Radical self-inquiry is the path to seeing habits and patterns. Questions that drive us toward that insight are endlessly helpful:

• ‘What parts of me are being projected onto the other person?’ 

• ‘How do I reclaim those parts of me?’ 

• ‘What do my reactions say about me?’ 

• ‘Why do I do what I do?’ 

• ‘Why do they do what they do?’ 

• ‘What need for love, safety, or belonging might they be trying to meet with their irrational behavior?

FIVE: What is a Person?

“And this traumatic vignette highlights a central truth about what human beings are: A person is a point of view. Every person you meet is a creative artist who takes the events of life and, over time, creates a very personal way of seeing the world. Like any artist, each person takes the experiences of a lifetime and integrates them into a complex representation of the world. That representation, the subjective consciousness that makes you you, integrates your memories, attitudes, beliefs, convictions, traumas, loves, fears,

desires, and goals into your own distinct way of seeing.” (Brooks, “How to Know a Person”,

p.64)

“People don’t see the world with their eyes; they see it with their entire life.

TWELVE: How Were You Shaped by Your Sufferings?

“People who are permanently damaged by trauma seek to assimilate what happened into their existing models. People who grow try to accommodate what happened in order to create new models. The person who assimilates says, I survived brain cancer and I’m going to keep on chugging. The person who accommodates says, No, this changes who I

am...I’m a cancer survivor. This changes how I want to spend my days. The act of

remaking our models involves reconsidering the fundamentals: In what ways is the world

safe and unsafe? Do things sometimes happen to me that I don’t deserve? Who am I? What is my place in the world? What’s my story? Where do I really want to go? What kind of God allows this to happen?

THE IMPERIAL TASK:

Pretty early in life, sometime in boyhood or girlhood, each of us has to try to establish a sense of our own agency. We have to demonstrate to ourselves and others that we can take control, work hard, be good at things. In the middle of this task, Erikson argues, a person has to either display industry or succumb to inferiority. If children can show themselves and the world that they are competent, they will develop a sense of self- confidence. If they can’t, they will experience feelings of inferiority.” (Brooks, “How to Know a Person”, p.193

“THE INTERPERSONAL TASK:

There’s a rough rhythm to life. Periods that are dominated by an intense desire to stand out and be superior are often followed by periods dominated by an intense desire to fit in. For many of us there’s a moment in life, often in adolescence, when the life task is to establish your social identity.

SIXTEEN: How Do Your Ancestors Show Up in Your Life?

“The challenge in seeing a person, therefore, is to adopt the kind of double vision I mentioned in the chapter on hard conversations. It means stepping back to appreciate the power of group culture and how it is formed over generations and then poured into a person. But it also means stepping close and perceiving each individual person in the midst of their lifelong project of crafting their own life and their own point of view, often in defiance of their group’s consciousness. The trick is to hold these two perspectives together at the same time.