We Were Never Meant To Be Static

What does it mean to be authentic when there is no fixed version of yourself to discover? The Unfixed Self Podcast launches with a profound exploration of human identity that challenges conventional wisdom about who we are and how we show up in the world.

Through personal reflection and philosophical inquiry, I unpack the liberating truth that we were never meant to be static beings. Our greatest strength as humans lies in our adaptability, our flexibility, and our capacity to wear different masks in different contexts. While social media and modern culture push us toward defining ourselves through rigid "personal brands," true authenticity emerges when we embrace the complex, paradoxical nature of our consciousness.

Drawing from Taoist philosophy, psychological theories like Jung's archetypes, and systems like astrology and Human Design, I propose that authenticity isn't a destination but a practice rooted in honest self-observation. Just as twelve musical notes can create endless melodies, our fundamental human elements combine to form infinitely varied expressions of self. The unfixed self doesn't reject personas (even "having no mask" is itself a mask) but develops awareness of them, understanding when and why we wear different aspects of ourselves.

This episode also tackles the fascinating intersection between individual development and collective liberation. When we recognize that the external world reflects our inner landscape, we understand that personal growth and social transformation are interdependent journeys. True authenticity cannot exist in isolation—our mirrors in others only reflect accurately when they too are on paths toward freedom and authentic expression.

Subscribe to join me on this journey of exploration and transformation. Together, we'll unravel questions of identity, authenticity, and personal development not to arrive at fixed answers, but to reimagine what it means to be human in a complex, ever-changing world.

Transcript

Introducing The Unfixed Self Concept

Speaker 1 0:00

Hello, welcome to the Unfixed Self Podcast. I'm your host, Thomas Sage Pedersen. This is a space where we explore everything surrounding authenticity, identity, personal development, leadership, transformation and the emergence of new ideas, Not to arrive at fixed answers, but to unravel questions and reimagine so that we might transform ourselves and, in doing so, shape culture and the world around us. All right, I'm so blessed to be here right now, be here right now To start this series off. I just want to explain kind of what is the unfixed self Through my own personal journeys, through authenticity you know, I guess I was under the illusion in the beginning that there may be a part of us or there is a self that is more rigid and through exploration and study and just feeling into myself, the realization that, you know, we are never static and we were never meant to be static as human beings. One of the most powerful things about being human is our adaptability. It's our ability to be flexible in certain situations. It's our ability to wear multiple masks, it's all these things. We're very complex creatures based on our consciousness. We're meant not to be perfect or fully figure it out, this idea where we have to be certain about ourselves and have a niche, or you know, we now, with social media, we highly focus on branding and what is our brand and who are we, and those certain circumstances. But when we start to fully be ourselves, we start to realize it's not about the fixed identity, it's about the ability to observe and to look at all the different masks we were putting on. As much as I would like to be like I have no mask on right now, I definitely have a mask on. It's the awareness of us having a mask. Us as human beings, we almost in social situations, we need to have some form of persona. The idea of taking away the persona is in itself a persona, you know, and so I think that's where the observations come in, and really the core of who we are is something far more complex that I don't even know if I have the brain capacity to describe, and I'm curious about what other people and future guests will have to say about it. You know, this world rewards being certain. It rewards an idea of simplicity. Oh, I'm just a baker, I'm just a. This Our identity is wrapped up into what we do rather than who we are and the vast complexity and and paradoxes that we hold within each of us.

Authenticity as Practice, Not Destination

Speaker 1 4:19

So what is authenticity then, if we have no fixed internal state? You know, I tend to lean on Taoist philosophy and this idea that authenticity is rather not looked at as a destination but looked at as a practice. It's about showing up with honesty. Honesty is probably the number one thing that strengthens authenticity, this practice. You cannot do this practice without being honest. So the unfixed self is being honest at every single moment, you know, with yourself and in the external world, because the external world is nothing but reflections of who we are, because we are the ones perceiving the world. So the idea is to be in that flow, that idea of not knowing where we are, who we are, but like seeing the, the complexity and observer, being the observer of the complexity that is unfolding in front of you.

Speaker 1 5:41

Even when you look at things like astrology or human design, which I have studied pretty in depth, you know, yes, there is a fixed set of archetypes that can describe who you are, but within each one of those archetypes is a vast amount of complexity, Like if you just look at, for instance, like a Sagittarius archetype. It's a symbol, it's a story that we tell ourselves, that we identify with. You know, the centaur, the half horse, half man, originally inspired by Chiron the wounded healer, who was the only centaur that had godly powers and was philosophical and wise and studied medicine. This idea of philosophy, right, the love of thinking, is in this Sagittarius story, this idea of being a warrior, somewhat like the archer, you know, aiming, having to be accurate, but also being part horse, being part of the natural world. So, having that rawness to this individual, and to describe the core of this one being, we have to look at elements. You know this being is more yang than yin. You know he's more push, you know he's more part of that aggression, vibe, fire. So fire is the descriptor we use to understand where he is or she is coming from in this world. Right? So only with one archetype, Sagittarius. Right now I can dive extremely complex into the complex story of this character. Now imagine 12 of them. The complex story of this character. Now imagine 12 of them. Right?

Speaker 1 7:43

Same with music. You know, in Western music we have 12 notes and we're still creating new sounds, new ideas and new innovations. And it's not slowing down when we only have such a limited range of musical notes and hearing and hearing sounds that actually sound good, that are not too high or too low. We are very limited in our expression, Yet we see the most complex variations come from those 12 notes and that boundary of sound. And you know, if you look at astrology even, just even deeper, you know we are connected with the stars. So, like, when the stars are moving, our chart is moving. Same with human design, right, Our things are moving. It's never static, right, there's never a static moment.

Speaker 1 8:42

The idea that we had to understand within ourselves is that there were multiple parts of ourselves, so similar to family systems therapy, where there are different parts of who we are within ourselves and we have to understand them. And we're fairly complex creatures and the best way and the fastest way to understand consciousness is through stories. It's through us associating with stories. You know, Jung knew this and coined the term, you know, and popularized the word archetypes and the shadow and all these different elements, shadow and all these different elements, and that is how we grow and how we transform and how we discover who we are.

Surface Level vs. Deep Reflection

Speaker 1 9:25

Even when I look at things like even fictional films and movies and stuff like that, right, there's a reason why we are attracted to all these things like that. Right, there's a reason why we are attracted to all these things, it is not just because we like their shirt. And if it is because we like their shirt, even dive deeper. What color is that shirt? What does that shirt make you feel like you know? And keep going to the depth. Don't just stop at the surface level. I think a lot of the people I've seen in this world, especially in politics and activism, they stop at the surface level, they stop at the external level and they only use the external knowledge and understanding of their world. I like those shoes because those other people have those shoes. Oh, and it makes me seem cool, it makes me feel good. Right, Stop there. That's where they stop. They don't go deeper into. What is this reflecting back on you? What is this telling you about yourself? Attraction is intelligence. It has wisdom. It has all these different aspects. Same with defense when you're defensive, there's a wisdom there. Why are you defensive? What is this telling you about yourself? Right, it is also the reason why you know, Don Miguel Ruiz, who popularizes the book the Four Agreements, talks about not taking things personally.

Individual Liberation and Collective Freedom

Speaker 1 10:51

Right, Because he the realization there is that once we start to take things personally, like someone is and meaning like someone is offending us and it's they're trying to hurt me. They are just working on their stuff and they're projecting their reflection on you. It's all about them. And where does hyper individualism and communal and collective action fit into all of this? That is the question, right? I've had a theory for some time that hyper-individualism was actually a gift when we connect it to collective. If you see it as a way of us understanding. One of the weaknesses of being in collective action and working together were that some people may have felt not seen, bitter, resentful even, that they are not doing the thing they're here to do in our Western world, in our colonized world.

Speaker 1 12:02

I don't know too much about indigenous wisdom. I know a fair amount, but even then, there have been systems of understanding the individual so that the individual can give to the community in the best possible way, and that's something that human design tries to tackle, right? Human design is a system created by Ra ooh. Ra forgot his name, some interesting white man with an Egyptian name. I think his real name was Jack or something. I don't know his real name. I did, but I forgot. But you know, I joke about that because you know, I think, when we're doing a lot of this work.

Speaker 1 12:53

It's also comes there's questions of cultural appropriation, colonialism and like how do we function in that kind of society and kind of world and kind of world? And it becomes messy conversations because when you come to, when you're doing inner work, there is a lot of the inner systems and colonized work there. But when you start to transcend that on an individual level you start to see everyone, the truth, right. You start to be honest that we are all human here, right? The problem is that any kind of liberation, even if it's on an individual level or any kind of like authentic practice, has to incorporate the collective and communal aspect in some way or form as either a reflective reflection of yourself, mainly. That's where you have honest reflections of who you are in your consciousness and if you can respect the external world and love the external world as well as love the internal world, where you face some of the deeper shadows of yourself and have compassion right and love. It stands to, stands to reason that the love would transfer internally and externally, and how that is manifested and expressed I think is up to the individual and where they are in one's society.

Speaker 1 14:22

So when I am exploring these notions of authenticity, of liberation. There has to be a point when we all have to be liberated. You know you cannot find true authenticity or true liberation without everyone else being liberated. Or you're just wandering around, you know, and the mirrors are seeing you and they're trying to wake up. You know, or or not, or defending themselves or projecting a lot of stuff onto you and your reflection will never be mirrored back in an authentic way because those people are not mirroring the accurate way.

Speaker 1 15:03

Also, things I would love to explore on this podcast so the unfixed self, the idea that we are always moving, always transforming, that we're not meant to be static, perfect or fully figured out. We're meant to grow, to adapt, to be flexible. That's the basis of evolution around our environment. Evolution is not like you're not going to this idea of perfection. I think people get confused. They mix this word between evolution and growth. So I want to clear that up. Evolution is purely what you are adapting to. There's no linear thinking. There's no hierarchy in evolution. Evolution is just adapting to your environment over time and what comes out of that?

Evolution, Growth and Final Thoughts

Speaker 1 15:59

I'm curious with our society, what adaptions we have made to the society that we're going to see, if we survive this long in generations, generations, generations down the line in humanity If, if you know, we survive. But either way, this podcast is just about exploring this. Podcasts is just about exploring this. Me talking here. You know, I hope to have some guests on where we get to explore the deeper side of things and reflect deeper on this. You know, I appreciate you guys for listening. My name is Thomas Sage Petterson and thank you for listening to the Unfixed Self podcast. Have a good day.