others or to others. They will put a disagreeable feeling out of
sight with a rapidity which would seem to come from sheer fright
lest they should see and acknowledge themselves in their true guise.
Or they will acknowledge it to a certain extent, with a pleasure in
their own humility which increases the complacency in proportion.
This peace is not to be desired. With those who enjoy it, a true
knowledge of or friendship with others is as much out of the
question as a knowledge of themselves. And when it is broken or
interfered with in any way, the pain is as intense and real as the
peace was false.

The first step towards amicable relations with ourselves is to
acknowledge that we are living with a stranger. Then it sometimes
happens that through being annoyed by some one else we are enabled
to recognize similar disagreeable tendencies in ourselves of which
we were totally ignorant before.

As honest dealing with others always pays best in the end, so it is
in all relations with one's self. There are many times when to be
quite open with a friend we must wait to be asked. With ourselves no
such courtesy is needed. We can speak out and done with it, and the
franker we are, the sooner we are free. For, unlike other
companions, we can enjoy ourselves best when we are conspicuous only
by our own absence!

It is this constant persistence in clinging to ourselves that is
most in the way; it increases that crown of nervous troubles,
self-consciousness, and makes it quite impossible that we should
ever really know ourselves. If by all this, we are not ineffable
bores to ourselves, we certainly become so to other people.