Self-obsessiveness Is the Enemy of Authenticity

Boat on Lake Michigan

Thomas Merton writes: "All sin starts from the assumption that my false self, the self that exists only in my own egocentric desires, is the fundamental reality of life to which everything else in the universe is ordered." (Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, 34-35)

What sense can we make of this?

1. "Sin" is: missing the target.
2. The target is: God and God's will and desires, God's honor and glory and majesty. (Note: sans God there is no target, not at all.)
3. Pride and shame are obsessiveness about the wrong target; viz., the self.
4. To live life as if the universe was ordered around one's self is to live a false life; is to live the life of the false self.
5. Self-obsessiveness is the enemy of authenticity.