JW_Rogue
I do not agree with what you said: “Perhaps there is no true self and self actualization is just a grandiose myth.”
Your true self is more meaningful (like the software of your computer) than your body (like hardware of your computer). Bringing home computer hardware, and dispensing with the software as unwanted makes no sense. I too used to think like you before. But once I tried to go beyond thoughts and asked the question who is creating these thoughts, it made a big difference, as Tolle puts it. “The moment you start watching the thinker, a higher level of consciousness becomes activated. You then begin to realize that there is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought, that thought is only a tiny aspect of that intelligence. You also realize that all the things that truly matter — beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace — arise from beyond the mind. You begin to awaken.” (The Power of Now, Ekhart Tolle) It is from this “vast realm of intelligence” that dreams are designed. Many scientific discoveries (such as Periodic Table, Aromatic Chemistry, Insulin …) have their roots in dreams. (http://dreamtraining.blogspot.com/2010/12/inventions-that-came-in-dreams-largest.html) Even Einstein’s great invention of Theory of Relativity is connected with two dreams he had. (Einstein: A Life by Denis Brian p.159)
When I was taught in the school that the left side of the brain performs tasks that have to do with logic, such as in science and mathematics whereas the right hemisphere performs tasks that have do with creativity and the arts, I was convinced that brain activity is much more than its material components called 100 billion neurons, and man is made in the image of God which explains why we have a subjective experience and why we love truth, benevolence and beauty….etc.