Robert KEGAN

An examination of the evolution of the self-image from infancy to adulthood discusses the individual's efforts to find meaning in life and the developmental theories of the psychologist, Jean Piaget

The Evolving Self

Ivaylo Durmonski

If you consider yourself a smart dude, you won’t like this book. Your grammar skills will be tested to the extreme by the sophisticated words used inside. I was personally challenged to understand what the author was trying to say throughout most of the text. On top of that, I often skipped sections and felt asleep. Not intentionally, but because I wasn’t simply getting what Rober wanted to say and my attention quickly wandered.

Yet, the elegant, but complex words and statements, were not enough to stop me from finishing the book. What Robert Kegan gathered in The Evolving Self is staggering. As a fan of human psychology and a lifelong learner of personal behavior, reading this book was like giving candy to a baby. I was able to understand so much about how the minds of the infants work that it will be hard to tell you all about it in this summary. You simply have to read the book. But be warned, the text is really complicated to grasp. First, I thought it was just me. But once I read reviews I realized that I’m not the only one struggling with sentences like:

“But how did our four-year-olds come to find themselves in this predicament in the first place? How did they get embedded in their perceptions? Why do they get disembedded? And what does disembedding do to the subject-object balance?”

Key takeaway?

You’re not the relationship with other people. You’re not the stuff you have around. You simply have these things. If you give too much attention to the objects around, they’ll cage you. You need to separate yourself from your environment (the stuff around) to find meaning.

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The Evolving Self

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