Robert S. Hartman on Self-Awareness

Across our work with the axiology of Robert S. Hartman, and especially within the interpretative insights provided by his assessment instrument, we have talked about the vital importance of Self-awareness, both knowing/experiencing the Self on the highest levels possible and also being able to fulfill the highest potential of our existence. This degree and intensity of Self-awareness, in Hartman’s teaching, allows us to more fully appreciate the world we are a part of, our own Selves, and also to be able to contribute in the most impactful ways with the lives we are living.

Bringing interpretation to the assessment, we have always placed vital emphasis on the way the work-side scoring in Part 1 is either enhanced or diminished in its overall power by the self-side scoring in Part 2. We have explained that the self-side is the “pedestal” that the work side sits on. Unfortunately, we find many, many people who are strong on the work side and yet notably compromised and made vulnerable by a weak self-side.

More specifically, a person who is “Dominant Systemic” on the self-side—the Systemic score is the strongest—will have less Self-awareness. This does not make the person a “bad person,” but it certainly reveals a highly important area for growth. Unfortunately, many young adults—and in growing numbers—score in this range. The major culprit at the root cause of low Self-awareness is probably factors such as social media, even COVID, which tends to separate people from real-life contacts where who we are gets defined and worked out through engagements with others. Low, systemic Self-awareness is usually not caused by a person, or desired by a person, but the result of the impact of cultural dynamics that are very subtle and nuanced.

A person who is “Dominant Extrinsic” on the self-side will be highly role-defined, and see Self primarily in terms of the work being done, the roles played in family and community, and the responsibilities associated with all of these engagements. This “Self-identity” is often advanced and imbedded by the ways that others see us and the way that societal acceptance and reward frame the way we integrate into the communities we are part of. Most people in our databases that we have compiled over four decades are “Dominant Extrinsic” by a wide margin compared to the other, two possibilities.

The ideal on the self-side is to be “Dominant Intrinsic.” Here, the individual sees Self beyond the abstractions of the Systemic and beyond the factors and forces of role-identity. In some ways, the movement from “Dominant Extrinsic” to “Dominant Intrinsic” is the move from seeing one’s own Self in terms of a “profession” to seeing one’s own Self as a unique and singular “person”/individual. It is on this level that highest Self-awareness is achieved, and the stronger our Self-awareness, the stronger our awareness of any other dynamics of our existence from the beauty of nature to the uniqueness of others.

These distinctions are at the heart and core of Hartman’s axiology. We can see this clearly in his autobiographic writings found in?Freedom to Live.?These matters are so vitally important, that it might be very helpful to let Hartman speak for himself:

The more I am aware of my Self, the more, and the more clearly, I define and fulfill my Self, the more I am a morally good person, a good “I.”

It is interesting that Hartman underlines this statement, an odd characteristic of his writing that does not show up very much. He also identifies this level of Self-awareness with the profoundly important, philosophical word?authenticity,?and he firmly believes that this kind of authenticity leads to “being sincere, honest, genuine, true, and having Self-respect and integrity.”

Hartman then has a kind of warning: “To be your Self seems to be a simple thing, but it is most difficult to achieve. The catch is that it’s not so easy for you to know who you are, and even more difficult, once you know, to fulfill this knowledge in your living.” He is pretty clear that most people “sell out” to the demands and rewards of extrinsic culture with its collection of transactional rewards and punishments; acceptance and rejection can be powerful catalysts that influence the way we live. Hartman’s more succinct phrasing is uncompromising: “Some people know everything, but are aware of nothing.” This “nothing” would most certainly include heightened Self-awareness.

Hartman identifies the Systemic Self as the “thinking Self,” the Extrinsic Self as the “social Self,” and the Intrinsic Self as the “inner, moral Self.” He is not defining “morality” here as a specific set of values that would be almost always limited by a particular culture or community, but as a?way of valuing?that gives greatest attention to the recognition, respect, and enhancement of the lives of others and—in turn—one’s own life. He then constructed one of his most famous teaching icons, an inverted cone with a flag on top:

The flag at the top, smaller in size than any other element in the icon, represents the Systemic/Thinking Self, far removed in its emphasis from Descartes’ “I?think, therefore I am” defining Self in terms of the priority of rational ability. The circular, flat grid at the top of the cone represents the Extrinsic/Social Self with all of its lines pointing out to the landscape of our transactional engagements in the world. The inverted cone, the largest part of the icon, is constructed in a way that indicates both “depth” and something of what the philosophers called the “ground” of our existence. Here, we find the Intrinsic/Moral Self that is capable of evaluating and engaging with the world and its people from the perspective of the acknowledgement of and acceptance of uniqueness, the intrinsic that Hartman’s believed was alive in all of the creation and in most people. Without a doubt, all three dimensions are parts of who we are. Hartman even uses the word?personality, but he uses it in a very different way than most psychological interpretations and certainly in a different way than most “personality” assessments. For him, “personality” is the “total value pattern” that defines our engagement with life, how we frame and evaluate the world, others, and our own Self. And, this “Self-scape” is always changing, maturing and evolving in positive ways we hope, but also capable of de-volving and diminishing.

The dimension of intrinsic Self-awareness is the goal/the fulfillment of human potential. Hartman is quick to say: “Here is where the person with meaning is separated from the person without meaning. . . .For if we cannot define and become aware of ourselves, we are lost. If we can become aware of ‘I’—develop the concept of our Self—and if we can BE that Self which we have defined, then we become a morally good “I.”

I love the analogy that Hartman often used to explain the priority of intrinsic Self-awareness, the fulfillment of all that we can be. He envisioned a chess board where two masters are engaged in playing the game. Suddenly, a huge gust of wind blows all of the chess pieces, standing where they were in the masterful progress of the game, onto the floor. There are plenty of times, Hartman reasoned, when the “game” can be turned upside-down, even when it is being played with intellectual brilliance. But, he says, nothing has been lost?physically?(extrinsically) or lost?mentally?(systemically)—the pieces, board, and player expertise is still totally intact. What has been lost is the?meaning?(intrinsically) of that moment of engagement. Herein is the dramatic challenge of life—to have the important and useful dynamics of existence that are “physical” and “mental,” but not to lose that which is “meaning-full,” of highest?value.?The pathway to achieving and maintaining the “meaning-full” is the pathway to intrinsic Self-awareness.

Written by Steve Byrum