through solidarity. Support others expressing their individuality. Participate in group efforts where the individual contributions of each person cannot be separated and distinguished.
Level 4: Level of Imbalance
Behaviors (outer): individualistic, special, aesthetic, exotic, symbolic, indirect, creating “atmosphere,” elegant
Attitudes (inner): romanticizing, fantasizing, dramatizing, idealizing, past-oriented, infatuated, creating expectations
Desire (why do you act and think these ways): To cultivate and prolong selected feelings, creating a “Fantasy Self”
The Fear that will kick you down to a less healthy level: Interestingly, as your sense of self ossifies around your sense of uniqueness, the more your inward worries become filled with the fear that others will not appreciate the significance of your identity and, especially, of your feelings.
The Counterintuitive truth that you have to face to move to a healthier level: Face your own feelings as simple indicators of a transitory emotional state, and admit to yourself that you seek to cultivate and prolong certain feelings not only to maintain a self-image but also to build an entire “Fantasy Self” that is both more tragic and “larger than life” than your everyday experience.
Level 5: Level of Interpersonal Control
Behaviors (outer): temperamental, withholding, moody, aloof, hypersensitive, brooding, sulking, “precious”/mannered, “mysterious,” uninvolved
Attitudes (inner): self-absorbed, self-referential, self-conscious, melancholy, vulnerable, feel misunderstood, self-doubting, uninterested
Desires (why do you act and think these ways): To be reassured of others’ interest and concern for you (playing “hard to get”). If others’ find your individuality valuable enough to pursue, then you feel validated in the persona (“Fantasy Self”) that you have created.
The Fear that will kick you down to a less healthy level: You begin to fear that life’s demands will force you to give up your Fantasy Self. In connection to this fear, you may begin to doubt that another/others will “rescue” you.
The Counterintuitive truth that you have to face to move to a healthier level: Let go of trying to “test” others through alternating patterns of conflict and withdrawal. Face the very real possibility that your growing need to be reassured of others’ concern for you, through playing “hard to get,” is actually pushing people away.
Level 6: Level of Overcompensation
Behaviors (outer): decadent, sensual, pretentious, unproductive, “difficult,” demanding, identity problems
Attitudes (inner): self-indulgent, feel exempt, dismissive, disdainful, petty, self-pitying, envious, petulant
Desires (why do you act and think these ways): To be absolutely free to “be yourself.” Of course, at this level, “being yourself” is far more about enacting the persona you have crafted, not true authenticity.
The Fear that will kick you down to a less healthy level: As opposed to some other types, you begin at this level already to fear that your actions are ruining your life. You start to obsess over “wasting your opportunities,” that it may already be too late for you.
The Counterintuitive truth that you have to face to move to a healthier level: Do not exempt yourself from the “rules” that apply to others in the name of being “free” or “true” to yourself. Begin the hard work of seeing how you follow the pattern rather than focusing on yourself as the “exception.” Going to individual or group therapy is a good idea; of course, you do have to be willing to take the advice of others (which becomes increasingly difficult as you move down the levels of health).
Level 7: Level of Violation
Behaviors (outer): alienated, self-inhibited, mourning, morbid, hateful, self-neglecting, fatigued
Attitudes (inner): deeply resentful, emotionally blocked, ashamed of self, apathetic, detesting, confused
Desires (why do you act and think these ways): To reject everyone or anything that does not support your emotional demands. To cut off anything that threatens to burst the bubble of the “Fantasy Self” that you have created.
The Fear that will kick you down to a less healthy level: The thought enters your head more and more that you are cut off from others and from life. You fear that this withdrawal is becoming permanent. This process may be happening almost entirely in your head, but you are beginning to fear that you can’t tell reality and imagination apart. And, you keep withdrawing as a result.
The Counterintuitive truth that you have to face to move to a healthier level: Look around you. How many of your friends and family do you still interact with? Focus on building relationships, especially with people who will offer views and opinions different from your own. Remind yourself that disagreement does not necessarily mean rejection. Go to therapy.
Level 8: Level of Delusion and Compulsion
Behaviors (outer): clinically depressed, self-sabotaging, self-mutilating, accusatory, turbulent, addictive
Attitudes (inner): self-rejecting, self-hating, guilt-ridden, tormented, seething, death-obsessed
Desires (why do you act and think these ways): To punish yourself (and, indirectly, others). At this stage, any positive desire feels like a far-away memory.
The Fear that will kick you down to a less healthy level: The process that started several levels above begins to press upon you fully. You start to fear that your situation is hopeless; everything is futile. You fixate on the lie that nothing you do matters at all.
The Counterintuitive truth that you have to face to move to a healthier level: Fight back against a sense of hopelessness by getting out of your head. Find someone who needs help and help them. Go to therapy, perhaps residential therapy, depending on how constant thoughts of hopelessness and futility have become. Suicidal ideation is common; call someone; don’t delay.
Level 9: Level of Pathological Destructiveness
Behaviors (outer): life-denying, self-destructive, “broken down,” crimes of passion, strangely calm, suicidal
Attitudes (inner): despairing, hopeless, feel defeated, utterly worthless, dissociated, desolate
Desires (why do you act and think these ways): To escape your crushingly negative self-consciousness, which at this stage may often be expressed as attempts to crush any sense of self or consciousness
The Fear that will kick you down to a less healthy level: N/A. The basic fear is realized. You have lost your identity and personal significance not because of any inherent flaw but because you have pushed everyone away. Also, at this final level, the delicate apparatus of your “Fantasy Self” completely collapses.
The Counterintuitive truth that you have to face to move to a healthier level: No easy move. Go to (residential) therapy. Begin to work back by acknowledging the lie that started the whole process. It is a lie that you are more inherently flawed than others; it is a lie that you are missing something that others have.