Philosophy of the External Soul: Emily Tucker

In class, guest speaker Robert McIntosh spoke on the philosophy of the external soul. 

He began by referencing the story of Punchkin. Punchkin is an evil immortal wizard who imprisons a princess. The princess agrees to marry Punchkin in order to learn secrets about him. She finds out that he keeps his soul hidden thousands of miles away which allows him to remain immortal. This is an example of the ideology of the external soul.

The external soul is an ancient mythological concept that a person's soul can be stored outside of their body, usually in some sort of hidden object. If that object is harmed or destroyed, the person dies. It is symbolic of immortality and the belief that identity (one's true self) is transcendent of the physical body.  When our physical body dies, our soul lives on and goes on a long "journey". 

The guest speaker claimed that the external soul is everywhere. So much of who we are, we live outside of ourselves. When we live outside of ourselves, we are exhibiting the external soul. In class, he had us give examples of this including the feeling that when someone dies, a part of us dies with them; appreciating art that we've taken into ourselves; laughter, yawning, empathy, altruism are all examples of this. 

He also mentioned the philosopher Peter Demianovich Ouspensky. Ouspensky taught that human beings develop spiritually by integrating body, emotion, and intellect. True consciousness must be awakened, and having an accurate self-awareness creates a "higher self". Ouspensky also believed that the human personality is not unified-- we are many small shifting "I's". This relates back to the external soul because our true self (soul) can be separated from our everyday personality and our persona. Because our real self is hidden and undeveloped, we are constantly searching for it. The guest speaker relates this lost knowledge Ouspensky was seeking back to the external soul. He claimed that perhaps Ouspensky was seeking this idea of a part of yourself being linked to something greater and finding your place in the world. 

I found all of these thoughts to be very intriguing because there is something to say about the power that comes with being a part of something greater than just yourself. It adds a whole new level of meaning to your life when it is linked to something that transcends the "here" and "now". I also really enjoyed learning the story of Punchkin and delving into the ideologies of Ouspensky:)

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