Self-understanding

Personality – is the dynamic and organized set of characteristics possessed by a person that uniquely influences his or her cognitions, motivations, and behaviors in various situations.
Self-understanding
Gnothi Seauton – the ancient Greek aphorism inscribed in golden letters at the lintel of the entrance to Temple of Apollo at Delphi and was adopted by Socrates as his motto. It translates to “Know thyself.”
Donald Kagan on an Open Yale course asserts that, “The Greeks combined a unique sense of mankind’s high place in the natural order with a painful understanding of the limitations of the greatness. The greatest limitation is being mortality.”
Our predisposition to think certain patterns of thought and engage in certain patterns of behavior.
How can you determine or judge another person’s personality? People have impact on us and that’s why we want to be able to predict their behavior.
Sigmund Freud
Hysterical fit came to be viewed as a psychological disorder. French neurologist Jean-Martin Charcot utilized hypnosis to treat women suffering from hysteria (emotional excess). The mystery of hysteria played a major role in the early development of psychoanalysis.
Freud assumed that our mental life was divided into 3parts: the conscious, the preconscious and the unconscious. The conscious refers to ideas that we are aware. It operates on the surface of personality and has a small role in personality development and functioning. The preconscious refers to those experiences that are unconscious but could be conscious with little effort. For example, you forgot the food you ate yesterday, but you could probably recall them If you were asked to list them. The preconscious exists just beneath the surface of awareness. On the other hand, the unconscious operates on the deepest level of personality. It consists of memories we are not aware of. Those remain out of awareness bcuz making them conscious would create huge pain and anxiety.
When thinking of the unconscious mind, it can be helpful to compare the mind to an iceberg. Everything above the water represents conscious awareness while everything below the water represents the unconscious. The unconscious could include abuse that we experienced during early childhood by our parents, relative or family friend. It could consist of strong emotional reactions of anger or rage toward certain figures, or painful feelings of shame and humiliation. A key point is that such memories don’t simply disappear from awareness; they continue to operate outside awareness. Unconscious ideas, memories, and experiences may interfere with conscious and rational behavior.