The trilogy of being

Laurent Grenier, Canadian philosopher, author of the essay “Life Revisited: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Purpose of Existence” (SOLEDIT, January 2025).

Every individual is in fact a fully integrated trilogy of beings, merged into one: 1) the habitual self, which is our usual point of awareness and attachment, 2) the adaptable self, capable of acquiring new habits of thought and behavior in response to changes in our circumstances or for the sake of variety, and 3) the foundational self, which can be framed in religious or secular terms. It refers to the ultimate ground of being of which each individual is a transient and local incarnation, living in harmony or conflict with other transient and local incarnations.

As we age, all the challenges and losses we experience are opportunities to explore every aspect of the trilogy I just described. First, we are called to tap into the creative resources of our adaptable self to navigate these challenges and losses constructively. We still cherish the past, for what it was worth, but learn to let go and move on with some measure of peace and joy in our heart.

Finally, when death approaches and stares us in the face, we penetrate deeper below the surface of appearances to embrace the underlying reality within and beyond us, like an ocean wherein, alternately, waves rise and fall, time and again. This underlying reality—that science aims to formally grasp in terms of laws and principles, based on evidence—gives shape to everything and has always done so effortlessly.

At that level of reflection, we are one with the reality in question, which is foundational and timeless, and can appropriately be characterized as divine (without appealing to a tradition in particular), simply to acknowledge its supremacy in the order of things, as it transcends death and every other instance of transformation from one thing to another in the infinite course of universal evolution. This mental elevation represents a spiritual liberation that is transpersonal, fluid, and open onto an incredibly rich unknown.