In Latin, the term circare belonged to the hunting lexicon: it described the way a dog would move, tracing progressively wider circles around the places where the prey had been sighted. The verb ricercare (“to research” or “to search again”), by contrast, has an iterative value and indicates the act of repeated searching—hence attentive, careful, systematic, and aimed at completeness. Autoricercare (“self-researching”), finally, is a reflexive term and denotes the possibility of shifting the focus of investigation from the outside to the inside—that is, from perceived objects to the perceiving subject, as well as to the very mechanism of perception.

In other words, if research is a predominantly centrifugal movement, oriented “outward,” self-research is an essentially centripetal motion, directed “inward”: the circles, instead of expanding, progressively contract, with the intent of capturing the coveted prey that hides somewhere at the center, in our most intimate and profound core. It is there that our primary identity resides—what we truly are beyond illusory representations and the distorting filters produced by the ordinary mind.

What has been said symbolically summarizes the essence of self-research, that is, the process through which human beings, since the most ancient times, have attempted to lift a corner of the great veil: the mystery that envelops the existence of each of us. A mystery that can be condensed into a few fundamental questions, such as: Who and what am I, really? Where do I come from and where am I headed? Why am I on this planet, within this specific set of consciousnesses, in this particular historical period? Can I improve my condition, both inner and outer? Is there something beyond physical death? What is my evolutionary potential, and how can I realize it? Do all these questions make sense, and if so, to what extent is it possible to answer them?