This confusion between small self and larger Self is the core illusion of the human condition, and penetrating this illusion is what awakening is all about.
Cynthia Bourgeault
Larger Self
Topic: Self-Cultivation & Health
The person I normally take myself to be—that busy, anxious little ‘I’ so preoccupied with its goals, fears, desires, and issues—is never even remotely the whole of who I am, and to seek the fulfillment of my life at this level means to miss out on the bigger life. This is why, according to his teaching, the one who tries to keep his ‘life’ (i.e., the small one) will lose it, and the one who is willing to lose it will find the real thing. Beneath the surface there is a deeper and vastly more authentic Self, but its presence is usually veiled by the clamor of the smaller ‘I’ with its insatiable needs and demands.
This confusion between small self and larger Self (variously known in the traditions as ‘True Self,’ ‘Essential Self,’ or ‘Real I’) is the core illusion of the human condition, and penetrating this illusion is what awakening is all about.
Cynthia Bourgeault (born March 13, 1947, in West Chester, Pennsylvania, United States) is an Episcopal priest, modern-day mystic, teacher of Christian contemplation, and author. She studied medieval studies at the University of Pennsylvania and Ohio State University, focusing on early music and liturgical drama. Her early experiences of silence at a Quaker school influenced her lifelong interest in contemplative spirituality. Ordained in the Episcopal Church in 1979, she combined her Christian vocation with a deep openness to other traditions, studying Sufism, Tibetan Buddhism, and G. I. Gurdjieff’s Fourth Way.
Her contemplative path deepened in 1990 at a Centering Prayer retreat with Thomas Keating, after which she became his student, editor, and colleague for nearly thirty years. She was also shaped by the guidance of hermit monk Raphael Robin and Benedictine writer Bruno Barnhart. From these roots she helped form communities dedicated to Wisdom Christianity, co-founding The Contemplative Society in British Columbia and serving as founding director of the Aspen Wisdom School. She is also a member of the Global Peace Initiative for Women’s Contemplative Council, where she supports interspiritual dialogue and peace work.
Cynthia Bourgeault divides her time between a hermitage on a small island off the coast of Maine and her global teaching commitments. She is core faculty emerita at the Center for Action and Contemplation and continues to guide the Wisdom Waypoints network. Her books, including The Wisdom Jesus, Mystical Hope, and The Heart of Centering Prayer, explore how immanence and transcendence meet in daily life. In 2021, Watkins Review named her among the 100 most spiritually influential living people. She remains dedicated to what she calls “the path of Wisdom,” a way of living that unites contemplative practice, interspiritual learning, and embodied presence.
Bourgeault, Cynthia. Centering Prayer and Inner Awakening. Cowley Publications, 2004, p. 10.
Cynthia Bourgeault
Theme: Being in Self
About This Cynthia Bourgeault Quotation [Commentary]
Cynthia Bourgeault begins by naming the ordinary sense of self with exactness: “the person I normally take myself to be” is that “busy, anxious little ‘I’ so preoccupied with its goals, fears, desires, and issues.” But this smaller identity is “never even remotely the whole of who I am.” Her quotation clarifies the real problem: “this confusion between small self and larger Self is the core illusion of the human condition.” The mistake is not simply that the small self exists, but that we take it to be the whole self. When we seek “the fulfillment of my life at this level,” she says, we “miss out on the bigger life.”
The context passage follows that movement further. Cynthia Bourgeault points to Jesus’ teaching that the one who tries to keep this smaller “life” will lose it, and the one willing to lose it “will find the real thing.” Beneath the surface of the small self, there is “a deeper and vastly more authentic Self.” She names this deeper reality as “True Self,” “Essential Self,” or “Real I.” What hides it is “the clamor of the smaller ‘I’ with its insatiable needs and demands.” Her sequence is clear: the surface self grasps, fears, and strives; the deeper Self remains present, but veiled.
This is why Cynthia Bourgeault says that “penetrating this illusion is what awakening is all about.” Awakening is not the improvement of the “busy, anxious little ‘I,’” but freedom from confusing it with the larger Self. The quotation carries both diagnosis and release. The “core illusion” is deep, yet beneath it there is already “a deeper and vastly more authentic Self.” In that sense, Being In Self is not a matter of acquiring something new. It is a matter of seeing through the confusion and consenting to the “bigger life” that is already there.
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