The Strange Desire to Become

At the end of the part 2, we arrived at a strange place.

Human beings don’t merely want to know what is true.

We don’t merely want to know what is good.

We want to become something.

We want to become better people.

We want to grow.

We want to mature.

We want to become the kind of person we believe we ought to be.

And that desire is so ordinary that we rarely stop to ask how strange it actually is.

A tree grows.

A child grows.

A human being grows physically.

But we also talk about growing in a much deeper sense.

We talk about becoming wiser.

Becoming kinder.

Becoming more courageous.

Becoming more patient.

Becoming more honest.

Becoming more fully ourselves.

We don’t merely want to acquire information.

We want information to change us into more loving people.

And that takes us back to where this entire journey began.

Knowledge Is Supposed to Do Something

Think about the way we talk about education.

We don’t educate children simply so that they can accumulate facts.

We want them to learn how to think.

How to reason.

How to make decisions.

How to relate to other people.

How to navigate the world.

How to become responsible adults.

In other words, knowledge is supposed to lead somewhere.

Knowing changes what we are capable of doing.

And what we do, over time, changes who we become.

The same thing happens throughout life.

We read because we want to understand.

We understand because we want to make better decisions.

We make decisions because we are trying to build a life.

And eventually, those decisions become habits.

Those habits shape character.

And character shapes the kind of person we become.

There is therefore a movement built into ordinary human existence:

We know something, we respond to what we know, and we become someone through those responses.

That seems almost obvious.

But once you notice it, a deeper question appears.

Why do we experience human life as something that is supposed to have a direction?

Why does “becoming better” make sense to us in the first place?

Better according to what?

Better for what purpose?

And who gets to decide what the better version of me looks like?

Knowledge Is Power, But Power Is Not the Point

There is a familiar saying that captures part of what we have been describing:

“Knowledge itself is power.”

The phrase is commonly associated with Francis Bacon, who wrote in Meditationes Sacrae that “knowledge itself is power.” The shorter form became the familiar expression later.

But why is knowledge power?

Because knowledge expands our vision.

When we understand more about the world, we see possibilities that were invisible to us before. We recognize options we could not previously recognize. We can anticipate consequences, imagine alternative responses, and choose between paths that were previously indistinguishable.

In that sense, knowledge can increase freedom.

Imagine standing in a dark room. Your options are limited because you cannot see what is around you. You may stumble forward, reach for something, or discover a doorway by accident.

Then someone turns on the light.

The room has not changed.

But your possibilities have.

You can see the door. You can see the obstacles. You can see the other paths.

Your vision has expanded, and therefore your freedom has expanded.

This is one of the ways knowledge becomes power. It does not necessarily give us control over everything around us. It gives us a clearer view of what is possible, what is dangerous, what is available, and what our choices may produce.

Knowledge gives us more than information.

It gives us room to act.

But increased vision and increased freedom also create a new obligation.

As another familiar saying puts it:

“With great power comes great responsibility.”

The line is most strongly associated with Spider-Man, but its significance does not come merely from its place in a comic book or film. It resonates because millions of people recognize something true in it. We understand, almost instinctively, that greater ability creates greater accountability. If we can do more, see more, influence more, or protect more, then we also have more responsibility for what we choose to do with those capacities.

That is why the saying has endured. Spider-Man gives the principle a memorable form, but the principle reaches far beyond the character. It expresses a moral truth that feels recognizable because it describes something we already know about human life: power is never morally neutral once it is placed in our hands.

If knowledge gives us greater power by expanding our vision, then that power cannot be separated from responsibility.

Greater freedom creates greater responsibility.

And perhaps that responsibility exists because we are not merely trying to know more or do more.

We are trying to become something.

Our choices do not merely determine what happens around us. They also begin to shape who we become.

Knowledge gives us greater vision.

Vision gives us greater possibilities.

Possibilities give us greater freedom.

Freedom gives us greater responsibility.

And responsibility requires us to choose.

That is where the question of becoming begins.

So if freedom has increased it’s because vision has increased.

This helps us understand why Logos and knowledge matter so much to the human journey.

So when we say that knowledge is power, we should immediately ask:

Power for what?

If knowledge gives us greater vision, what are we supposed to do with what we see?

If freedom gives us more choices, which choices should we make?

If our choices shape our character, what kind of person are we trying to become?

That brings us back to the strange desire we are exploring in this part.

We do not merely want the ability to choose.

We want to become the kind of people who choose well.

We do not merely want freedom.

We want the freedom to become more loving, more truthful, more compassionate, more courageous, and more fully human.

And that means knowledge cannot be the end of the journey.

It is part of what makes the journey possible.

The greater our vision becomes, the more possibilities we can see.

The more possibilities we can see, the more freely we can respond.

And the more freely we respond, the more capable we become of growing into the person we believe we ought to be.

The Desire to Become Yourself

Carl Jung captures this desire in a simple phrase:

“The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are.”

The language is familiar because the experience is familiar.

There is something inside us that resists the idea that we should simply remain whatever circumstances have made us.

We want to become more integrated.

More whole.

More ourselves.

We recognize that there can be a difference between the person we currently are and the person we could and even feel like we should become.

And that difference can create a kind of longing.

I could be more patient than I am.

More courageous.

More honest.

More generous.

More loving.

I could become less controlled by fear.

Less controlled by anger.

Less concerned with what other people think.

More capable of giving myself to something beyond my own interests.

We don’t normally experience those possibilities as meaningless.

We experience them as invitations.

There is a better version of myself that I can and should move toward.

And the strange thing is that I can recognize that possibility before I have become it.

I can know that I am not yet who I want to be.

The Paradox of Change

Carl Rogers captured another part of this beautifully:

“The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.”

Again, the statement sounds almost contradictory.

If I accept myself exactly as I am, why would I need to change?

But most of us recognize the experience.

Real transformation rarely begins with pretending to be someone we aren’t.

It begins with honestly seeing who we are.

I have to be able to say:

This is who I am right now.

These are my strengths.

These are my weaknesses.

These are my fears.

These are the ways I hurt people.

These are the things I still don’t understand.

These are the parts of myself I would rather hide.

Acceptance does not mean that everything about me is good.

It means that I am willing to see myself truthfully.

And once I can see myself truthfully, change becomes possible.

That brings us back to the relationship between knowing and becoming.

We cannot become what we refuse to see.

We cannot change what we will not acknowledge.

Knowledge of ourselves becomes the beginning of transformation.

And once again, the pieces begin to connect.

We Want to Become Better

This is not limited to therapy or psychology.

It appears everywhere.

Someone decides they want to become a better parent.

Someone realizes they have been selfish and wants to become more generous.

Someone recognizes that anger has controlled their life and wants to become more patient.

Someone looks back on the person they were ten years ago and realizes they have changed.

Sometimes that change is painful.

Sometimes it is slow.

Sometimes we fail and have to begin again.

But the desire itself remains.

We don’t simply want to remain alive.

We want our lives to go somewhere.

We want to become someone.

And notice what happens when we use the word better.

Better is not merely another word for different.

If I change my hairstyle, I have become different.

If I move to another city, I have become different.

If I learn another language, I have become different.

But we reserve the word better for something more.

Better implies that one way of being is preferable to another.

It implies some kind of standard.

And now we are back where we were at the end of the last part.

Should.

I should become more patient.

I should become more honest.

I should become more compassionate.

I should become more courageous.

But why?

Where does that standard come from?

The Human Ideal

Every culture seems to have some conception of the kind of person worth becoming.

The details differ enormously.

Different societies celebrate different virtues.

Different traditions disagree about what constitutes a good life.

But the idea itself is remarkably persistent.

We tell stories about heroes.

We admire people who sacrifice for others.

We celebrate people who overcome selfishness.

We remember people who stood for justice when doing so was dangerous.

We teach children stories about courage, honesty, kindness, and compassion.

And we don’t merely say:

“Those people were interesting.”

We say:

“Be like them.”

That is an extraordinary statement.

We are telling another human being that there is a way of living that is worth becoming.

We are not merely transmitting information.

We are transmitting a vision of the human person.

And perhaps that is why our stories matter so much.

They don’t just tell us what happened.

They show us possible ways of being human.

We see the person we could become.

The Problem of the Self

But there is a tension here.

If I am supposed to become my “true self,” how do I know what my true self actually is?

What if what I want isn’t what is good?

What if becoming more powerful makes me less compassionate?

What if becoming more successful makes me more selfish?

What if becoming more confident makes me less willing to listen?

What if becoming more independent makes me incapable of receiving love?

We have already discovered that desire cannot be the final measure of goodness.

So becoming more fully myself cannot simply mean becoming more effective at getting what I want.

There has to be some deeper standard.

Otherwise “self-actualization” could simply mean becoming a more efficient version of my existing selfishness.

And most of us recognize that isn’t what we mean.

When we say we want to become better, we usually mean something more profound.

We want to become more whole.

More capable of love.

More capable of truth.

More capable of relationship.

More capable of giving ourselves to something worthwhile.

More capable of living in a way that we can respect when we look back on our lives.

So the desire to become is connected to the moral sense we explored in the last part.

The person I want to become is not merely the person I happen to desire.

I want to become the person I believe I ought to become.

And now the pieces are beginning to converge.

Knowledge.

Meaning.

Love.

Moral awareness.

Becoming.

These don’t feel like five unrelated human experiences anymore.

They seem to be pointing toward one another.

From Knowing to Becoming

Perhaps this is what knowledge was for all along.

We began with the question:

How do I know what is true?

Then we discovered that reality appears intelligible.

Then we discovered that knowing isn’t enough.

We want meaning.

We want relationship.

We want love.

Then we discovered that love isn’t simply whatever we happen to desire.

We recognize that some ways of treating people are better than others.

We experience an ought.

We experience conscience.

And now we have arrived at something else.

We don’t simply want to know what is true.

We don’t simply want to know what is good.

We want to become good.

We want our knowledge to shape our lives.

We want our choices to shape our character.

We want our character to become something we can recognize as good.

And perhaps that is why the deepest forms of wisdom have never been merely about knowing more.

Wisdom has always had something to do with how to live.

Knowing tells us something about reality.

Moral awareness tells us something about how we ought to respond to reality.

And our choices, repeated over time, begin to make us into someone.

Know.

Respond.

Become.

And perhaps this is why knowledge expands freedom without becoming the purpose of freedom. Knowledge gives us vision, vision gives us possibilities, and possibilities give us room to choose. But what matters most is what we do with that freedom and who those choices are making us become.

That movement seems to be woven into human existence itself.

But Why Should We Become?

And now I think we have reached the strangest question of all.

Why should I become anything?

Why should I become better rather than simply more effective?

Why should I become more loving?

Why should I become more compassionate?

Why should I become more truthful?

Why should I become more graceful?

Why should I become more whole?

We can give practical answers.

Because relationships work better.

Because society functions better.

Because people suffer less.

Because we are happier.

Because it produces better outcomes.

And all of those answers have something to say.

But they don’t quite answer the deeper question.

Why does better exist as a category at all?

Why does human life seem to have a direction?

Why do we experience ourselves as unfinished?

Why can I look at who I am today and sense that I am not yet who I could become?

Why does that possibility feel like something worth pursuing?

And perhaps most strangely of all:

Why do we seem to recognize that becoming more loving is not merely becoming different, but becoming better?

We began this journey by asking how human beings know.

Then we discovered that reality is intelligible.

We discovered that we seek meaning.

We discovered that we seek love.

We discovered that we recognize moral obligation.

And now we have discovered that we are creatures who seem to be oriented toward becoming.

We are not simply beings who exist.

We are beings who are always, in some sense, becoming.

And if that is true, then perhaps the deepest question is no longer:

What do we know?

Or even:

What should we do?

Perhaps the deeper question is:

What were we made to become?

That is a question I don’t think we can answer simply by looking harder at ourselves.

But I think we are finally ready to ask it.