Self-assessment can be a tricky exercise.
On the one hand, we need to be fearlessly honest. Deflecting blame and finger-pointing may be instinctive (who likes to shoulder blame?) but it doesn’t get us anywhere. We need to face our own inadequacies and mistakes, learn from them, and evolve into better people.
But what about the flip side? What if we are so bent on being ‘honest’ that I consistently find fault in my own actions? What if I find myself claiming too much ‘credit’ for collective miscalculations and blunders? What if I start defining myself by my own ‘downside?’
In a strange way, being hard on yourself can make you feel good. You can get a virtue-thrill from being so ‘honest.’
But that’s not the authentic, or truly honest path. An honest self-assessment will have me rising above my emotional tendencies – neither ducking blame nor clinging to it – to assess myself objectively (as objectively as I can in a self-assessment). If I try to stand apart from my emotions, and view myself dispassionately, I’ll probably find a ‘mixed bag’ of results; there will be elements that I want to fix, and other elements that I need to continue exercising and expanding.
I assume that I’ll find both of those elements because I’m human, and we’re all a ‘mixed bag.’
I’m describing a level of internal freedom, the freedom to honestly assess oneself, without being sidetracked by one’s emotions. And now is an especially pertinent time to focus on internal freedom, because it’s the Passover season.
Passover isn’t only about our past.
Our ancestors’ story needs to be our story. Passover is a time of Freedom for the human spirit, a season in which we can all transcend our individual ‘Egypts’.
Life is full of ‘Egypts,’ i.e., forces that constrict us, impeding our soul’s healthy expression. These ‘Egypts’ are often internal and self-imposed; and they take many forms: fears, anxieties, self-perceptions, etc. A person’s self-perception can be an ‘Egypt’, since a counter-productive self-perception can really get in the way of a meaningful life.
Passover hands us a tool of liberation in the Matzah.
Matzah is made of flour and water, but it must be prepared and baked quickly, before it can rise. Once it rises, it becomes Chametz (dough that has risen or leavened) and unfit for Passover.
Matzah is simple, flat bread, while Chametz is ‘bloated’. Matzah represents humility, the surrender to honesty; Chametz represents undisciplined emotional expansion and impulse.
Passover, and the Matzah, teach us an important lesson in personal freedom: don’t let your impulses, even your ‘virtuous,’ high-minded ones, run the show.
With humility, you should find the freedom to see – and like – yourself honestly.
That’s a freedom to cherish.