Self and Identity

If the self is not a fixed entity but an unfolding process, then everything we attribute to it—thoughts, impulses, memories, dreams—must also be understood as processual, causal, and conditioned. From this standpoint, our common notion of personal agency becomes highly suspect. We experience urges, decisions, and emotions, but we are not their authors. The conscious

March 26, 1992 Archive NoteThis text is drawn from earlier manuscript materials and is presented largely in its original form. It reflects an exploratory raw stage of thinking rather than a finished or fully developed argument. There is no inside or outside; no compulsion stemming from within or without; no inner or outer worlds in