Good morning everyone! It’s Tuesday in America, and we’re getting after it with full thought bellies. To be honest, my thought waist is feeling a little bloated after where we left off. So today we’ll portion out our breakfast to maximize digestion.

For our main course today, we’ll be expanding on what we started yesterday; Augustine standing in the middle of his “not yet.” On the side, we’re going to really crack that crystal orb in your head (more on that later). For dessert, we’re handing out slices of Aquinas, who mindfully projects those ideas of Aristotle and Augustine. Bear with me, loosen your belt a notch, and pull up your seat. Thought Breakfast is served!

Yesterday we hammered down on Augustine’s “not yet” prayer; his realization that his will was divided between what he knew he should do and what he couldn’t let go of. This realization sparks the possibility for action. After realizing his soul is divided, Augustine goes further to understand exactly how it’s divided. That understanding puts one foot in the doorway to transformation.

Out of the frustration of “why can’t I do what I want to do?” comes the insight “Oh… it’s not that simple.” Here is where hesitation starts to lose in the tug-of-war between intention and action. You can’t fix what you don’t know is broken. You can’t align the pieces before opening the box.

Sigmund Freud draws a nice, modern, psychological picture of what’s going on here. What Augustine confessed as his divided will, Freud identified as a tug-of-war between the id (impulse) and the superego (internalized standards, conscience). The result of this battle, as Freud would put it, is an all-too-common internal dialogue. One voice in your head says go, the other says stay. One says do it, the other says don’t. Your ego sighs from the middle, begging the mind to make up its mind.

Plato also gives his two cents on the vision of the soul. Plato envisions the soul as a charioteer guided by two horses. One horse is trained and the other unruly. The charioteer has to manage to guide both horses at the same time. Augustine’s divided will and Freud’s tug-of-war are the chariot. The subjects of Augustine’s divided will, spiritual discipline and physical comfort, are the horses.

Modern psychology knows this very well. Yesterday, we touched on the aspect of cognitive dissonance (holding two conflicting beliefs at once). While we established that temporal discounting was the psychology behind “not yet,” we can say that this next stage is more aligned with cognitive dissonance. Realizing you have two conflicting wills, and standing in between them, creates a tension between what we believe and how we act. Note the humanity behind Augustine’s experience of this. We’re using fancy terms to define it, but Augustine confessed his broken will by way of his own personal crisis. This also trickles down into behavioral economics. Your “future” self wants discipline and your “now” self wants pleasure. Augustine just happened to express this to God instead of composing his own TED Talk.

Sometimes we can feel like two different people inside ourselves not because we’re broken, but because we’re intellectual beings and with that comes competing motivations. Your “now” self that wants comfort and pleasure isn’t evil. Your “future” self that wants discipline and growth isn’t always right, either. These two sides of you coexist. Instant gratification is what keeps you alive, or else you wouldn’t know it’s time to eat or breathe. Motivation to do better comes with maturity and, quite frankly, the realization that the short-term hits of happiness aren’t enough. Desire and self-control are simply dance partners that frequently step on each other’s toes.

Augustine doesn’t condemn himself after realizing his will was divided; he just observes. That honest observation is what helped him (and will help us) move toward wholeness.

To master yourself, you first must admit that you are not just one self.

This is that crystal orb we’re cracking open. Not to claim the self is permanently broken, but to admit the paradoxical truth: that understanding your own internal division in the first place is what unifies you in the long run.

Once Augustine stopped pretending his will was simple or singular, he discovered that he has the freedom to choose which part of him gets to take the wheel. This isn’t a direct transformation, but an awakening that shows transformation is possible.

Accepting this as a paradoxical reality is the “finally now” that comes after the “not yet.”

For today’s Book Nook, we’ll pass the plate over to Thomas Aquinas. St. Augustine’s portrayal of the divided will is a phenomenal piece of work, but it is very emotional. Rightfully so, this is Augustine’s expression of his own internal crisis, and the emotion makes the lesson very relatable. However, it is good to step outside of the emotional attachment to really understand what’s going on in your head, logically. Aquinas, inspired by St. Augustine and Aristotle, helps us a bit with this.

Aquinas argues that the will is always predisposed to good. He says we never choose evil as evil, but rather we choose it under the guise of good (bonum apparens). This brings us directly from Augustine’s “my two wills conflict” to Aquinas’ “but they can be redirected.”

Aquinas says, “The will is borne toward good universally; it does not desire evil except in so far as it is thought to be good in some respect.” (Summa Theologiae I-II Q.8 a.1)

This is a beautiful and compassionate redefining of human weakness. We don’t do bad because we love it; we do bad because our inner idea of Good is confused, divided, or both.

“The will always chooses what the mind presents as good.”

If the will always chooses what the mind presents as good, then it is not about changing the will; it is about changing your perception.

Munch on that for today. We’ve laid the foundation; we recognized the divided will concept, and today we explored why that split exists. Tomorrow through Friday, we’ll learn how the will can become unified.

Have a great day and come back tomorrow for another steaming hot plate of Thought Breakfast!

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Remember to stay mindful, smell the flowers, and take it easy.

Chef Ricky - Thought Breakfast

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