Involution is the evolution of the heart, mind, and soul. It is not a dogma, a belief or a doctrine, it is a process that we intentionally choose to follow to lead a wise, authentic and whole life. It is a philosophy of life.
Table of Contents
Why do we need involution?
Involution is necessary because we are undergoing deep psychological, emotional and spiritual suffering as a species – and it has only gotten worse for a while.
The inner evolution is essential because we are generally slaves of our body, our spirit, and our emotions. We are also slaves to others and to the society that conditions our minds.
The involution process breaks down as follows:
- Self-awareness
- Self-exploration
- Self-discovery
- Self-understanding
- Self-love
- Self-transformation
- Self-control
We all exist in each of these facets to different degrees. It’s about finding out where you exist the most and where you exist the least. This will allow you to see what you need to work on the most.
1. Self-awareness:
Self-awareness is the ability to observe the thoughts, feelings, and actions that you perform every day.
A person with this ability can identify what they are feeling, but not necessarily why they are feeling it.
2. Self-exploration:
Self-exploration, or self-study, is the process of investigating and analyzing our inner thoughts, emotions, beliefs, and ideals. Once we become aware of our internal processes (thinking, feeling, reacting and making decisions), it is then useful to ask ourselves why we function as we do.
Self-exploration is often a complex process that involves a lot of introspection, observation, and research.
How to explore yourself:
- Practice self-observation – this includes meditation, mindfulness and entering altered states of consciousness.
- Practice self-analysis – this includes introspection and psychoanalysis.
3. Self-discovery:
Self-discovery can be understood as the act or process of acquiring knowledge or understanding oneself. Self-discovery is closely linked to self-exploration because if you don’t study yourself, reaching a level of self-discovery is impossible.
People who live at this level tend to discover the underlying mechanisms and truths behind many of their beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors toward themselves and the people around them.
How to discover yourself? To find yourself more deeply, there are books, meditation, online articles, tests, and documentaries.
Recommended: 10 Signs You Are on the Right Path to Achieve Your Highest Goal.
4. Self-understanding:
Also called self-knowledge, self-understanding is the ability to know what, how and why you are doing what you are doing. For this reason, self-understanding is closely linked to self-discovery.
People who live at this level generally have a comprehensive understanding of the origins and reasons for much of their feelings, thoughts, and behaviors.
If you understand yourself, then you have:
- A deep understanding of your strengths, weaknesses, attitudes, beliefs, motives, defenses and reactions.
- Self-understanding is what happens when we learn so much about ourselves that it becomes assimilated knowledge. Assimilated knowledge becomes “knowledge” when it is actively experienced through applied use.
Ways to continue living what you have learned can include:
- Reflection – Examine and contemplate your thoughts, beliefs, goals, and motivations.
- Ask questions – Asking questions is simple, but it can often get to the root of the problem. Keep asking “Why?” “What?” and “How?” During your journey of involution and you will develop an ever-deeper understanding of yourself.
- Be aware of others – Others are our mirrors, and whatever is hidden or unresolved will stand out in our relationships with those around us.
5. Self-love:
Self-love results from self-understanding and is defined by a compassionate acceptance of your strengths and weaknesses.
Those who practice self-love realize that they are imperfect in different ways, but stop criticizing and punishing themselves for their imperfections.
6. Self-transformation:
When we become aware of ourselves, undertake self-exploration and obtain discovery, understanding, and self-love, we can then experience a true self-transformation.
When you free yourself from the bondage of cultural values, as well as unconscious desires for stimulation, possessions and socially acceptable lifestyles; you begin to feel an enveloping feeling of isolation, you begin to experience your own apocalypse. Gradually we find that we don’t care much about what we use.
It is at this stage that we begin to undergo our own process of spiritual alchemy: a moment of self-transformation which involves the death of the old and the birth of the new.
As this transformation of self develops in us, we can undergo mystical experiences, the deep death of the ego and other major inner changes that make us grow in true wisdom, compassion and inner freedom.
Recommended: 7 Powerful Signs that Your Entire Life Is About to Change.
7. Self-control:
The end goal of the involution process is self-control. In this new change of consciousness, the person goes beyond the limited ego and in this sense, he becomes “master”.
Self-control is rare and includes:
- The ability to see and experience the illusion of the ego.
- The ability to simply observe feelings and emotions without identifying with them.
- The ability to realize that we are not our thoughts and emotions.
- The ability to stop reacting with hate, anger, embarrassment, jealousy and other harmful emotions.
- The ability to live in peace and wisdom.
In order for self-control to occur, it often requires the first in-depth exploration of the individual sense of self. Consider this as preparing a garden: to plant a seed, you must first have clean and fertile soil. But when this soil is full of weeds and rocks, it is very difficult to sow this seed.
To summarize the involution process:
Self-awareness is the time when we have enough courage to begin to face the truth that we are trying to run away from. Quickly, we begin to explore and discover ourselves, and with sufficient intensity of consciousness, we finally begin to understand ourselves and grow in self-love.
During this whole process, self-transformation begins to happen, and with sufficient awareness and grace, this results in the release of the false self and the experience of self-control.
