The Developing Self: “Working on a Better Person”

The Developing Self identifies participants’ sense of their current selfhood as just one phase in their ongoing growth and self-improvement. The perspective of a Developing Self emerges through one’s resolution of his Confused Self as he begins to view his problems as opportunities for growth. Typically, this selfhood was expressed in relation to men’s goals and their desired future selves meaning that the Developing Self is largely defined by the temporal aspects of self that compare the current “me” to the old and future possible versions of “me” (McConnell, 2011). Furthermore, the Developing Self often encompassed a commitment to working on the self (Zigon, 2011). The Developing Self was unique from the Abjected and Confused Selves for while the latter were observed in the narratives of nearly all participants, only the more agentic men described their selfhoods in terms of the former.

The chronology of these first three selves was evident in Jason’s narration of his present self. Jason described his Abjected and Confused Selves from his past to situate his present, Developing Self. He explained, “I always thought that I was happy until I went through the jail system and discovered who I was up to then. [I] realized that it was just a happy face covering a whole bunch of crap.” Jason continued by defining his present self through his intention to obtain the goals that he had for his desired future self. “I’ve just been working towards a place where I can just feel good about myself and just be like everybody else,” he stated. Being like everybody

else for him meant to, “Feel good about their job, feel good about their life, feel good about work, and everything else.” Jason’s goal was to have what Zigon (2011) identified as a “normal life” where the desired ideal is to live between the extremes of poverty and wealth while

maintaining a life of responsibility and law abidance. Accordingly, Zigon defined normal persons as responsibilized subjects who are self-regulating and adhere to a moral code by limiting certain behaviours, emotions, thoughts, and relations. The Developing Self is the acquired subjectivity of being a responsibilized subject.

This subjectivity has two defining qualities. First, the Developing Self is a self-concept that is based upon progressive, ongoing growth, and is enabled by habitual self-reformation. Participants who exhibited this pattern held forward-looking orientations combined with images regarding the kind of person they would like to become. Kevin, for example, explained that, “I’ve only been in treatment for a few years. This is going to be a life long project.... I’m not building a house that’s going to be finished one day.” Chris viewed himself as being in “a state of change” where, “I’m really trying to work on who I am and... a lot of the problems that I’ve had in the past.” Chris, Kevin, and other men spoke of “working on the self” in a manner that suggests that they are a “self in progress” with an evolving personhood, thus exemplifying the changing nature of selfhood. “Working on the self” is a labour of one’s will to “enact an internal transformation of the self so as to allow for the fulfillment of certain socially and morally

expected behaviours” (Zigon, 2011, p. 110). SOTPs can elicit a new self-awareness and

subjectivity in willing participants that creates the foundation for moral habilitation via working on the self.

The second quality of the Developing Self is that it is directed by moral valuations of worth that inform one’s transformation. When Chris spoke of working on his self, he elaborated

upon what that meant for him: “I’m working for a better person, more well rounded and happy, and more satisfied [but] not in the unhealthy way. You know, not in the temporary satisfaction way.” Chris’s words echoed Taylor’s (1985) articulation of agency that places higher moral value on the decision to pursue long-term contentment over immediate, but potentially

counterproductive, satisfaction. In Chris’s example, it was more virtuous to deny or delay one’s immediate gratification in order to achieve the more valuable goals of a responsibilized subject. The moral influence of Mel’s ethical self-reformation was explicit. Mel was a Caucasian man on parole after having served the institutional portion of a life sentence. Although he had never been convicted of a sexual offence, he took a SOTP because he saw it as beneficial to some of his previous life patterns. When I asked him about the kind of person he would like to be in the future, he quickly replied, “I’d like to be more like Jesus.” I followed up on his reasoning. “Well that’s part of my spiritual thing,” Mel responded. “To be more like him. To be more loving, more caring, not... caught up in this materialistic, squash everybody, and walk over people for the buck” kind of society. “How is that different from the kind of the person you are now,” I asked? “Well it’s a growing process, growing and learning each day,” Mel replied. He went on to

describe how his favourite author of self-help books prescribed learning, loving, and laughing for a fulfilled life.

Instead of explicitly adopting an attitude of life-long work on the self, quite a few

participants took the perspective of having undergone a transformation from an old to a new self, as if they had made all of the changes they felt necessary to their lives. They directly linked beneficial changes within their selves to their prison or treatment experiences and frequently narrated their development in the language of an old and new self. Their desired future selves were limited to achieving the markers of a normal life. For example, Mathieu viewed himself as

“more social, more positive, [and] not as materialistic as before.” The social interactions of his old self were all computer-based and took place in the virtual world with a fictional online identity. “It was fake stuff,” he said. Mathieu’s transformation now included regular in-person social activities with friends from his support group. He claimed, “I prefer [real] life.... It’s more fun being me now than I used to be.” When it came to their desired future selves, many of these men expressed contentment with who they were in the present, rather than seeing their selves as Shane put it, “a little version” of his future self.

Consequently, there are two variations of the Developing Self. The first takes a more future-oriented perspective on one’s ongoing, continuous growth throughout his or her life. The second variation is more present-oriented and views the self as having achieved the level of self- reformation desired by the subject. The difference between these perspectives may be attributed to two factors. Three men who expressed selfhoods of ongoing moral striving – Chris, Shane, and Mel – identified fairly strongly with Christianity. As for Kevin, he problematized his

personhood as having a “deviant sexuality” to which he referred several times and expected to be a lifelong problem. These very different influences seemed to make the notion of ongoing self- work highly salient.

The Developing Self also identified small but significant changes for some participants. Todd and Dennis, both of whom had intellectual disabilities, experienced improvements to their self-esteem following completion of their most recent treatment programs. Both men had long histories of sexual offending and had attended treatment programs more than once. Todd’s sense of self-esteem came from meeting people who appreciated his company, which substantiates the value of positive human contact for theories of a relational self (Andersen & Chen, 2002; Tice & Baumeister, 2001).“Nobody has ever liked me that much,” Todd admitted. During and after his

treatment, “all these people [were] telling me what a good guy I am and I’m thinking to myself, ‘They can’t all be wrong or lying.’ So yeah, I see myself totally different from before I went to treatment.” Having someone compliment him “was totally new” for Todd. Both he and Dennis experienced improved self-concepts by developing the sense of mastery and pride in learning to self-regulate their thoughts and behaviours to avoid high-risk situations. “For [a] long time I always thought... I was no good for nothing,” Dennis said. He had difficulty articulating how he felt differently about himself and was only able to allude that he was more empowered to avoid problematic situations.

Not all development is progressive and the changes wrought through moral habilitation become highlighted when the Developing Self is contrasted with more regressive goal patterns. A small minority of participants desired to reclaim what they had lost with their sexual offence, which in itself is understandable when it comes to financial security, the respect of others, and self-esteem. However, Carl claimed that his past, present, and desired future self were all the same. “I really haven’t changed. I still help people, I [am] still very kind hearted, [and] willing to listen.... The only thing I have changed is to not be around kids as much anymore.... I’d still like to be a father again. That’s one thing I miss [and] if I do get remarried, I’d like to have one more kid.” Carl ascribed to an essentialized view of a core, stable, inner selfhood that problematized his ability to adapt to change. While some men have a progressive selfhood and talk about change and growth, Carl’s selfhood can be described as regressive in his desire to return to his previous state, largely I suspected because the role of “good father” is one of the few sources of self-esteem and identity that sustained him. His loss of this role explained why his desired future self was regressive and emulated what for him was a romanticized version of this previously

“happy” time in his life. Carl’s regression combined with his trouble with moving on demonstrated the importance of having multiple positive identities.