The problems of identity, real and superimposed
The starting point of critical elaboration is the consciousness of what one really is, and is "knowing thyself" as a product of the historical process to date, which has deposited in you an infinity of traces, without leaving an inventory.... Therefore it is imperative at the outset to compile such an inventory. (Antonio Gramsci, Prison Notebooks , quoted in E.W. Said, Orientalism , p. 25.) We all need to be deeply conscious of our own prejudices. But we should recognize that this is also part of the spiritual path, at an even deeper level than Gramsci's appeal to historical processes. Gramsci is talking about critiquing political ideology, but we can recognize within it the imperative to the highest self-realization. In Upanishadic terms, this is knowing avidyā along with vidyā , i.e., knowing avidyā means to have taken Gramsci's inventory and said, neti. Vidyā is to know your true identity or svarūpa . The two processes are to be conducted simultaneously. ...