The Work - Pathologos or the Limiting Frames of Our Self
The late Pierre Grimes, the modern pioneer who brought Philosophical Counseling to life as a profession, and reviving, in many ways, the Platonic tradition as a living one, identified in his work, something he called “pathologos.” He identified it as one of the primary blocks that prevents a person from coming to know their true self and achieve their inborn excellence (arête). Personal excellence is important to philosophical counseling as it is one of its primary goals. The actualization of personal excellence in a client’s life is to any philosophical counselor a hallmark of a successful philosophical counseling relationship. It is a counselor’s role to facilitate and enable a client through different philosophical practices to realize their unique, innate excellence, and to assist them in actualizing and then sustaining it as a living process in their life. Thus, having a basic understanding of Pierre’s idea of the pathologos can be useful for a philosophical counselor and anyone getting started on their philosophical journey, as the philosophical journey will hopefully lead a person to a clear view of the reality of themselves and reality itself. Understanding the concept of pathologos can also provide a person with a good idea of what a philosophical journey might entail as they find their way out of the cave for the first time.
Pierre defines pathologos as a “sick or false belief about the self.” It means an untrue belief we hold deep within ourelves about who and what we are. In my own terms, a pathologos is a false frame that a person limits their view of reality with. The pathologos is one key thing that limits us, most often without us realizing it as its origins are buried deep on the history of our life and identity. The limiting belief of a pathologos is one we have adopted from sources like our parents, teachers, or culture, when we were young and just forming our identities. It is a natural byproduct of a culture and a society that uses language and which requires individuals to adopt the customs and ways of a certain group. Pierre asserts that the pathologos is imparted to us in a non-traumatic way in a relationship of openness and love when we are children, that we then take up as part of our identity and in doing so it becomes part of the frames through which we see ourselves and the world. He asserts that these pathologoi are transmitted to us before the age of reason and that once we have attained the age of reason no more pathologoi become a part of our identity.
Pierre has developed a method he called Philosophical Midwifery to help people come to identify their pathologoi. This is one technique we utilize at Useful Frames, though not the only, as we don’t believe there is just any one way or practice that is good enough to achieve lasting transformation for a variety of reasons we will discuss in further articles. But, there are some things this concept of the pathologos provides to us that is central to all of our philosophical counseling work, and which are important for a person to know before embarking on a philosophical counseling journey.
The things you should know are that philosophical counseling requires work on your part, effort on your part, and courage on your part. It requires work because philosophy as we see it, is not a form of argumentation to prove who is right by being the most logical and having the keenest intellect, but it is instead a set of practices, practices you do consistently over time. Some practices you do alone, some you do with your philosophical counselor, and some are done as group practices. It is only the committed and continual practice of philosophy that permits you to begin truly transforming your life. Thus, it requires work. But the work, is often filled with joy, though not always.
It requires effort because philosophical counseling requires your involvement, as you must be willing to inquire and think, your counselor will not think for you, or feel for you, though with their expert guidance the work and effort are made much easier.
Lastly, it requires courage. This is where the pathologos comes in. If you have been living your life identifying yourself and your identity with false beliefs, even though they are false, you have still believed and considered them to be a part of who you are. You are deeply invested in that belief, that story of who you are. Thus, when you become aware for the first time as an adult that your identity contains something false, the experience of realizing that can be jarring. Thus, courage is essential as you must be willing to see things as they are, even when that calls into question what you thought was your identity. Only by seeing what limits us can we achieve real and lasting transformation and begin to move towards our own excellence.
The great Pierre Grimes offered some words of advice for anyone embarking on the journey to their own excellence which is the point of philosophical counseling:
Challenging one’s fate opens one to a new vista, a new kind of life, and that life can be an unfolding of one’s destiny. To whatever degree one leaves the confined and predictable patterns of pathologos behavior to that very degree there is an openness to the unknown. The unexpected is the rule not the exception. The inner development of man moves in unexpected ways, it creates opportunities, and can restructure everything in one’s life. While it is likely that inner growth will bring about changes in the outward circumstances of one’s life it is a certainty that it will transform one’s most basic values and worldviews and with that kind of change relationships are also perceived in a new and vital way. Anyone who embarks on a path of self growth should know this to be true and if they don’t they soon will discover it.
Before anyone decides to enter this program they should realize this fact and fully accept the responsibility for their own development. It is impossible to play safe and embark on the journey of self discovery. Our program is not a safe plaything. Without accepting totally and unconditionally the responsibility for one’s own growth this program will contribute little if anything to your life.
If you are ready to take the next step, schedule your free discovery call here.
