[Avodah] Self-awareness as a Middah

[Yonatan Kaganoff]

I have been wondering about the following question and am now posting 
it to the Aishdas society to see if anyone has any thoughts on the 
matter.
   
  Is emotional or psychological self-awareness (and I would also 
include being in touch with one's emotional/feelings/etc.) considered a good 
middah to be acquired like humility, faith, not being angry, jealous, 
resentful, or envious, etc.?
   
  Or could it be considered like a preparation, a hechsher for working 
on a middah, like a hechsher mitzvah?
   
  Or, as a third option, it could be seen a valuable in making a person 
into a better or happier person.  And with self-awareness, one can 
better be an ovaid hashem.  (But is this just another way of saying a 
hechsher middah?)
   
  I know many people who have self-awareness, but haven't used it to be 
better people, but, on the contrary, have used it to justify their bad 
middos.  
   
  On the other hand, I have met people who lack self-awareness, but 
this has not stopped them from working on their middos, and being very 
good people.
   
  Does anyone have any thoughts on this question?
   
  Yonatan Kaganoff
       
---------------------------------
Ahhh...imagining that irresistible "new car" smell?
 Check outnew cars at Yahoo! Autos.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avodah-aishdas.org/attachments/20070423/7b123e61/attachment-0001.htm>