Me, myself and I

March 17th, 2023

According to Immanuel Kant — there are three stages in the development of human understanding of its own psyche: “mine stage”, “me stage” and “I stage”. Since then, studies in psychology and socio-biology and of the human mind have confirmed that this is a universal order in all people at all times throughout recorded history in all different societies.

Mine stage is a childhood stage when everything is about a possession — be it things that can be held and kept or taken from somebody else. Or time required and taken from parents, teachers, and others — when being the center of attention is the most pressing and important thing there is.

Me stage is an adolescent stage when self-worth and value are based only on the way a person is perceived by other groups. Their opinions and views and comments are the way a person shapes his or her personality, playing and adjusting to expectations of belonging to or of acceptance by peer group.

I stage is an adult stage. Very mythical stage since very few people have ever achieved it. That stage should be a crowning achievement in development as a person and getting in life to the pinnacle of assuredness and comfort and truthfulness in being yourself and being a part of other social groups.

It worked a little differently in me — I think I skipped a mine stage in childhood, spend 40 years of my life mired in a suffocating and exhausting miasma of me stage, then for a short period I finally went through the mine stage, and only now I am on the verge of I stage. And it seems to me that most of the other people I have ever interacted with never outgrew the first two stages of human development and are stuck there without even knowing of the potential for better development. Most people stay in the stage where possessions (or keeping others from possessions) are of utmost and only importance, or in the stage where mirroring the anticipated views of themselves as reflected by others and voluntarily playing along with it, is the only way of experiencing self-worth. Sadly, there is very little development of I stage in the majority of the population. And there is very little knowledge of and need among people for working on developing a more advanced version of themselves.