KEY TO FREEDOM: KNOW YOURSELF, OR KNOW THE TRUTH? By Felix Nyerhovwo Jarikre

Socrates said: 'Man, know thyself.' 
Since then, philosophers, neuroscientists, motivational speakers etc have embarked on a long exhaustive journey of exhortation to cajole men and women everywhere  to know themselves. Another word for this quest is called self-discovery.
The proposition is that you must know or discover yourself before you can master yourself and your environment. Sounds enticing, doesn't it? Yes.

But when you think about it, it's a quest of futility and self-conceit. 
That has not stopped men and women everywhere  from attempting to discover what stuff their characters are  made of. They are eager to discover what they are capable of. How to  maximize their potentials is a favourite topic. Learning and getting in tune with their passions is an adventure they refuse to disdain. If they don't find out what they are afraid of, how can they summon the courage from the ether to march forward and destroy their fears?
They must find out in minute details their likes, their loves, what their sexual preferences are, not excluding their sexual proclivities.
What are the ingredients necessary to drive their ambitions to the point of fulfilment. They are  told what must be done to self-actualize.
Having to undertake a personal SWOT analysis (your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) cannot be sneered at!  It comes highly recommended. After all, Socrates decreed: 'Man, know thyself.' Sigmund Freud made it fashionable in the name of psychoanalysis. 

Self-analysis is in! Even some of your pastors in the name of emotional  intelligence have told you that you can't neglect self-analysis. How dare anyone to rebuke the concept  of self-knowledge?

Now let's come to brass tack. Is there anywhere in the New Testament where Christ commanded His followers to KNOW themselves? NONE !
He asserted that with your  knowledge of the truth, your freedom cannot be revoked. 

In John 8:32, He says: And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.

For you to escape enslavement or limitations, you must learn the truth. For you to escape oppression and being dominated by another man, your resolve to learn the truth cannot be questioned. 
When you have knowledge of the truth, you are automatically released from being coerced or constrained in choice and actions.
When you have learned the truth, your liberation from slavery or restraint by the power of another man is inevitable. 

Clearly, Christ never suggested or counseled His followers to embark on any self-analysis. It's unprofitable and deceitful to self- analyse yourself. Rather He commanded His followers to concentrate their efforts in pursuing the knowledge of the truth.  That way, they can come into the sort of freedom that cannot be revoked or squashed by another man or power. 

Knowing yourself is never an antidote against victimization from another person. Yet when you know the truth, you can easily smash victimization from another man.

The harsh reality is that it is futile trying to know yourself as the heart of man is defaulted on the position of desperate wickedness. The heart of man is a cauldron of unmitigated evil.
Jeremiah 17:9 says: The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: WHO CAN KNOW IT?

No man can know the depth of the deceit and desperate wickedness of his heart...