The Self and the Identity of Experience

Speaking of ‘experience’ in terms of identity raises the question about the nature of experience. What does the word ‘experience’ really mean? What is the core meaning of experience? It may sound simple but considering the question more deeply exposes that the question can be answered in many different ways. The word ‘Identity’ is from Latin, and the meaning is ‘the same as’. So speaking of the ‘Identity of Experience’ means to consider and investigate different areas of ‘the-same-as’. This paper puts focus on experience with regard to what is called ‘the core-self’. The core-self is the creative and spontaneous part of the self, which means that a person will obtain his main energy here. So investigating experience in the light of the core-self means to figure out what kind of experience is useful for the core-self. Furthermore, experience supporting the core-self also has a certain overlap with experience supporting a person’s individual and social affiliation such as class, life stage, personality and learning style. But, an experience underpinning a person’s social class, for example, will not necessarily contribute to the core-self. On the contrary, belonging to a certain social class can be very oppressing for a person’s creativity. The paper will therefore give some concrete examples of how the core-self and the identity of experience fit together in different areas. On the theoretical background of Self Psychology developed by Heinz Kohut, R.D Laing, D. W. Winnicott and the Analytic Psychology by C. G. Jung, the paper will give examples from very different areas such as learning style (David Kolb), personality and life span development(C. G. Jung, Erik Erikson and Carl Rogers), and life philosophy (Ludvig Feilberg). The practical consequences for social work, pedagogy and teaching will be discussed.