Dear Reader,
In an ever-changing world, it can start to feel like the only constant is ourselves. We begin to feel like circumstances, even other people, cannot ultimately give us what we want, so we turn inward to rely on ourselves. As a society, we have taken to heart Polonius’ advice to Laertes in Hamlet: “This above all: to thine own self be true.”
This feeling is compounded by a western culture that is highly individualistic, as evidenced by the proliferation of phrases like self-reliance, self-discovery, self-reflection, self-sufficiency, self-care, and many others. Some of these concepts have a positive connotation and others have a negative connotation, but the phenomenon itself is curious. Why are we so obsessed with ourselves?
Perhaps the reason is that Polonius’ advice is much easier to hear than to implement; perhaps we don’t quite know who we are, so we don’t know how to be true to ourselves. In this 10th Issue of Synesis, we want to explore the idea of the self. We have set out to ask hard questions about who we are and how we can understand ourselves better, and we offer our perspective incorporating disciplines from philosophy to neuroscience to music.
Yet in our research and considerations, our guiding principle is our belief that Jesus Christ was a real person who died and rose again, paying for sins and offering salvation freely to all who believe in him. This belief may seem unrelated to the topic at hand, but we have endeavoured to show that a belief in Christ actually enhances our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.
We invite you to join us in considering these topics, and we hope that reading this journal will be both thought-provoking and comforting.
Sincerely,
Andrew Warren
Editor-in-Chief