UNDERSTANDING THE SELF:
• a journey towards one’s true identity.
• to understand and have a grasp of life’s paradox,
riddle, contradiction, and continuous search for true
identity and existence.
QUESTIONS TO REFLECT ON;
1. Why is it necessary to understand yourself?
2. Are you practicing meditation to exercise mental
discipline? If yes, is it everyday? How many minutes? If
not, what is the reason?
II. THE SELF FROM A PHILOSOPHICAL
PERSPECTIVE
SOCRATES 469-399 BCE:
• Socrates wrote nothing his students have countless
tribute to him in their works like Plato and Xenophon.
• He gathered followers on his journey as a ‘midwife of
knowledge’
• He dedicated his life for the search of truth and right
living (a characteristic of philosopher, not sophist)
• He was accused and charged of; Corrupting the youth
and denying the Gods then introducing new Gods.
• He defended himself in the book Apology from all the
accusations using Socratic Method. Yet majority of the
jury voted for him to be executed.
• Socratic Method, One must ask and clarify and the
validity must be rooted on proper reasoning not
because it is widely praised or believed.
PLATO 427-347 BCE:
• was greatly influenced by Socrates
• He established a school academy
• He wrote volumes of books including The Republic,
Crito, Symposium and many others.
• The Republic in Book VII, he explained the Allegory of
the Cave.
• Allegory of the Cave speaks about three stages of
human person (sensation, opinion and mind). A person
must break the chain that controls him/her from seeing
shadow fabricated by the opinions of the world.
• Plato is dualist – believing the Soul and Body are
inseparable (dichotomy/separation between soul and
body). He believed that Soul and Mind are one,
contrary to populr belief that Soul is associated with the
word Spirit (kaluluwa) as affirmed by St. Augustine.
• He was a Rationalist, maintains that mind/idea is
superior over the physical realities in relation to how it
can encapsulate the Truth, the Beautiful and Good.
ARISTOTLE 384-322 BCE:
• A student of Plato, he made a major leap from Plato
when he developed his own philosophy and established
his own school Lyceum.
• Unlike Plato, he believed one can find truth from
evidence gained through sense experience.
• He was not a dualist .
• Plato mistrusted the senses yet Aristotle relied on
them as evidence to back up his theories.
• One of Aristotle’s idea is the change in relation to his
preference on physical realm. For him, there is
potentiality and there is actuality where a thing or a
person will remain as it is. Changes will occur in the
process of actualization.
• For him, every human person is destined to a
particular end or telos – end or purpose.
• His idea on Happiness is related on how a person can
live a life of reason and contemplation and not in
pleasure so as to become self-sufficient.
ASSESSMENT:
1. How can Socratic Method resolve and reconcile
everyconcern and issue in society? How can it help your
personal struggles?
2. Using the Allegory of the Cave, how can you
transcend from sensation to the function of the mind?
3. What are the things and skills you have that you are
afraid to maximize and actualize?

EASTERN / ORIENTAL PHILOSOPHICAL PERSPECTIVE OF

THE SELF (ANCIENT ERA)