We have all met people with a certain presence. Individuals with an aura that is neither mystical nor supernatural – it just is. Like a powerful force in the relationship and tension between our inner self and our life energies. To meet such a person is to remember. Referring to the Jewish philosopher and author Martin Buber, for his thesis of dialogical existence , as described in his book: “I and Thou” – we can say:
“When my EGO opens toward another’s YOU.
A meeting occurs. Something new is created.”
The concept of a meeting is key to understanding the depth of Buber’s insight. Based on experience, we can draw imagery from the miracle of life – where something entirely new arises in the encounter between the male sperm cell and the female egg. The naked meeting is always innovative. After such a meeting, the world is never the same. Something happens. Something new emerges. The experience leaves its imprint and changes us.
The secret behind this transformation of impressions, information and knowledge is that what you experience in a meeting with another – Thou – is transformed into feelings that shape how my I (EGO) relates to the world.
Buber explained the dialog using the word pairs of Ich-Du and Ich-Es to categorise the modes of consciousness, interaction, and being through which an individual engages with other individuals, and all reality in general.
When this happens, for example in an employee conversation, we call it an open and learning process.
Open because we can never predict the outcome.
Learning because something new is added to what already is.
Process because the result depends on the interaction and relationship between:
My own EGO and the others THOU
Where “IT” represents the coping filter of experience-based reflexes, values, customs, traditions, and others’ perceptions.
The weaker our need for “coping,” the stronger the meeting between EGO and THOU becomes. In people who dare coaching or renewal, IT becomes small and EGO becomes large.
But the creative power and personal presence that many admire in such individuals also make them more vulnerable.
Because such openness leaves raw feelings and psychological wounds exposed. Growth, which many are not trained to handle, requires courage – not just in being seen, but in seeing yourself.
SGL basic grounding is
only personal experience
Martin Buber was not interested in ideas,
and would not discuss God,
only relationships to God.
Real communication between living human
beings will be the new success factor in the age of AI.
Machines will be able to answer almost anything
and simulate nearly everything—except the raw, genuine,
and truthful encounter between
your own EGO and the other’s YOU.
But before this encounter can take place, the message—
the words, the content—must pass through the filter
of attitudes, culture, life experience, and opinions, which the philosopher Martin Buber called the “IT.”
A simplified way to understand the “IT” is to compare it to the lens of your sunglasses. These lenses come in various shades, each coloring what you see with a yellow, brown, blue, or green tint. In this way, the sunglasses affect your perception of reality, regardless of how reality actually is.
Success in the new AI-driven culture will depend on our ability to remove the “IT” filter—so we can meet the real and simple humanity of one person to another.
Reflection task:
Try to describe at least three core values that your EGO—regardless of the situation—will communicate uncensored to another’s YOU.
