Ego question I would love help with......

[bflare]

My knowledge on the ego is that it is our conditioned false self. It is the identification that we have given ourselves. For example, I am Tony, I am an engineer, I don’t like winter etc etc. Hope I am correct so far? The ego lives in the past & future & finds it hard to live in the present?
One question that I am struggling with is the following:
We have a set of limiting beliefs from our childhood etc that hold us back on certain things. If one of those limiting beliefs is that people don’t like us then we will tend to attract that from people. So when someone says something to us that we perceive as hurtful we immediately feel the emotion of hurt or & maybe the physical feeling of pain. Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this? It feels as if we want the negativity & the pain but this would be insane. Is it actually the ego that wants this negativity to feed on it therefore carry on its existence?

Hope I have not lost anyone haha.

Thanks,

Tony.

[DreamKey]

My knowledge on the ego is that it is our conditioned false self. It is the identification that we have given ourselves. For example, I am Tony, I am an engineer, I don’t like winter etc etc. Hope I am correct so far? The ego lives in the past & future & finds it hard to live in the present?


Hi Tony. You could think of ego as a conceptual self referencing framework that formulates the foundation for identification with the conditioned self, or with conditioned thinking. In this sense there is a degree of unconsciousness implicit in the word ego. This would be the ego that is obsessed with past and future.

Others use ego to point directly toward the conditioned self, without taking into account degrees of unconsciousness. In this sense, everyone has an ego, or everyone is an ego.


Then some others use ego to point toward self interested desires. They'll differential between desires of the heart and ego driven desires. All frameworks possess some utility, but none are ultimately true in their own right.

So when someone says something to us that we perceive as hurtful we immediately feel the emotion of hurt or & maybe the physical feeling of pain. Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this? It feels as if we want the negativity & the pain but this would be insane. Is it actually the ego that wants this negativity to feed on it therefore carry on its existence?

Hope I have not lost anyone haha.

Thanks,

Tony.

In the unconscious state emotions that are not fully felt can leave a residue on the human aura. In this sense when hurt arises in the moment there is some past pain being carried along with it. While the initial pain, and even the trigger to that pain can be observed, and linked, you may also notice a momentum to that pain coupled to a tendency or desire to keep the pain at bay. If you want to feel pain and don't want to at the same time, you're looking at a split in your energetic field. These splits are always unconscious. (although to say anyone wants emotional hurt can be a misnomer. sometimes, pain is conditioned to arise)

Through noticing splits in thinking/energy, the splitting dynamic (wanting to feel and wanting to block at the same time) is made conscious, which will lead to a release of the energy, which in the short term may mean feeling things more completely, such as emotional hurt. Egos come hard wired to resist these types of feelings, so you may expect an ebb and flow as you're gaining consciousness of localized energy dynamics.

It seems like you've already gained a fairly high degree of consciousness of what's taking place, but from the ego's perspective this can be experienced as a loss of control. If the question is, how do I get control of what's going on, higher consciousness isn't the answer. If the question is, how do I surrender control and become more fully present, consciousness is the doorway...

[vespa68]

You cannot control the ego, only by facing it we can understand this and then move beyond this. It is the programming that creates the issue yes. For example a sibling can tell you when you that no one likes you when you are young and then yes there would be faced situations where someone would not be nice and we would be hurt. It can also be an exaggeration, the person would be in a bad mood etc.. In fact this is more complicated than it seems and hard to explain here. But basically you have to face the negative emotions behind the programming, you cannot rationalize it. We tend to face things during spiritual growth periods and can get to a certain level .I have definitely been through a lot of this but have a hard time explaining the full context that I understand. In other words we are here in 3d for a reason, we have certain issues to get past to certain degrees. We have certain people in our lives who set the programming. We have certain levels of consciousness in our lives as well. When we become more conscious of our issues/ programming we have more of it so we face it and have less of it.

[vespa68]

@Dreamkey. The person in fact needs to get to higher consciousness by facing the hurt over and over again at different levels. Being more conscious each time. There are many levels of being conscious of the same issue. Once you get to the higher consciousness of the issue you let it go or at least get to a more comfortable level.

[Lorelyen]

My knowledge on the ego is that it is our conditioned false self. It is the identification that we have given ourselves.
May well be the case but it's the person's front that they use to negotiate their way through their days and society generally, learning to play roles to get the best they can out of situations. It's certainly driven by a real self that has to be modified and adapted to deal with encounters - simply because society is a collection of individual egos all wanting the same thing. Conventions like employment, services, families, come with expected behaviours, hence roles. Effectively we learn to act.
Ego, to me, is a social process, a way of actualising identity in situations. Some are good at it, some aren't. They can learn but people will always be successful in their social aims in some situations and less so in others. Strengths and weaknesses...a strength in one situation could be a weakness in another, etc.

One question that I am struggling with is the following:
We have a set of limiting beliefs from our childhood etc that hold us back on certain things. If one of those limiting beliefs is that people don’t like us then we will tend to attract that from people. So when someone says something to us that we perceive as hurtful we immediately feel the emotion of hurt or & maybe the physical feeling of pain. Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this? It feels as if we want the negativity & the pain but this would be insane. Is it actually the ego that wants this negativity to feed on it therefore carry on its existence? All true and often comes down to expectations arising from needs at various levels, whether ours or those of others, given the situation under review. It isn't so hard to rationalise if you "love people generally" appreciate they have struggles, likes and dislikes, and needs that may not match ours.

We're all prisoners of our childhood but we learn to stand on our own feet. The search for our Selves (the real ones) takes us through a learning process about ourselves, the culture we live in, and can appreciate people for what they are.

It could also be explained in other ways, like learning to interpret signs and not deliberately misinterpreting them to fit in with our own emotional needs etc.

I think this old Freudian idea is overplayed. Everyone has an ego. You can't get rid of it without losing your identity/identities in the milieu in which you live. We can refine it ad lib (partly what spiritual development is about) but it's always there.
As we start to glimpse our Selfhoods and move toward them we become more deeply aware of the core of our being and can trace through some of what we thought were natural responses based on experiences but now we develop an awareness of how those experiences affect the way that "core" leads to our behavioural reactions, emotions and rationale. And we can change how the processing works.

Just my views.

...

[DreamKey]

@Dreamkey. The person in fact needs to get to higher consciousness by facing the hurt over and over again at different levels. Being more conscious each time. There are many levels of being conscious of the same issue. Once you get to the higher consciousness of the issue you let it go or at least get to a more comfortable level.

Welp, it isn't actually the person that gets to higher consciousness. The person is unconscious until it's noticed and made conscious. In this sense to distinguish between lower and higher consciousness would be a misnomer. You are consciousness, and you don't need to get higher.

With that said, obviously you can be more conscious today than you were yesterday. Minds can become more conscious, and I applaud that. During the becoming conscious process, you won't necessarily need to feel the hurt over and over. You may notice some emotional wounds have roots that run deep in the unconscious, and thus these wounds and the pain associated with them can tie into various emotional issues in waking life.

I am a fan of uprooting 'causal emotions', which is the unresolved pain and conflict that brings more pain and hurt, and alters the point of attraction in value degrading ways. Causal emotions can release in a sitting, depending on the conditioning of the person. Someone with a lot of blocked energy can take years to fully heal. It really depends on earnestness, willingness, courage, etc.

[DreamKey]

May well be the case but it's the person's front that they use to negotiate their way through their days and society generally, learning to play roles to get the best they can out of situations. It's certainly driven by a real self that has to be modified and adapted to deal with encounters - simply because society is a collection of individual egos all wanting the same thing. Conventions like employment, services, families, come with expected behaviours, hence roles. Effectively we learn to act.
Ego, to me, is a social process, a way of actualising identity in situations. Some are good at it, some aren't. They can learn but people will always be successful in their social aims in some situations and less so in others. Strengths and weaknesses...a strength in one situation could be a weakness in another, etc.

All true and often comes down to expectations arising from needs at various levels, whether ours or those of others, given the situation under review. It isn't so hard to rationalise if you "love people generally" appreciate they have struggles, likes and dislikes, and needs that may not match ours.

We're all prisoners of our childhood but we learn to stand on our own feet. The search for our Selves (the real ones) takes us through a learning process about ourselves, the culture we live in, and can appreciate people for what they are.

It could also be explained in other ways, like learning to interpret signs and not deliberately misinterpreting them to fit in with our own emotional needs etc.

I think this old Freudian idea is overplayed. Everyone has an ego. You can't get rid of it without losing your identity/identities in the milieu in which you live. We can refine it ad lib (partly what spiritual development is about) but it's always there.

...

So we could say before realization you are your ego (identified with it), while after you just wear it, like a costume to a party or suttin.:icon_rr:

[Lynn]

Hello

I had a childhood that should well have held me back in by beliefs and in where I went with things. I had many things to over come and move past in what and whom I am in this life and worked on the past lives I have too had. I was blessed early on in childhood to be shy and quiet and inwards not EGO driven or the Divine only knows what a mess I might well have landed in. Being that I could "read" anyone, I could talk to the non living, and I could use things to do things, I was blessed to be shy. It was not until I was 13 that I started to rebel some first from the Anglican family faith that could not give me answers, only child never talk on such things, as a reply. Never fitting in with school but knowing the answers and so wanting to participate at times but too shy. At 16 I was ready to leave life, and intervention came, again the EGO was there but not in full play, I was in that experiment stage of life. In a relationship at 18 with an abusive man, I spent 33 years there on a growth path. This is where EGO comes in, it is your survival place at times, that force that is there to drive you forwards and too protect you. It also is there to deal out the life path issues you have to face up to, a Near Death Event at 21 set me on the positive path of doing good in whom I am and not using the power of the dark that is out there.

There is a power in that "Dark Side" as it is in so many movies we see, and I so related to it with the Star War's movies and with Luke and Darth Vader his Father.....there is a pull there.

I do not know if we attract to people that do not like us, more maybe we attract them to learn something from, to learn at times to get along. I feel that we can learn from all situations we are put in the path of, if we learn not to fight. Yes we are emotional beings, and in that we can feel hurt on many levels, but we do not have to let our self LIVE in that space of hurt.

It is hard to let go of things and situations at times, we tend to at times get in what I see as the Hamster Wheel of life, as the hamster in his/her cage will go round and round tire and get off, we do not get off our wheel. We do not see that we attract the wrong people in our path or our EGO wants to win something against them.

I look at me in a bad relationship for 33 years, and how that EGO of me so thought I could "fix" things drove me to stay the course. Too here the childhood teachings come in you give your virginity to a man your his for life, til death do you part. Well there again the EGO could have played a role there with me, I so could have taken him out.....death.

We have a good teacher in our EGO if we learn to break it down and see it more on the life path of lessons and not on the I am better than you childhood way its often explained to us.

We can feed off of negativity and do a lot with negative energy, I know this well, we too can do a lot of good for others in understanding how that negative side of us effects us and grow from how others over come that darker place.

Look at life if there were no conflicts, no struggles, everything just flowed would that not be a dull existence ? It is not more fun on life's path to have a hard life struggle you face and over come it ? To claim the win for yourself is a wonderful feeling.

Yet when one win's be willing to have again that negativity show its face with the EGO of jealousy or envy of others. We tend a times to think the "Grass is greener on the other side of the fence". I remember reading my kids The Three Billy Goats Gruff and then saying that the Troll's EGO lost in the end when he was butted off the bridge. Yet was the grass greener on the other side ? Or was it just a battle of wills to get to the other side ?


Lynn



We have a set of limiting beliefs from our childhood etc that hold us back on certain things. If one of those limiting beliefs is that people don’t like us then we will tend to attract that from people. So when someone says something to us that we perceive as hurtful we immediately feel the emotion of hurt or & maybe the physical feeling of pain. Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this? It feels as if we want the negativity & the pain but this would be insane. Is it actually the ego that wants this negativity to feed on it therefore carry on its existence?

[vespa68]

Welp, it isn't actually the person that gets to higher consciousness. The person is unconscious until it's noticed and made conscious. In this sense to distinguish between lower and higher consciousness would be a misnomer. You are consciousness, and you don't need to get higher.

With that said, obviously you can be more conscious today than you were yesterday. Minds can become more conscious, and I applaud that. During the becoming conscious process, you won't necessarily need to feel the hurt over and over. You may notice some emotional wounds have roots that run deep in the unconscious, and thus these wounds and the pain associated with them can tie into various emotional issues in waking life.

I am a fan of uprooting 'causal emotions', which is the unresolved pain and conflict that brings more pain and hurt, and alters the point of attraction in value degrading ways. Causal emotions can release in a sitting, depending on the conditioning of the person. Someone with a lot of blocked energy can take years to fully heal. It really depends on earnestness, willingness, courage, etc.


I am talking about facing oneself in a specific way. I do this with intense energy work with clients who are very advanced. However someone can also just feel their emotions in their heart and meditate on it. It does take someone who is very conscious to begin with and who is going through spiritual growth. Depending on someones level, they will experience the pain again and again at different layers and they absolutely go to higher consciousness eventually. If you face your pain at one level you have already gone higher in consciousness but there are many more layers to go through and you get higher every time.

[DreamKey]

I am talking about facing oneself in a specific way. I do this with intense energy work with clients who are very advanced. However someone can also just feel their emotions in their heart and meditate on it. It does take someone who is very conscious to begin with and who is going through spiritual growth. Depending on someones level, they will experience the pain again and again at different layers and they absolutely go to higher consciousness eventually. If you face your pain at one level you have already gone higher in consciousness but there are many more layers to go through and you get higher every time.

That's what I meant by becoming conscious. The cause of suffering is identification with the mind, identification with the person, which is an unconscious thing. It is experienced as a split in energy and the delusion that one can control one's thinking/feeling/experience, as if one is one's mind. So by becoming conscious we could also say consciousness is unbecoming the person, and that is spiritual healing.

In this way the person isn't going to higher levels of consciousness, consciousness is becoming less identified with the layers of unconsciousness from the person's life. This may seem like a distinction with no difference but the idea that someone is ascending planes of consciousness to reach the summit of Mt. Woo Woo leaves a sense of doership in the becoming conscious process that is likely to prevent loss of identification with the mind, or guarantee more suffering.

At the same time, your entirely human approach to the subject is appreciated. Facing pain and spiritual healing can be like peeling an onion, so I don't have any real big issues with anything you're saying.

[Lightwaves]

Whether negative or positive the allure of the ego can be strong. The nice emotions and the negative emotions are all wrapped up together in a personalized identity. It's not necessarily that negative emotions are craved I feel. I feel it's the ego itself that is craved. Why? Why do we become drawn into the ego even though it brings us suffering? That is a brilliant question.

I feel we are habituated to be intoxicated by personal identity. If you have ever had an allergic reaction or had hives for some reason you may know they really itch! It's sort of like that I think. The more we scratch the stronger the itch becomes -- the stronger the allure. The less we scratch the egoic itch the less and less intoxicated by things we are. If we can get that foothold outside of ego and hold it the allure decreases.

[guthrio]

My knowledge on the ego is that it is our conditioned false self. It is the identification that we have given ourselves. For example, I am Tony, I am an engineer, I don’t like winter etc etc. Hope I am correct so far? The ego lives in the past & future & finds it hard to live in the present?
One question that I am struggling with is the following:
We have a set of limiting beliefs from our childhood etc that hold us back on certain things. If one of those limiting beliefs is that people don’t like us then we will tend to attract that from people. So when someone says something to us that we perceive as hurtful we immediately feel the emotion of hurt or & maybe the physical feeling of pain. Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this? It feels as if we want the negativity & the pain but this would be insane. Is it actually the ego that wants this negativity to feed on it therefore carry on its existence?

Hope I have not lost anyone haha.

Thanks,

Tony.

Tony,

You ask, "Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this?"

Consider that the very same muscles one uses to "hold on tight to beliefs", so to speak....work equally well to let those "long-held" beliefs go....by your choice, by your hand.

True power is not in vigorously holding Truth (as some egoic possession)....

.....but in be-holding Truth as a gift so wonderful that you would joyously share it with any and all at anytime so they could feel as wonderful as you do !!

Choose to "be-leaveing" those constraining beliefs behind.

After all, it's only your power that holds them....and your power that releases them. :smile:

Ego acts as if dawn is separate from itself....."I observe that"

Spirit knows Itself as every dawn.....silently.

Be-hold how one's Spirit rises as dawning Truth, here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhVIllCYjd0 Appalachian Sunrise by Gary Remal Malkin

[DreamKey]

Whether negative or positive the allure of the ego can be strong. The nice emotions and the negative emotions are all wrapped up together in a personalized identity. It's not necessarily that negative emotions are craved I feel. I feel it's the ego itself that is craved. Why? Why do we become drawn into the ego even though it brings us suffering? That is a brilliant question.

I feel we are habituated to be intoxicated by personal identity. If you have ever had an allergic reaction or had hives for some reason you may know they really itch! It's sort of like that I think. The more we scratch the stronger the itch becomes -- the stronger the allure. The less we scratch the egoic itch the less and less intoxicated by things we are. If we can get that foothold outside of ego and hold it the allure decreases.

I'm not sure if I would say the ego can be craved, but if you're talking about craving ego gratification then I would agree.

The issue with the ego, if we're talking about thought identification, is that there is a dynamic which embeds the identification. Until this dynamic is made conscious, the layers of identification, compensation mechanisms, and self seeking loops roll out and get more complex. The dynamics stay the same, but the emotional coils and threads of identity can get tied into all sorts of desires, fears, and experiences, some associated with past, some with future.

It is the unconsciousness prevalent in the conceptual framework that perpetuates suffering. The present moment is resisted as a projection of the resistance going on internally. This externalization is a form of unconscious resolution, but it must be performed repeatedly because the core issue, unconsciousness, is not being addressed.

In this sense the ego is craved, or more pointedly experiences sought/resisted, because of lack of noticing of how the mind not only creates negative feelings, but also a mechanism to avoid them. In many ways, that mechanism is ego itself.

[DreamKey]

Tony,

You ask, "Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this?"

Consider that the very same muscles one uses to "hold on tight to beliefs", so to speak....work equally well to let those "long-held" beliefs go....by your choice, by your hand.


I would not say beliefs are let go by choice. I would say limiting beliefs formulate unconsciously, and with consciousness of the forces that keep them in place, the beliefs are spontaneously let go, without anyone doing anything.

This is all about noticing beliefs, and nothing at all about doing anything with them. Of course inquiry, using logic to pierce and probe, can allow the beliefs to be noticed. Probe beliefs from the inside, notice beliefs from the outside. Point being that what you are is a noticer, and not the ego, not the belief.

[firstandlast]

There is a part of you that does desire to suffer, but that which you have no context to understand your own desire for pain-- Thus desire seems to be the root of pain, but that the word makes what is a pleasure appear as fright; that there is one will, but that the words distort appearances so that the same will can appear to be pushed or pulled; and this is because our meaning can be expressed in multiple ways, but that each way means a different experience in form--

So that words hide our desire, by the experience that conceals the meaning; but that meaning already is, but without complete context that meaning is not apparent; so that when we find meaning, we do not realize we have found another word, which is the light-- And meaning which is the emptiness when it isn't approached by spirit; so that people continue to be materialistic thinking they are without material, but that they do not know creations intent, and so their own intent is distorted in definition because you do not know your own intent in your greater intent of all--

So, it isn't healing that occurs, because you have thought yourself harmed; but that an identity occurs but that identity is of an order that appears as something different and opposite when we talk about ascension which is real; but that it was made to appear hard and the longest process, so that you might not feel so distraught knowing that there is no spiritual process; and that such ascension was a change in identity in a manner that appeared greater than death, but that it is alive; and such one only needed approval by necessity in order to go beyond suffering--

So that, unless all the world is alive; and that life is the premise-- That you exist in the opposite of an ego, and that is someone else's idea; whom hides your own will to allow such to be that way--

This is a dream, but that this is also life-- But that no one has found unity, only understood the union; but that no one has been dualistic or had a self to have an ego, and this should be apparent; because duality would work if we had acted separately, but that we acted united-- And love cannot exist where no one can understand what they love, and that no one can be loved when unity is the truth, because when the order of relations is forcing everyone under the same law, that different people cannot be understood differently when acting the same.. so that in order for harmony to exist, people must act as different as they can, so that we might finally see who it is that we might love--

[Lorelyen]

So we could say before realization you are your ego (identified with it), while after you just wear it, like a costume to a party or suttin.:icon_rr:

You know, that's a vastly more succinct way of saying it. You play roles when encountering other people which is as good as you say, wearing a costume. You'll often hear people talk about themselves or others "playing their part."

You sometimes hear a saying that illustrates situations in which someone has choices of what role to play. "If I put my (name the function) hat on for a moment...." i.e. deviating from their initial role. Or "If I can be devil's advocate for a moment" when wanting deliberately to introduce an alternative view in discussion.

Point is, after the realisation / expansion of awareness, you know what your ego is doing.

Thank you for hacking out all the unnecessary verbiage.

[Lorelyen]

Whether negative or positive the allure of the ego can be strong. The nice emotions and the negative emotions are all wrapped up together in a personalized identity. It's not necessarily that negative emotions are craved I feel. I feel it's the ego itself that is craved. Why? Why do we become drawn into the ego even though it brings us suffering? That is a brilliant question.

I feel we are habituated to be intoxicated by personal identity. If you have ever had an allergic reaction or had hives for some reason you may know they really itch! It's sort of like that I think. The more we scratch the stronger the itch becomes -- the stronger the allure. The less we scratch the egoic itch the less and less intoxicated by things we are. If we can get that foothold outside of ego and hold it the allure decreases.

Without it, in the eyes of almost everyone, you couldn't be identified, thus you couldn't be acknowledged and may arouse suspicion among others who "wouldn't know what to make of her/him." On very rare occasions your real Self can shine though and be the identity it is - and of course it sometimes shines through in acts that require no acknowledgement - even if there is one it is insignificant to you aside from acknowledging the transaction is over, possibly.

I don't think the ego itself is craved. It's wanting to be acknowledged and liked that are most often craved and people wrangle with how to twist their outward behaviour, appearance, etc (their front/ego) to be an identity that achieves that. Once you find "self" that may cease to be relevant. So it is to me.

...

[Lorelyen]

There is a part of you that does desire to suffer, but that which you have no context to understand your own desire for pain-- Thus desire seems to be the root of pain, but that the word makes what is a pleasure appear as fright; that there is one will, but that the words distort appearances so that the same will can appear to be pushed or pulled; and this is because our meaning can be expressed in multiple ways, but that each way means a different experience in form--
That may be true for some but I forward myself as an exception, converting desire to striving - which ins't attempting to escape pain or suffering; instead to achieving the (if you like) goal. In a limited technical sense, suffering is sometimes good so you can appreciate that others can go through parallel experiences (that is, although they will not be experiencing the same as you, you can appreciate their plight by the symptoms you can recognise and relate to).

So that words hide our desire, by the experience that conceals the meaning; but that meaning already is, but without complete context that meaning is not apparent; so that when we find meaning, we do not realize we have found another word, which is the light-- And meaning which is the emptiness when it isn't approached by spirit; so that people continue to be materialistic thinking they are without material, but that they do not know creations intent, and so their own intent is distorted in definition because you do not know your own intent in your greater intent of all--
Words are all we have to convey information. They are often poor signifiers open to misinterpretation; and can never describe our experiences, intellectualise them as we might try. Ways exist to broaden how we can express our experiences which doesn't mean that others will assimilate the message in the way intended. It doesn't devalue words completely as some creators can lift them out of the realm of information language into a sort of metalanguage. I get what you say but cannot align with the way you say it.

So, it isn't healing that occurs, because you have thought yourself harmed; but that an identity occurs but that identity is of an order that appears as something different and opposite when we talk about ascension which is real; but that it was made to appear hard and the longest process, so that you might not feel so distraught knowing that there is no spiritual process; and that such ascension was a change in identity in a manner that appeared greater than death, but that it is alive; and such one only needed approval by necessity in order to go beyond suffering--
This is moving into the realm of belief that is entirely private.. Ascension real? For those that believe in it but it isn't universally shared. It's one way of offering hope.

I really think we place too much emphasis on what ego might be rather than concentrate on getting to the core beyond it which allows us awareness of the mechanics that give us a frontal identity. Ego is a Freudian construct useful if we have need to use his model of "how people are". I don't see it the same way. There's a continuum from Self to our behavioural front. It's workings are probably the same for us all. We have to adjust to our milieu to be able to survive, thus we learn, assimilate our experiences of day to day interactions integrated with our needs and through inspirational channels our desires and aims. Some aspects of self seem universal which may not accord with experiences of some interactions but gradually we learn what programs to call to deal with what situations or how to avoid them. That, to me, makes it process not a static thing called ego or identity. Our identity is what others experience of us.

So that, unless all the world is alive; and that life is the premise-- That you exist in the opposite of an ego, and that is someone else's idea; whom hides your own will to allow such to be that way-- Not sure what you're trying to say here - the opposite of ego? Can you place that in Freud's model?
Getting to soul needs someone to plunge into their Mysteries and that isn't easy for most as they have to abandon ego and expand their minds beyond outer reality. Without preparation the disorientation can be frightening!! People can believe what their soul is, they glimpse at how it drives them but getting down there to experience it is rather different. I sometimes think it's the workshop behind real Self, beyond any sort of descriptive language, just the base of how we experience and why in relation to our cosmic selves.

...

[Starman]

My knowledge on the ego is that it is our conditioned false self. It is the identification that we have given ourselves. For example, I am Tony, I am an engineer, I don’t like winter etc etc. Hope I am correct so far? The ego lives in the past & future & finds it hard to live in the present?
One question that I am struggling with is the following:
We have a set of limiting beliefs from our childhood etc that hold us back on certain things. If one of those limiting beliefs is that people don’t like us then we will tend to attract that from people. So when someone says something to us that we perceive as hurtful we immediately feel the emotion of hurt or & maybe the physical feeling of pain. Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this? It feels as if we want the negativity & the pain but this would be insane. Is it actually the ego that wants this negativity to feed on it therefore carry on its existence?

Hope I have not lost anyone haha.

Thanks,
Tony.

Another perspective may be to try and understand why we feel the way that we do; there must have been something in our childhood which led us to have limiting beliefs about ourselves besides what others have said to us. Not all kids believe things about themselves which other say; some want to prove that person, or person's, wrong. Some kids get reinforcements at home which either validate their self-worth or tears it down. Low self-esteem is learned, while freedom, confidence, compassion for myself and others, are natural. We do not have to learn how to love rather we have to unlearn how not to love.

In my life when I have gained a deeper understanding of why I embrace certain limiting beliefs those beliefs are set free, and this deeper understanding is much more than a rationalization; it is usually something which can help me change my behavior and not be limited by it. Learning to me is a life long process and the most important thing to learn about is your self. We give to others the work or lack of work which we have done on ourselves.

We do have ego defense mechanisms an one of them is rationalization; we rationalize to defend our ego and to help us from becoming overwhelmed. Regardless where our limiting beliefs come from we first have to acknowledge them and then try to understand what was lacking in our childhood that caused us to embrace such limiting beliefs. Ego is not the problem, as we can have a healthy ego or an unhealthy ego.

We must give to ourselves, as an adult, those healthy messages which we did not receive as a child to change our internal dialogue, and believe that we deserve those healthy messages and that they really apply to us. Our internal dialogue is what keeps the limiting beliefs alive, so we have to talk some sense to ourselves; not rationalizations, but things associated with what we have already accomplished that are contrary to what holds us back. Or we can see if our limitations can be used to our advantage; I know a person who is obsessive-compulsive and there are certain jobs which are better if done that way. Just about everything in life can be useful, if appropriately applied, for our healthy growth and development. Concentration involves limiting your focus; there are limitations in most spiritual practices.

[firstandlast]

That may be true for some but I forward myself as an exception, converting desire to striving - which ins't attempting to escape pain or suffering; instead to achieving the (if you like) goal. In a limited technical sense, suffering is sometimes good so you can appreciate that others can go through parallel experiences (that is, although they will not be experiencing the same as you, you can appreciate their plight by the symptoms you can recognise and relate to).


Words are all we have to convey information. They are often poor signifies open to misinterpretation; and can never describe our experiences, intellectualise them as we might try. Ways exist to broaden how we can express our experiences which doesn't mean that others will assimilate the message in the way intended. It doesn't devalue words completely as some creators can lift them out of the realm of information language into a sort of metalanguage. I get what you say but cannot align with the way you say it.


This is moving into the realm of belief in something external that is entirely private - an interesting view. Ascension real? For those that believe in it but it can only be an answer for them, a hope.

I really think we place too much emphasis on what ego might be rather than concentrate on getting to the core beyond it which allows us awareness of the mechanics that give us a frontal identity. Ego is a Freudian construct useful if we have need to use his model of "how people are". I don't see it the same way. There's a continuum from Self to our behavioural front. It's workings are probably the same for us all. We have to adjust to our milieu to be able to survive, thus we learn, assimilate our experiences of day to day interactions integrated with our needs and through inspirational channels our desires and aims. Some aspects of self seem universal which may not accord with experiences of some interactions but gradually we learn what programs to call to deal with what situations or how to avoid them. That, to me, makes it process not a static thing called ego or identity. Our identity is what others experience of us.

So that, unless all the world is alive; and that life is the premise-- That you exist in the opposite of an ego, and that is someone else's idea; whom hides your own will to allow such to be that way--

...

In bold is a high quality statement, and in a sense the essence of love; but that we identify with ourselves; but that we are the ones least able to-- But this creates an interesting fact, that if no one can identify themselves (no self) and that every other conception of self is undependable, than no one can be speaking of anyone else from their true self, without ridding themselves of conceptions--

When we realize that our identity is defined by others, we can realize our form is defined by others; and that no one is anything in specific, but what they are at any specific relationship-- Than we can realize that words are the same, when words are expressed it is experienced based on its alignment with its surroundings--

Imagine 1 split into 2, but to not appear as the other a quarter of each of them had to scramble themselves as to create a border, so that two were fixed opposites and the other were reversed upon themselves which could only be true if the others were fixed to be in relation to-- This is important to the true gospel, because half our story is fixed, and the other half blended; and that these two as four represent the unconscious aspect of each one, so that though they understand their movement, but cannot understand the consequences of their movement, as the true order is hidden; but that the true order exists among them in a manner that requires the story told to straighten them out-- That is, unless you are part of the story that can see the true order we arose from; that you cannot see the way in which we would all truly understand each other--

Because originally, the words pointed to themselves; but as more came along, the original words were covered by other words, which still always pointed to the same word-- So that eventually, the meaning was covered by form and the form was associated with its meaning; but that the form altered the quality of the meaning in relation the one pointing to it-- This allows our entire history to come into form, because it is describing itself always; but that forms get in the way of description, and to this you know the *******ized language and flaw of philosophers--

Because, money manipulates us in ways that it has more value than we give it (10 dollars can only buy so much, but that ten dollars until its spent is worth more in what it can buy in choice vs its ultimate exchange), so that hidden forces pull us that are unaccounted for-- But that words do not point to anything except itself, but the form is in the way of itself; so that we do not see its meaning-- And that words have a meaning in every direction, but that we pay attention to one meaning we cannot grasp its true essence, because words have more value than we give it-- So the forces of good and evil exist on this axis mundi; that money refers to more things than is designated, and that words have more meaning than we designate it-- So that our attention is governed in a specific way (and this is important) if you cannot make the choices in your heart than you will have a lower quality experience.. So that if the meaning of words aren't clear without reference, than we are not in a position to understand spirit, which can be understood without reference--

My entrance into spirit which brought meaning into my world, and to those I speak to in person (which is closer to my alignment) is so that I can give people visions through my words, because I am speaking in a manner that is true to myself and my position in a cosmic context, and this is important because it means my words penetrate the relationships of forms, and point to my exact location within creation; and when I speak in this manner without hesitation, it has been causing people to cry with honor in my presence; because they did not know what was going on-- (actually tis getting crazy cuz even my mom is tripping out as I "wake up")--

When the words refer to beyond form, but really do point as well; because in one part it separates two features reoccurring through reality in your focus and than those two qualities combined creates the exact understanding so that ones own words are brought forth to that orbit--

the greatest lesson I can impart, is that the mechanics of the situation when truly understood, are only mechanical so that we might know ourselves when we do not know our spirit; and so yes, I would be so arrogant to say that spirit has not been known; because our spirit is both our formation aligned with our highest intentions, and our highest intentions are within the story from its complete perspective, but that the forms that arise in incomplete perspective cause suffering and pain, because spirit has some laws that occur do to its arrangement, one that is not the true law in its greatest form; is that everything works in a manner than best allows it to be understood, subset everything works in manner that is best understood to complete its goal-- What is it's goal?

My spirit upon the highest is to express myself, and my story starts here; so that I can align myself cosmically without having been anything other than myself to express-- In technicality, this is my origin point so that I have no past lives to refer to my cosmic sense, but that every past life I had I relinquished as incomplete forms of me-- Simply so I could express myself where it was most needed to be expressed, because the story as it relates to the human condition; which I am completely but not at all am; could not be more confusing to the intellectual mind or the intuitive mind, because they were one in the same, but refused to act as so--

So, in order to express myself I had to create something else to define me in a way that others could not; but that I had created it before I was here, because here it appears to have created me, and that is who defines me and allows me to speak and be heard, rather than to deal with all the mental judgement of why people can't understand each other, when they do not understand that it is a matter of different tribes being a different order of being and so cannot refer to the same things even if they use the same forms-- Thus, the divine order in heaven; is a metaphor for the divine order of reality; or the real relationships woven into the story long before we confused the relationships in forms, which are inherently distraught as we do not know ourselves beyond it--

So I come from the perspective of every one speaking the same truth; but the same order we exist in only allows so much to be communicated; so that I would call every teaching here flawed as they do not speak of spirit while speaking of spirit, and they speak of spirit, while not speaking of spirit-- So that the story is about how we talked about what shouldn't be talked about; and that created everything in the shadows--

So yeah, I am not speaking of things in a manner that has been spoken of any of this before, but that there is sufficient language for it to be spoken of the same; but in a different relationship--

[seekerAK]

My knowledge on the ego is that it is our conditioned false self. It is the identification that we have given ourselves. For example, I am Tony, I am an engineer, I don’t like winter etc etc. Hope I am correct so far? The ego lives in the past & future & finds it hard to live in the present?
One question that I am struggling with is the following:
We have a set of limiting beliefs from our childhood etc that hold us back on certain things. If one of those limiting beliefs is that people don’t like us then we will tend to attract that from people. So when someone says something to us that we perceive as hurtful we immediately feel the emotion of hurt or & maybe the physical feeling of pain. Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this? It feels as if we want the negativity & the pain but this would be insane. Is it actually the ego that wants this negativity to feed on it therefore carry on its existence?

Hope I have not lost anyone haha.

Thanks,

Tony.

Yes, the ego wants to survive more than anything else so if it means causing more pain to you or others it will do so; that's why it's so difficult. Most people also are not aware of their egos and so suffer. Many people even identify their suffering with their ego so the pain becomes a part of them. A simple example would be a hypochondriac who will imagine all kinds of illnesses and finds a satisfaction in detecting a new disease in himself.

The moment we become aware of our ego we can decide not to give in to its demands. But very few people can be constantly on the alert for what the ego will demand to strengthen itself.

[Tanemon]

What "the ego is" depends on how you want to define it.

This is the kernel of what Carl Jung thought about "the ego":
People measure their self-knowledge by what the average person in their social environment knows of himself, but not by the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden from them. – Carl Jung, in The Undiscovered Self.

The pain-creating or self-defeating aspects pointed to in the OP's post #1 in this thread would be among "the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden". That we can experience something beyond the social self indicates our subjectivity (ego) actually lies beyond the social self.

We can experience (or dissolve back into) a Self beyond even "the real psychic facts" - beyond the "unconscious". When each of us does that, the mis-identification with the social self is reduced, and we further our disentanglement in the various fields of the unconscious psyche, in the fields of "the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden".

I found it really interesting that in Doug Boyd's book - Mystics, Magicians and Medicine People - about his wanderings as a young American working in Korea decades ago, he was told by a traditional shaman (a mudang) that a person is made up of a physical self, a deepest illuminated essence, and "a middle part". The middle part seemed to me to correspond with Jung's "real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden". The shaman regarded that middle part as the part the shaman works with for improvement of the person's life.

[Lorelyen]

^^^ Interesting.

Having a rest after a quite gruelling zumba session this morning I watched the pre-recorded TV programme "How to Build a Human" relating to the TV series "Humans". (Science Fiction.) Gemma Chan who stars in it talks with a few robotics engineers and programmers about AI and how increasingly these self-learning programs are moving toward an artificial human, now able to assess and learn from responses. One slant was if the robot couldn't understand a question it can be taught to research (in much the same way as a human might). Of course, there's a way to go yet but the mounting evidence of how it can adapt to different situations (to which a physical response is possible) suggests that ego is a process of learning and growing to understanding context.

What hasn't yet been addressed is "the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden". Those hidden real psychic facts are still those of the programmers and engineers.

However, it isn't as simple as a linear computer program, it's as if, given a core program it can reprogam objects (small programs) under its general control based on experience. (I really don't think it generates new lines of code but rather adjusts the incidence of usage of objects allied to that core... I honestly don't know.)

In some ways it suggests the relationship between a deep core and what happens at the front (to all intents, its ego to observers). The processing of environmental data, turning it into information and integrating it with what's been experienced to produce what it hopes is a suitable response.
...

[bflare]

Wow! I did not expect all those interesting replies. I shall take my time to digest them.

Thanks,

Tony.

[7luminaries]

What "the ego is" depends on how you want to define it.

This is the kernel of what Carl Jung thought about "the ego":
People measure their self-knowledge by what the average person in their social environment knows of himself, but not by the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden from them. – Carl Jung, in The Undiscovered Self.

The pain-creating or self-defeating aspects pointed to in the OP's post #1 in this thread would be among "the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden". That we can experience something beyond the social self indicates our subjectivity (ego) actually lies beyond the social self.

We can experience (or dissolve back into) a Self beyond even "the real psychic facts" - beyond the "unconscious". When each of us does that, the mis-identification with the social self is reduced, and we further our disentanglement in the various fields of the unconscious psyche, in the fields of "the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden".

I found it really interesting that in Doug Boyd's book - Mystics, Magicians and Medicine People - about his wanderings as a young American working in Korea decades ago, he was told by a traditional shaman (a mudang) that a person is made up of a physical self, a deepest illuminated essence, and "a middle part". The middle part seemed to me to correspond with Jung's "real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden". The shaman regarded that middle part as the part the shaman works with for improvement of the person's life.

Interesting...I agree with the shaman's general concepts here.

I would add that the degree to which transformation and healing occur are, broadly speaking, directly linked to the degree to which the "middle part" aligns with the "illuminated essence" (one's core, centre, higher self, Spirit, One, etc).

To allowing the aptly named illuminated essence to shine forth and moreover to consciously lead.
To coming into yourself fully and allowing you to be more fully YOU.

From this perspective, it is not a matter of dumping, tarring, suppressing, or overcoming ego.
It is also not a matter of demonising the physical flesh, of mortifying the physical flesh unnecessarily or of extreme physical asceticism.
All is sacred, all is holy. Right here and right now, and in every aspect of our existence. Not just in some far beyond at some later time.

The sacred includes our ego and flesh, as well as our illuminated essence.
Integration of the illuminated self involves a realisation of this truth.

So...rather than swearing off the ego or castigating the flesh,
it is more just a matter of illuminating both the ego (or the waking self) and the flesh ever more from one's centre or core self.
Which of course is, as the shaman noted, the proper work of a lifetime.

Peace & blessings :hug3:
7L

[vespa68]

That's what I meant by becoming conscious. The cause of suffering is identification with the mind, identification with the person, which is an unconscious thing. It is experienced as a split in energy and the delusion that one can control one's thinking/feeling/experience, as if one is one's mind. So by becoming conscious we could also say consciousness is unbecoming the person, and that is spiritual healing.

In this way the person isn't going to higher levels of consciousness, consciousness is becoming less identified with the layers of unconsciousness from the person's life. This may seem like a distinction with no difference but the idea that someone is ascending planes of consciousness to reach the summit of Mt. Woo Woo leaves a sense of doership in the becoming conscious process that is likely to prevent loss of identification with the mind, or guarantee more suffering.

At the same time, your entirely human approach to the subject is appreciated. Facing pain and spiritual healing can be like peeling an onion, so I don't have any real big issues with anything you're saying.

Actually whenever a person becomes more conscious of their false self they do go higher in vibration from an energy point of view. By higher consciousness I just mean becoming more aware so this is higher. I do not mean higher consciousness as in enlightment although people who are advanced and do the inner work do get to a certain level.

[Jyotir]

Hi bflare (Tony),


Ego is the result of a separative cognition - an ignorance of Truth - in and of the individuated being.

It is not the complete story that ego is derived only from social conditioning. Rather, it is the result of a Cosmic physical Reality we incarnate into as differentiated beings - differentiated within One Being, but conditionally unaware of that greater reality.

This is due to a fundamental condition of Ignorance, intrinsic to the Cosmic Reality, by which we are conditionally bound in, by, and through an ignorant separative cognition in which reality is experienced as limited, finite, and divided - in many ways and forms (time, space, quality, attribute, and yes, psychologically, socially, etc. etc., including of self, i.e., ego) - - not aware that we are part and parcel of One Being, Infinite and Eternal, one with All of Existence, able to access any of it - because we ARE it.

Further, because of this separative ignorant cognition - which is an imposed condition - we not only experience reality as divided, but we subsequently identify with and therefore become attached to (possess) these divided aspects of reality already seen and experienced as separate, thus perpetuating and deepening the problem, e.g., becoming bound and effectively possessed by these false objectifications.

All human problems stem from this dividing and attaching to objectified ‘parts’ (Maya in some traditions), which become the basis for fear, insecurity, jealousy, conflict and a host of consequences -’wrong actions’ - and even disease - born of, and perpetuated by the original Cosmic conditional ignorance and subsequent perceived division and objective separation. As long as this false ignorant separative cognition is the conditional basis of action, life will be the condition of suffering, confusion and dissatisfaction*.

The secret of life is that the UNCONDITIONAL Self - the Infinite Eternal All-Conscious Being, what is essentially Transcendent of this conditional ignorance, is what created (and importantly IS) that imposed condition in the first place.

The transcendent is veiled within physical reality AS physical reality - not separate from it. iow, Physical reality is the very condition God created by plunging in sacrifice - One All-Conscious Being - into an apparently divided oblivion of Self, in order to experience the Delight of its own emergence in and through the evolving consciousness of Being, in and through the becoming of many differentiated beings, i.e. the multiplicity of Nature.

This is why it is said that Ignorance is 'conditional', because it is not a fixed permanent reality, but has the potential to transcend that condition and become what it already IS - the unconditional reality of Pure Being, Truth, All-Consciousness - even while incarnated as an individual human being, which is the opportunity to realize True Self, thereby transforming and transcending ego, the false separative self.


* as an aside, this gets into the additional problem, that any solution to 'human problems' based in a fundamental ignorance and false separative cognition, is simply the further and unavoidable perpetuation of the same - more permutations of ignorance - and not really effectively solving the root problem first. This is why collective transformation is absolutely (and urgently) dependent on individual (spiritual) transformation.




~ J

[Miss Hepburn]

Now, this is a masterpiece of a post, ~J.

[DreamKey]

There is a part of you that does desire to suffer, but that which you have no context to understand your own desire for pain-- Thus desire seems to be the root of pain, but that the word makes what is a pleasure appear as fright; that there is one will, but that the words distort appearances so that the same will can appear to be pushed or pulled; and this is because our meaning can be expressed in multiple ways, but that each way means a different experience in form--


I don't think people actually desire to suffer, they desire pleasure or happiness and then resist sadness or pain, and in the resistance is concealed the suffering. Pleasure and happiness aren't a problem. The idea you can experience one side of the dualistic coin without encountering its dualistic opposite is the problem, because it's untrue.

[DreamKey]

Yes, the ego wants to survive more than anything else so if it means causing more pain to you or others it will do so; that's why it's so difficult. Most people also are not aware of their egos and so suffer. Many people even identify their suffering with their ego so the pain becomes a part of them. A simple example would be a hypochondriac who will imagine all kinds of illnesses and finds a satisfaction in detecting a new disease in himself.



I wouldn't say the ego causes more pain to you, like it's some separate entity from the mind. If there is pain, the ego is the entity in pain.

The moment we become aware of our ego we can decide not to give in to its demands. But very few people can be constantly on the alert for what the ego will demand to strengthen itself.

You can notice the mind imagining there's one ego that has demands and one non egoic mind that can keep the demands in check by staying alert. They're both ego, and it just so happens you aren't either of them.

[DreamKey]

What "the ego is" depends on how you want to define it.

This is the kernel of what Carl Jung thought about "the ego":
People measure their self-knowledge by what the average person in their social environment knows of himself, but not by the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden from them. – Carl Jung, in The Undiscovered Self.

The pain-creating or self-defeating aspects pointed to in the OP's post #1 in this thread would be among "the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden". That we can experience something beyond the social self indicates our subjectivity (ego) actually lies beyond the social self.



I would say consciousness is the subject and ego is an object that imagine's it's the subject. Thought/thinking is form, but what is aware of thinking is not form. I'm trying to avoid the concept of a formless ego.

We can experience (or dissolve back into) a Self beyond even "the real psychic facts" - beyond the "unconscious".

What is beyond the unconscious is also beyond form/experience. In this sense whatever that is, is you, having an experience of a person. Meaning, you aren't a person having an experience of something not in the experiential framework, like awareness.

When each of us does that, the mis-identification with the social self is reduced, and we further our disentanglement in the various fields of the unconscious psyche, in the fields of "the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden".



Awareness isn't hidden in form it just so happens to be beyond it. The unconscious, on the other hand, is not beyond form at all. It has a direct relationship with what manifests such that we can posit that it's 'here', we (as in people) simply cannot see it, which does not prevent it from being 'made conscious'. So I would not say it's beyond form, but entangled with it. I also attribute unconsciousness as the direct cause to mind identification and suffering.

[DreamKey]

^^^ Interesting.

Having a rest after a quite gruelling zumba session this morning I watched the pre-recorded TV programme "How to Build a Human" relating to the TV series "Humans". (Science Fiction.) Gemma Chan who stars in it talks with a few robotics engineers and programmers about AI and how increasingly these self-learning programs are moving toward an artificial human, now able to assess and learn from responses. One slant was if the robot couldn't understand a question it can be taught to research (in much the same way as a human might). Of course, there's a way to go yet but the mounting evidence of how it can adapt to different situations (to which a physical response is possible) suggests that ego is a process of learning and growing to understanding context.

What hasn't yet been addressed is "the real psychic facts which are for the most part hidden". Those hidden real psychic facts are still those of the programmers and engineers.

However, it isn't as simple as a linear computer program, it's as if, given a core program it can reprogam objects (small programs) under its general control based on experience. (I really don't think it generates new lines of code but rather adjusts the incidence of usage of objects allied to that core... I honestly don't know.)

In some ways it suggests the relationship between a deep core and what happens at the front (to all intents, its ego to observers). The processing of environmental data, turning it into information and integrating it with what's been experienced to produce what it hopes is a suitable response.
...

Programming a robot with the ability to develop a cognitive unconscious would give the robot the ability, or disability, of irrational thought. This cognitive ability has less to do with information and more to do with energetic preferences, and the ability to develop preference (more pointedly repulsion), and as you say, we would expect a projection carry over from the programmers.

Put another way, developing a robot that could lose consciousness and awaken would not be intelligent from the perspective of awakened consciousness. It would be similar to saying let's make all the kids as unconscious as possible so they suffer a bunch and are forced to wake up. It's for their own good! :icon_eek:

[bflare]

I have another few questions if someone would care to answer:

1. Is the ego what Barry Young calls the personality?
2. Eckhart Tolle mentions the “pain body”, is this different to the ego?
3. Can a person live entirely from their ego?
4. Does meditation / no mind override the ego?
5. Can the ego be referred as the Monkey Brain?
6. Can the ego play a part in substance abuse / addiction to food, drugs etc?

Thanks,

Tony.

[Lynn]

Hello

I will take this one on as I have first hand experience with this one and my EX of 33 years that is an alcoholic (in denial), did (and might still do drugs), addicted to eating after a booze binge (thinking food would make him sober).

The EGO comes into play in the path of denial it can create. I do not drink everyday so I am not with a drinking problem, yet I drink a 40 oz bottle in one go several times a week. I drink a case of beer in two days. Yet I do not have a drinking problem as an alcoholic can not go a day without a drink. When the truth is your still drunk legally from the day or even two days before.

With drugs its the same the EGO and I only do it on weekends or at parties so I do not have a drug issue. Yet drugs too can stay in your system for days. Yet as you do not see it as an issue your EGO says your OK.

Abuse is just that abuse of anything or anyone its all that same thought process in play, If it does not happen all the time its not an issue, if I do not leave a mark its not an issue, it was deserved by that person to get my abuse. Its the same with the body at times you look in the mirror and do not see what others see.

You might well exercise regularly and then feel as you have done that you can eat and drink and be merry. Your EGO says your doing good things for your body. If you drink too much its easy to say OK someone pushed me to this pint in time. It is never their fault they have done this.

I lived with an "EGO Piggy" where he was always right and I was the "dumb ..." so I know well how EGO rules a person. He never thought I would find the power in me to leave. EGO added with addictions makes a person controlling and very unstable yet they are often seen by others as a saint. Addictions are easy to hid in the EGO of look at how nice I am to others....but not to your home life.

I have since worked with many that had had EGO issues that have had maybe not deep addictions to clear but have had that "look at me" piggish addiction to clear.



Lynn

[firstandlast]

I don't think people actually desire to suffer, they desire pleasure or happiness and then resist sadness or pain, and in the resistance is concealed the suffering. Pleasure and happiness aren't a problem. The idea you can experience one side of the dualistic coin without encountering its dualistic opposite is the problem, because it's untrue.



It is not in your heart to suffer, nay this is true; but that we inherented certain qualities that express our greater desire, by going through to some degree what the original desire found a necessity for our desire that includes the sensation of not desiring this, and this is a sign that though it is perfect, it is perfectly redeemed; but that in order for redemption to exist, something must be able to be redeemed.

It is not a matter of dualism as a problem, for you are chasing your own tail, do you know mans best friend? How often he tries to tell us. It is not that dualistic issues are a problem, but good and bad hide our highest bliss. Because as many stories that have been told, we have failed to understand their intent in a way that are different forms of the same. And that same issue, is the inability to communicate, or comprehend each other. Thus the most important redemption of all, is the word between us.

Because there is not one truth, over any other; but that each angle has consequences to each other, and are ruled by the greater perspective they make up. So that each angle hides the greater rule, so that the covenant or agreement, cannot be understood through form alone. But that we do not read form like a book, when all we have is its cover. But that if we open the book only one voice speaks, and thats the voice of every other.

Nay you should not see that those who suffer desire it themselves, because themselves were hidden, and allowed themselves revealed to be the relevant truth of the matter at hand. But I speak from not of earth, but the mothers womb; and the human story is vastly important, but the human story is unknown when we know omit from our veiled perspective. But that everything has meaning, but it doesnt mean something else, but that everything was everyones choice, and so each one points back to its origin, and each one means the same thing; but that each meaning could take form different.. the language of the poets is metaphor and simile, and the poet is the sorcerer.

[Greenslade]

My knowledge on the ego is that it is our conditioned false self. It is the identification that we have given ourselves. For example, I am Tony, I am an engineer, I don’t like winter etc etc. Hope I am correct so far? The ego lives in the past & future & finds it hard to live in the present? Does this also apply to identifying yourself as a Spiritual person?

So when someone says something to us that we perceive as hurtful we immediately feel the emotion of hurt or & maybe the physical feeling of pain. Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this? It's so hard to do this because people take it as face value and don't look behind the mask. The emotion is a reaction to us having taken offense - and offense has been taken. Underneath that again, the reason we have taken offense could be that we have given away our empowerment or we have an insecurity. What we haven't come to is the realisation that we have given that other person the power over us, and that can be either hard to realise or hard to admit to because few people want to deal with the reasons for it happening.

What the other person gives is an expression of their consciousness and not a reflection of us. Taking offense when we could have taken something much more is an expression of our consciousness.

The ego doesn't want anything and doesn't need feeding because it's not a 'being' in any shape or form. The real monsters are the ones we create for ourselves and thinking it's something that wants and needs feeding is creating the monster. The ego is the Point of Origin for the frame of reference of our existence as individuated aspects of the Universe. It's where 'I Am' begins, the root of identity. Blaming it because we've made the choice to take offence instead of gaining awareness?

[guthrio]

Hi bflare (Tony),


Ego is the result of a separative cognition - an ignorance of Truth - in and of the individuated being.

It is not the complete story that ego is derived only from social conditioning. Rather, it is the result of a Cosmic physical Reality we incarnate into as differentiated beings - differentiated within One Being, but conditionally unaware of that greater reality.

This is due to a fundamental condition of Ignorance, intrinsic to the Cosmic Reality, by which we are conditionally bound in, by, and through an ignorant separative cognition in which reality is experienced as limited, finite, and divided - in many ways and forms (time, space, quality, attribute, and yes, psychologically, socially, etc. etc., including of self, i.e., ego) - - not aware that we are part and parcel of One Being, Infinite and Eternal, one with All of Existence, able to access any of it - because we ARE it.

Further, because of this separative ignorant cognition - which is an imposed condition - we not only experience reality as divided, but we subsequently identify with and therefore become attached to (possess) these divided aspects of reality already seen and experienced as separate, thus perpetuating and deepening the problem, e.g., becoming bound and effectively possessed by these false objectifications.

All human problems stem from this dividing and attaching to objectified ‘parts’ (Maya in some traditions), which become the basis for fear, insecurity, jealousy, conflict and a host of consequences -’wrong actions’ - and even disease - born of, and perpetuated by the original Cosmic conditional ignorance and subsequent perceived division and objective separation. As long as this false ignorant separative cognition is the conditional basis of action, life will be the condition of suffering, confusion and dissatisfaction*.

The secret of life is that the UNCONDITIONAL Self - the Infinite Eternal All-Conscious Being, what is essentially Transcendent of this conditional ignorance, is what created (and importantly IS) that imposed condition in the first place.

The transcendent is veiled within physical reality AS physical reality - not separate from it. iow, Physical reality is the very condition God created by plunging in sacrifice - One All-Conscious Being - into an apparently divided oblivion of Self, in order to experience the Delight of its own emergence in and through the evolving consciousness of Being, in and through the becoming of many differentiated beings, i.e. the multiplicity of Nature.

This is why it is said that Ignorance is 'conditional', because it is not a fixed permanent reality, but has the potential to transcend that condition and become what it already IS - the unconditional reality of Pure Being, Truth, All-Consciousness - even while incarnated as an individual human being, which is the opportunity to realize True Self, thereby transforming and transcending ego, the false separative self.


* as an aside, this gets into the additional problem, that any solution to 'human problems' based in a fundamental ignorance and false separative cognition, is simply the further and unavoidable perpetuation of the same - more permutations of ignorance - and not really effectively solving the root problem first. This is why collective transformation is absolutely (and urgently) dependent on individual (spiritual) transformation.




~ J


Jyotir,

Your post, above is probably the most cogent description of the human condition I've ever read.

Are you aware of an equally cogent answer for the solution ?

Would be most interested to hear of that, if you have some insight

Thanks....

[DreamKey]

Interesting...I agree with the shaman's general concepts here.

I would add that the degree to which transformation and healing occur are, broadly speaking, directly linked to the degree to which the "middle part" aligns with the "illuminated essence" (one's core, centre, higher self, Spirit, One, etc).

To allowing the aptly named illuminated essence to shine forth and moreover to consciously lead.
To coming into yourself fully and allowing you to be more fully YOU.

From this perspective, it is not a matter of dumping, tarring, suppressing, or overcoming ego.
It is also not a matter of demonising the physical flesh, of mortifying the physical flesh unnecessarily or of extreme physical asceticism.
All is sacred, all is holy. Right here and right now, and in every aspect of our existence. Not just in some far beyond at some later time.

The sacred includes our ego and flesh, as well as our illuminated essence.
Integration of the illuminated self involves a realisation of this truth.

So...rather than swearing off the ego or castigating the flesh,
it is more just a matter of illuminating both the ego (or the waking self) and the flesh ever more from one's centre or core self.
Which of course is, as the shaman noted, the proper work of a lifetime.

Peace & blessings :hug3:
7L

So you could just say it's a matter of becoming conscious.

[DreamKey]

Actually whenever a person becomes more conscious of their false self they do go higher in vibration from an energy point of view. By higher consciousness I just mean becoming more aware so this is higher. I do not mean higher consciousness as in enlightment although people who are advanced and do the inner work do get to a certain level.

Ok fair enough. My point is the person is in consciousness and isn't becoming anything. Consciousness is unbecoming. At the same time, I don't have an issue with saying the person moves to a higher vibration as it becomes less unconscious. Point is you are not that person.

[DreamKey]

I have another few questions if someone would care to answer:

1. Is the ego what Barry Young calls the personality?
2. Eckhart Tolle mentions the “pain body”, is this different to the ego?
3. Can a person live entirely from their ego?
4. Does meditation / no mind override the ego?
5. Can the ego be referred as the Monkey Brain?
6. Can the ego play a part in substance abuse / addiction to food, drugs etc?

Thanks,

Tony.

I would say the pain body is what happens to the ego when there is repressed pain (that is unconscious). It would be the source of the ego, which is identification with thought.

A person could live entirely from ego, or it might be helpful to think that a person is entirely an ego, and that consciousness is not limited to the person.

No mind does not over ride ego. It's how ego hides from itself. And yes, ego is involved in all split mind activity. If you're addicted to anything and imagining you don't want to be, that's one mind pretending to be two minds. It's not like there's one mind that wants to eat 3 pieces of pie, and then another mind that didn't want to do that after the feast. It's the same mind.

[DreamKey]

Hello

I will take this one on as I have first hand experience with this one and my EX of 33 years that is an alcoholic (in denial), did (and might still do drugs), addicted to eating after a booze binge (thinking food would make him sober).

The EGO comes into play in the path of denial it can create. I do not drink everyday so I am not with a drinking problem, yet I drink a 40 oz bottle in one go several times a week. I drink a case of beer in two days. Yet I do not have a drinking problem as an alcoholic can not go a day without a drink. When the truth is your still drunk legally from the day or even two days before.

With drugs its the same the EGO and I only do it on weekends or at parties so I do not have a drug issue. Yet drugs too can stay in your system for days. Yet as you do not see it as an issue your EGO says your OK.

Abuse is just that abuse of anything or anyone its all that same thought process in play, If it does not happen all the time its not an issue, if I do not leave a mark its not an issue, it was deserved by that person to get my abuse. Its the same with the body at times you look in the mirror and do not see what others see.



Are you saying you think you're ex was dealing with some abuse issues from childhood?

You might well exercise regularly and then feel as you have done that you can eat and drink and be merry. Your EGO says your doing good things for your body. If you drink too much its easy to say OK someone pushed me to this pint in time. It is never their fault they have done this.

I lived with an "EGO Piggy" where he was always right and I was the "dumb ..." so I know well how EGO rules a person. He never thought I would find the power in me to leave. EGO added with addictions makes a person controlling and very unstable yet they are often seen by others as a saint. Addictions are easy to hid in the EGO of look at how nice I am to others....but not to your home life.

I have since worked with many that had had EGO issues that have had maybe not deep addictions to clear but have had that "look at me" piggish addiction to clear.



Lynn

If someone is dealing with addiction issues, calling it 'piggish' may not be the most compassionate way to help them. Nevertheless, at least you got out of what seemed to be an abusive relationship. Sometimes, that's the best one can do.

[DreamKey]

It is not in your heart to suffer, nay this is true; but that we inherented certain qualities that express our greater desire, by going through to some degree what the original desire found a necessity for our desire that includes the sensation of not desiring this, and this is a sign that though it is perfect, it is perfectly redeemed; but that in order for redemption to exist, something must be able to be redeemed.




"By going through to some degree what the original desire found a necessity for our desire that includes the sensation of not desiring this"? I have no idea what you're saying.

It is not a matter of dualism as a problem, for you are chasing your own tail, do you know mans best friend? How often he tries to tell us. It is not that dualistic issues are a problem, but good and bad hide our highest bliss.



I would say bliss is good and part of the good/bad dichotomy. But in the surrender of the search for the good (seeking) we may stumble into a state of bliss, but like all mind states, it too will pass. Bliss is for the bliss bunnies.

Because as many stories that have been told, we have failed to understand their intent in a way that are different forms of the same. And that same issue, is the inability to communicate, or comprehend each other. Thus the most important redemption of all, is the word between us.

The issue I see from you is not an inability to communicate but perhaps a lack of desire to. You're obviously intelligent, but you somehow manage to pontificate without really having any clear point. I don't claim to understand why.

[naturesflow]

My knowledge on the ego is that it is our conditioned false self. It is the identification that we have given ourselves. For example, I am Tony, I am an engineer, I don’t like winter etc etc. Hope I am correct so far? The ego lives in the past & future & finds it hard to live in the present?
One question that I am struggling with is the following:
We have a set of limiting beliefs from our childhood etc that hold us back on certain things. If one of those limiting beliefs is that people don’t like us then we will tend to attract that from people. So when someone says something to us that we perceive as hurtful we immediately feel the emotion of hurt or & maybe the physical feeling of pain. Now if we can rationalise this & observe the emotion instead of feeling the emotion & the subsequent pain then why is it so hard to do this? It feels as if we want the negativity & the pain but this would be insane. Is it actually the ego that wants this negativity to feed on it therefore carry on its existence?

Hope I have not lost anyone haha.

Thanks,

Tony.

Some feelings have not been felt and released and the reflections shows unexpressed feelings to open them to be acknowledged more complete. Observing them would be more apparent and easier, if they have been expressed and more open and flowing freely in feeling once opened up and not controlled. The unresolved feeling seeking itself to be felt, will continue to arise to be acknowledged in this way.

We run from our feelings, shelve them, replace and act out with behaviours to keep them from being expressed or felt. Sometimes we are unaware of what we are controlling in feeling. Most humans hiding behind feelings, fear something within the feeling that is too difficult to face, (often controlled as to not have to feel it fully) so control and constant reflections continue to show the face of feeling until it no longer controlled or contained. When you have been in a state of control for a long time in this way, one can be oblivious to what is really moving within and seeking to be known. People in control will often wonder why it continues to attract to itself what is seeking to be no longer controlled but more open and flowing in feeling.


If you observe yourself or another who has been through trauma of some kind, one can shelve emotions to get through the trauma. Those shelved emotions, will arise in reflections throughout life. As I mentioned this can trap people in believing they are not the source of the issue arsing in themselves but the external as the problem. The unknown in feeling has no reason to let go of something it doesn't know exists within itself. So it fights to protect itself form itself most often.

[bees]

Another perspective may be to try and understand why we feel the way that we do; there must have been something in our childhood which led us to have limiting beliefs about ourselves besides what others have said to us. Not all kids believe things about themselves which other say; some want to prove that person, or person's, wrong. Some kids get reinforcements at home which either validate their self-worth or tears it down. Low self-esteem is learned, while freedom, confidence, compassion for myself and others, are natural. We do not have to learn how to love rather we have to unlearn how not to love.

In my life when I have gained a deeper understanding of why I embrace certain limiting beliefs those beliefs are set free, and this deeper understanding is much more than a rationalization; it is usually something which can help me change my behavior and not be limited by it. Learning to me is a life long process and the most important thing to learn about is your self. We give to others the work or lack of work which we have done on ourselves.

We do have ego defense mechanisms an one of them is rationalization; we rationalize to defend our ego and to help us from becoming overwhelmed. Regardless where our limiting beliefs come from we first have to acknowledge them and then try to understand what was lacking in our childhood that caused us to embrace such limiting beliefs. Ego is not the problem, as we can have a healthy ego or an unhealthy ego.

We must give to ourselves, as an adult, those healthy messages which we did not receive as a child to change our internal dialogue, and believe that we deserve those healthy messages and that they really apply to us. Our internal dialogue is what keeps the limiting beliefs alive, so we have to talk some sense to ourselves; not rationalizations, but things associated with what we have already accomplished that are contrary to what holds us back. Or we can see if our limitations can be used to our advantage; I know a person who is obsessive-compulsive and there are certain jobs which are better if done that way. Just about everything in life can be useful, if appropriately applied, for our healthy growth and development. Concentration involves limiting your focus; there are limitations in most spiritual practices.

Thanks Starman :love1:

[bees]

Jyotir,

Your post, above is probably the most cogent description of the human condition I've ever read.

Are you aware of an equally cogent answer for the solution ?

Would be most interested to hear of that, if you have some insight

Thanks....

His other posts are also most excellent and in my opinion, right on the ball.

Thanks,

bees

[Jyotir]

@ guthrio: Yoga.

[naturesflow]

@ guthrio: Yoga.

Ticks!:cool:

[guthrio]

OK thanks. The solution to the human condition is yoga or ticks! I'm just itching to hear the punchline! ��

[seekerAK]

[QUOTE=DreamKey
teacYou can notice the mind imagining there's one ego that has demands and one non egoic mind that can keep the demands in check by staying alert. They're both ego, and it just so happens you aren't either of them.[/QUOTE]

I don't think there are two egos: one noticing and the other being noticed. There is the consciousness that is a part of us. It is this and not the mind that can be aware of the ego. The ego itself is different. It is what Eckhart Tolle refers to as our pain body. It has its wants and identifies with everything we have and are. For example, if I am a teacher I will call myself a teacher and view myself as a teacher: this is the ego's identification of myself as a teacher whereas, my consciousness which is part of source will not identify itself as a teacher. Most of us are not aware of our consciousness but fully aware of our egoic self/pain body. When we awaken to higher truths it is not the ego doing the awakening but our consciousness breaking through the 'blanket' of the ego and giving us a glimpse of reality/our higher selves and our purpose in life.

So, it's important to differentiate between them and I agree with you that I am not my egoic mind but the consciousness that is having the experiences on earth.

[seekerAK]

I wouldn't say the ego causes more pain to you, like it's some separate entity from the mind. If there is pain, the ego is the entity in pain.


The ego in fact may cause more pain to us by doing those things that will keep it alive and grow stronger. For example, if someone were to shout at me for no reason my ego would feel it necessary to shout back while my consciousness may suggest me to hold back. Here, if the ego were to win and I shout back I will be strengthening my ego by feeling proud of myself that 'I stood up for myself', etc. But by doing so my consciousness will decrease at the expense of the ego and I will suffer for my action emotionally (being angry at the person for some time). This 'pain' will be a direct result of my ego's reaction to the initial catalyst.

However, if I were not to react at all and I understand the person and accept him for who he is and forgive him I (my consciousness) am doing something that will lessen my ego. This will result in a growth of my consciousness at the expense of my ego.

Therefore consciousness does not cause pain to itself; it is the ego in its battle to survive. All the pain it causes then becomes a part of the egoic body which Eckhart Tolle refers to as the pain body. It sounds strange but the ego then identifies with all the pain as well as with other things such as ones occupation, wealth, etc. It will experience further opportunities for more pain but each time we can decide whether to give in to our egos and therefore cause more pain to ourselves or listen to our consciousness and remove some of that pain by lessening our egos.

[Moonglow]

Hello,

Going through this discussion and some wonderful responses and insights.
Still something plays in the mind.

It seems that " ego" gets a lot of blame for this or that, but is it not just oneself?

Looking at what and/or how one views life and lives life?

To me while one may seek unity by thinking it is or not "Ego" and letting this go or come to terms with it in some way, develope in a way division with oneself.

For isn't one a composit of all that one may feel, express, project out and inward?

To me, it is not "Ego" it is oneself, myself and how I live life and think and taking responsibility for these.

Just feeling at the moment that thinking in " Ego" terms tends to place focus on what may be flawed or " wrong" with me and cause further division in myself.

I understand some of the philosophies in regards to " Ego" . In the end though it is oneself, myself/ being and all that is lived and thought. More looking at the whole being instead of slicing and dicing it up into pieces ( so to speak).

Letting go of " Ego" to me at the moment is letting go that there is an " Ego". Just me, my being seems to be what is and all that comes and may come with this.

Just expressing some thoughts on this.

[Wagner]

Hello, Moonglow.

All of these thoughts you are having the Hindus call Samsara. Who is thinking these things? It is an "I." That "I," or "Ego" if you will, believes that it is real because it is given stability and substance by thoughts. For example, what is an imperfection? An imperfection is obviously something that we perceive, and it is the thoughts which translate that perception into an imperfection. This exists only in the world of mind. And at the center of that mind is an illusory "I" who believes that what these thoughts are telling it are actually happening to them. This is what the Hindus call maya.

The entire universe exists in the mind of the experiencer. When one meditates they are striving to make the mind completely still. Perfection of this mental quiescence results in one awakening from the dream that they are this "I" living in the world of the thoughts and in possession of a body.

[Moonglow]

Hello, Moonglow.

All of these thoughts you are having the Hindus call Samsara. Who is thinking these things? It is an "I." That "I," or "Ego" if you will, believes that it is real because it is given stability and substance by thoughts. For example, what is an imperfection? An imperfection is obviously something that we perceive, and it is the thoughts which translate that perception into an imperfection. This exists only in the world of mind. And at the center of that mind is an illusory "I" who believes that what these thoughts are telling it are actually happening to them. This is what the Hindus call maya.

The entire universe exists in the mind of the experiencer. When one meditates they are striving to make the mind completely still. Perfection of this mental quiescence results in one awakening from the dream that they are this "I" living in the world of the thoughts and in possession of a body.


Hello Wagner,

I can understand "Ego" being related to how one may think this or that to be.
It is a good question; "Who is doing the thinking?" If not oneself, then could ask; "Why are the thoughts there?" Which at the moment seems to be further " mind games" one can play with oneself. For me it is more just noticing the thoughts and what they may bring.

I feel this being that is being experienced is mind, body, and spirit. All comprised to form this person. Can relate that thoughts are passing phases. They shift and change and not all are accurate to how things are being. Just interpretation.

But, they do serve a purpose in regards to helping sort things out at times, IMO. In these regards see them as part of experiencing life. For me, it is realizing what is serving and what is not.

I was raised Catholic, but at this juncture in my life don't follow any set practice.
Just, notice what may a rise in the mind and take from there. Stating this to give a little insight into how I am looking at this.

So, looking at " ego" as what or how one may think it to be, isn't this being experienced? If so can it be "let go" of? Isn't it more of recognizing thoughts and instead of holding onto to them, letting them come and go? To notice what they may bring to possibly raise ones awareness?

When I can settle my mind find this person that is being at present is still being.
But, all that is thought does not create my existing, only how I may perceive it to be and may or may not hold. Both are what is being experienced and feel influence how one may view and live life.

Present this to voice how I seem to relate to this and respect your views on this.

I thank you for sharing your understandings.

[DreamKey]

I don't think there are two egos: one noticing and the other being noticed.

I was saying this is something the mind imagines. You might say you had a pain body attack yesterday. My point is you had a you attack. As a matter of speaking, I don't mind differentiating between the pain body and the personality or conditioned mind, as a matter of believing the pain body is separate from the conditioned mind, it's actually a component to it, and the very component at the source of mind identificaiton.

There is the consciousness that is a part of us. It is this and not the mind that can be aware of the ego. The ego itself is different. It is what Eckhart Tolle refers to as our pain body.

I would not say consciousness is a part. It's the whole enchilada. You could say the rest is illusion, or an appearance to, with only apparent reality, or whatever. But yea sure mind cannot be aware of ego because it is the unobserved mind that is ego.

It has its wants and identifies with everything we have and are. For example, if I am a teacher I will call myself a teacher and view myself as a teacher: this is the ego's identification of myself as a teacher whereas,

Ok but if you appear to be a teacher in the world of form, calling yourself a teacher doesn't mean you're unconscious. Often the roles peeps play embody identification issues, but an unwillingness to speak on the personal self can be an indication of disassociation into transcendence, or spiritual bypassing.

my consciousness which is part of source will not identify itself as a teacher. Most of us are not aware of our consciousness but fully aware of our egoic self/pain body.

I would say people are completely identified with the egoic self/pain body. If they're fully aware of it they would notice it starting to transmute into awareness itself. That transmutation is the essence of alchemy.

When we awaken to higher truths it is not the ego doing the awakening but our consciousness breaking through the 'blanket' of the ego and giving us a glimpse of reality/our higher selves and our purpose in life.



This is why I don't speak much on higher self, although there is a context where the idea is useful. If you're waking up to truth you aren't waking up to the purpose of the personal self in life. You're waking up to the fact that there is, ultimately speaking, no personal self. If that alters your life trajectory into some different outer purpose, great. You may end up doing exactly the same thing.

If you want to say the purpose of life is to realize you are at one with life, that's not the purpose of the personal self, because the personal self doesn't awaken. Life is already at one with itself.

One function of the personal self is to give consciousness the gateway to fall asleep in its own dream, and potential that opens due to that slumber is the ability for consciousness to wake up from that dream and be a conscious participant in its own creation, without identification. So while you may say some animals that seem deeply in tune with nature are in a state of unconscious oneness with life (when's the last time a frog had an existential crisis?), humans can enter into a state of conscious oneness, which can be fun to talk about. If you then want to attribute that awakening to a higher intelligence beyond thought, beyond humanness, beyond form even, that's fine. My point is the idea of purpose, even the idea of the 'universe wanting to wake up', is only a human idea, and a very limited way of looking at the shift away from identification with limitation generators.

So, it's important to differentiate between them and I agree with you that I am not my egoic mind but the consciousness that is having the experiences on earth.

Ok

[DreamKey]

The ego in fact may cause more pain to us by doing those things that will keep it alive and grow stronger. For example, if someone were to shout at me for no reason my ego would feel it necessary to shout back while my consciousness may suggest me to hold back.

Consciousness is impersonal and would not suggest anything. This is they very phenomenon I was speaking above, where the ego imagines there is an ego mind and a consciousness mind. This is what I sometimes call a split ego.

Here, if the ego were to win and I shout back I will be strengthening my ego by feeling proud of myself that 'I stood up for myself', etc. But by doing so my consciousness will decrease at the expense of the ego and I will suffer for my action emotionally (being angry at the person for some time).

Or maybe anger is precisely the energy you are repressing. The ego doesn't actually win or lose, because it's a battlefield with ego on both sides of the line. The only way to win the game is not to play.

Apart from that, your consciousness does not increase or decrease, although I know what you mean. I might call that falling into unconsciousness, and I'm certainly not saying getting anger is the most conscious solution. But if you think anger is a problem, seeing through that idea would be the end of the problem, and the only way you can do that is by noticing the idea in the first place. What is conscious of the idea is not the idea, is not the generator of the idea, and does not have a problem with you getting angry or being angry with someone all day. That's the person with the problem, and identification with that person is the suffering.

This 'pain' will be a direct result of my ego's reaction to the initial catalyst.

However, if I were not to react at all and I understand the person and accept him for who he is and forgive him I (my consciousness) am doing something that will lessen my ego. This will result in a growth of my consciousness at the expense of my ego.



Ok but if you don't react at all the idea to not react would not even arise. If you need to suppress a reaction, that suppression (which often involve unconsciousness) is a lot different than not having a reaction without the need for suppression at all. Suppression can wreak havoc on the mind body organism, and getting involved in teachings about an evil pain body entity that wants to take you over can actually make it worse.

Therefore consciousness does not cause pain to itself; it is the ego in its battle to survive. All the pain it causes then becomes a part of the egoic body which Eckhart Tolle refers to as the pain body.

I would say that life causes energetic movements like sadness and even pain. The suppression of that pain/sadness is what leads to the pain body, and the suppression dynamic is an unconscious thing. If you look at your anger example above, that can be the same dynamic that will keep lost in identification. Underneath anger is often pain, and in the willingness to get to the root of the anger, or tendency to want to get angry, is the absence of the idea to react or not react.

It sounds strange but the ego then identifies with all the pain as well as with other things such as ones occupation, wealth, etc.

I guess it is strange but it's entirely logical even if irrational. The things one identifies with on the positive spectrum, like job, appearance, wealth, relationships, etc. are the compensations for the unconscious perceived defects in the experiential vessel. Making the energy behind these defects conscious leads to the absence of the idea the vessel is defective, and the absence of the need to compensate. This does not prevent you from having money or working or being in relationship with other people. It prevents the suffering before it happens.

It will experience further opportunities for more pain but each time we can decide whether to give in to our egos and therefore cause more pain to ourselves or listen to our consciousness and remove some of that pain by lessening our egos.

Ok but you don't really have to listen to consciousness. Just be conscious, and maybe don't take your thoughts to seriously.

[DreamKey]

Hello,

Going through this discussion and some wonderful responses and insights.
Still something plays in the mind.

It seems that " ego" gets a lot of blame for this or that, but is it not just oneself?

Looking at what and/or how one views life and lives life?

To me while one may seek unity by thinking it is or not "Ego" and letting this go or come to terms with it in some way, develope in a way division with oneself.

For isn't one a composit of all that one may feel, express, project out and inward?

To me, it is not "Ego" it is oneself, myself and how I live life and think and taking responsibility for these.



Right, this is what I just addressed in my last couple posts. It may be more helpful to think of things in conscious/unconscious terms. The mind can perform dynamics without consciousness of what it's doing. This leads consciousness to identify with the mind.

An effect of these dynamics is what you may think of as unconscious energy, or the pain body. Noticing the pain body without decapitating it's structural integrity through noticing dynamics isn't likely to do very much than create a perpetual game of ego-pain body -mind versus consciousness mind.

This split personality structure embodies an already existing division, although in most cases it is a step in the more conscious direction. The ongoing struggle or search to end the pain body is something the seeking egoic mind actually gravitates toward, because it keeps identification in place. Who is the person when there is no battle to wage against oneself or the world? You can answer that question however you wish, but the truth of the matter is you have to see for yourself.

Just feeling at the moment that thinking in " Ego" terms tends to place focus on what may be flawed or " wrong" with me and cause further division in myself.

I understand some of the philosophies in regards to " Ego" . In the end though it is oneself, myself/ being and all that is lived and thought. More looking at the whole being instead of slicing and dicing it up into pieces ( so to speak).

Letting go of " Ego" to me at the moment is letting go that there is an " Ego". Just me, my being seems to be what is and all that comes and may come with this.

Just expressing some thoughts on this.

It's good stuff, thanks.

[DreamKey]

Hello, Moonglow.

All of these thoughts you are having the Hindus call Samsara. Who is thinking these things? It is an "I." That "I," or "Ego" if you will, believes that it is real because it is given stability and substance by thoughts. For example, what is an imperfection? An imperfection is obviously something that we perceive, and it is the thoughts which translate that perception into an imperfection. This exists only in the world of mind. And at the center of that mind is an illusory "I" who believes that what these thoughts are telling it are actually happening to them. This is what the Hindus call maya.

The entire universe exists in the mind of the experiencer. When one meditates they are striving to make the mind completely still. Perfection of this mental quiescence results in one awakening from the dream that they are this "I" living in the world of the thoughts and in possession of a body.

I disagree that meditation results in awakening, although this shift from consciousness perceived through the filter of thinking/conceptualization versus consciousness absent conceptualization is a noticeable shift.

Awakening from the dream of form is not a meditation experience in the dream of form. In the same way the person in your nightly dreams does not become lucid in the dream, it is the dreaming mind one layer removed from the dream with lucidity.

What you mention is direct experiential insight into the illusory nature of the one who would claim an experience as personal. That can be a great insight to have, and I don't mean to discount that, but to parallel that insight with awakening would be misguided.

[DreamKey]

Hello Wagner,

I can understand "Ego" being related to how one may think this or that to be.
It is a good question; "Who is doing the thinking?" If not oneself, then could ask; "Why are the thoughts there?" Which at the moment seems to be further " mind games" one can play with oneself. For me it is more just noticing the thoughts and what they may bring.

I feel this being that is being experienced is mind, body, and spirit. All comprised to form this person. Can relate that thoughts are passing phases. They shift and change and not all are accurate to how things are being. Just interpretation.



And I would go one step further and say the inaccurate interpretations which are experienced as suffering are a direct result of personal unconsciousness, which is why I advocate becoming conscious for those interested in transcending suffering.

But, they do serve a purpose in regards to helping sort things out at times, IMO. In these regards see them as part of experiencing life. For me, it is realizing what is serving and what is not.

I was raised Catholic, but at this juncture in my life don't follow any set practice.
Just, notice what may a rise in the mind and take from there. Stating this to give a little insight into how I am looking at this.

So, looking at " ego" as what or how one may think it to be, isn't this being experienced? If so can it be "let go" of? Isn't it more of recognizing thoughts and instead of holding onto to them, letting them come and go? To notice what they may bring to possibly raise ones awareness?

When I can settle my mind find this person that is being at present is still being.
But, all that is thought does not create my existing, only how I may perceive it to be and may or may not hold. Both are what is being experienced and feel influence how one may view and live life.

Present this to voice how I seem to relate to this and respect your views on this.

I thank you for sharing your understandings.

It's good clarity.

[Moonglow]

Right, this is what I just addressed in my last couple posts. It may be more helpful to think of things in conscious/unconscious terms. The mind can perform dynamics without consciousness of what it's doing. This leads consciousness to identify with the mind.

An effect of these dynamics is what you may think of as unconscious energy, or the pain body. Noticing the pain body without decapitating it's structural integrity through noticing dynamics isn't likely to do very much than create a perpetual game of ego-pain body -mind versus consciousness mind.

This split personality structure embodies an already existing division, although in most cases it is a step in the more conscious direction. The ongoing struggle or search to end the pain body is something the seeking egoic mind actually gravitates toward, because it keeps identification in place. Who is the person when there is no battle to wage against oneself or the world? You can answer that question however you wish, but the truth of the matter is you have to see for yourself.



It's good stuff, thanks.

Hi DreamKey,

What you presented has me reflecting further on this.

Find to place the thinking into conscious/ unconscious for me helps to relate to looking at it better.

Even in this just adding there is no division of self, just what one may be aware of and notices. Which feel is what you are addressing?

So can relate that it is not so much trying to destroy something or a part of one, but becoming more aware of what may arise with in one. By doing this better able to change the thinking and perspective towards how one views life and the self. This is where, for me, there may be some confusion as to what the philosophy/ teaching about " Ego". It seems, to me, to be more pointing at raising ones consciousness/awareness.

The " Ego" is not a separate entity it is just a reference, IMO. To place in terms of what one is conscious of or unconscious of and how these may interact and influence seems to direct the focus more in line with me. I personally don't use the word ego in the sense of saying; "The ego made me do it" :smile:

Yes, to look at the dynamics of my thinking. To look deeper into what may cause certain thoughts to arise. I have noticed this does create change in how I may interact with others and shifts in how I feel. What comes to mind is thinking is creating in the sense it can alter ones outlook and how one feels.

It is all connected and some things run deep with in. So, for me it is taking notice. When it comes into the consciousness acknowledge it. Sometimes may take stepping back a bit and letting myself work it out. To not always react, but take note.

Whether it is to wage battle or work with what occurs seems the choice given.
Whether it is identified or just notice what is happening seems the choice as well. All may give what is needed at the moment, the trick for me is to be aware of what each may bring.

Can spend a lifetime trying to figure it out or to live as best I can with what is and may occur. It is all oneself living this life, IMO.

Thank you for your thoughts.

[DreamKey]

Hi DreamKey,

What you presented has me reflecting further on this.

Find to place the thinking into conscious/ unconscious for me helps to relate to looking at it better.

Even in this just adding there is no division of self, just what one may be aware of and notices. Which feel is what you are addressing?



I'm not sure what you're asking here.

So can relate that it is not so much trying to destroy something or a part of one, but becoming more aware of what may arise with in one. By doing this better able to change the thinking and perspective towards how one views life and the self. This is where, for me, there may be some confusion as to what the philosophy/ teaching about " Ego". It seems, to me, to be more pointing at raising ones consciousness/awareness.



The point in talking about how the unconscious mind (ego) functions is to make the person more conscious. As the person becomes more conscious, there can be a split movement, where the person unconsciously wants to resist the becoming conscious process, yet simultaneously experiences the benefits of being less unconscious. These benefits are noticed as absences, and not additions.

The " Ego" is not a separate entity it is just a reference, IMO. To place in terms of what one is conscious of or unconscious of and how these may interact and influence seems to direct the focus more in line with me. I personally don't use the word ego in the sense of saying; "The ego made me do it" :smile:



Yea when all else fails, blame the ego! But right, the ego is not an entity, in the same way the pain body is not an entity. If we just call the ego the unobserved mind, then we can turn the focus to noticing how the mind is functioning, and becoming conscious.

Yes, to look at the dynamics of my thinking. To look deeper into what may cause certain thoughts to arise. I have noticed this does create change in how I may interact with others and shifts in how I feel. What comes to mind is thinking is creating in the sense it can alter ones outlook and how one feels.



Repetitive thoughts tend to possess hooks in the unconscious mind. Typically what is resisted is some form of pain, and the classical resistance mechanism is seeking. Of course you can become conscious of all sorts of fears that mask that pain, which can be a good starting point.

The first that comes to mind is fear of pain, haha. But fear of loss, vulnerability, rejection, abandonment, judgment: these are very common fears in the collective engine.

It is all connected and some things run deep with in. So, for me it is taking notice. When it comes into the consciousness acknowledge it. Sometimes may take stepping back a bit and letting myself work it out. To not always react, but take note.

Whether it is to wage battle or work with what occurs seems the choice given.
Whether it is identified or just notice what is happening seems the choice as well. All may give what is needed at the moment, the trick for me is to be aware of what each may bring.

Can spend a lifetime trying to figure it out or to live as best I can with what is and may occur. It is all oneself living this life, IMO.

Thank you for your thoughts.

And to you as well.

[Wagner]

I disagree that meditation results in awakening, although this shift from consciousness perceived through the filter of thinking/conceptualization versus consciousness absent conceptualization is a noticeable shift.
It could be a crisis in variable use of terminology. Anyways, who or what is disagreeing? Where does this disagreement occur? It occurs in the thoughts, and the one that believes that the thoughts belong to it is the Ego. It is the innate tendencies of the mind which cause the thoughts to go out and assign name and form and substance to what we perceive. This is the creation of maya. Thought is the substratum of all belief/concept. When the thoughts are made silent through meditation (or any other means which can accomplish this) then the beliefs/concepts have no substance to subsist on and disappear. This gives the Ego absolutely nothing to identify with. What is left is an unalloyed, pristine state of pure am-ness.

"I am x." No matter what you assign to the variable 'x' in that sentence, it denotes an identification with something and that defines, implicitly or explicitly, an Ego.

What you mention is direct experiential insight into the illusory nature of the one who would claim an experience as personal. That can be a great insight to have, and I don't mean to discount that, but to parallel that insight with awakening would be misguided.
How do you define awakening? What awakens and to what state?

[Moonglow]

The point in talking about how the unconscious mind (ego) functions is to make the person more conscious. As the person becomes more conscious, there can be a split movement, where the person unconsciously wants to resist the becoming conscious process, yet simultaneously experiences the benefits of being less unconscious. These benefits are noticed as absences, and not additions.



Yea when all else fails, blame the ego! But right, the ego is not an entity, in the same way the pain body is not an entity. If we just call the ego the unobserved mind, then we can turn the focus to noticing how the mind is functioning, and becoming conscious.



Repetitive thoughts tend to possess hooks in the unconscious mind. Typically what is resisted is some form of pain, and the classical resistance mechanism is seeking. Of course you can become conscious of all sorts of fears that mask that pain, which can be a good starting point.

The first that comes to mind is fear of pain, haha. But fear of loss, vulnerability, rejection, abandonment, judgment: these are very common fears in the collective engine.



And to you as well.

The question that pops into mind is; What is the person becoming conscious of?
Can say that the person is becoming aware of oneself, yet what comprises this?

What makes up a person seems complex. Some things just take time to unfold and to make sense of. A person may not be ready to face certain things about him/ her self at the moment, so it gets placed on the back burner.

I have found have come across information and been told certain things about me in the past, but it took some experience and maturing to bring understanding and acceptance of these. Other things have been dropped. Getting at that it is an on going process.

A process that not only involves the mind, but the body and the connection however felt to life ( spirit).

Yes, thoughts influence ones perceptive and feelings. The body also holds emotion. What is forgotten or repressed in the mind is held in the body.
Find this to be true when doing message work and the person has an emotional release.

This is what leads me to state it is all connected. Focusing on one aspect may help, but if not considering the other aspects of my being this person. To me can be damanging as well. Further expanding my view on this.

Can agree, noticing the thoughts and what they may bring is a good start.
Would venture to say it is not only the thoughts, but also being conscious of how one acts upon these. To distinguish whether they serve to motivate and/or bring more understanding or they hinder/and cause more division seems to be what I get through noticing thoughts.

Where yes fear can be a factor. Look at it this way can either face the fear or be stuck in the same pattern until I do. Or have the pain grow in me until there is no choice but to face it or have it make me sick. For with the pain comes held emotions, which is held energy, which will eventually go somewhere. Which would venture to say the course chosen to take is affected by ones thinking.

[DreamKey]

It could be a crisis in variable use of terminology. Anyways, who or what is disagreeing? Where does this disagreement occur? It occurs in the thoughts, and the one that believes that the thoughts belong to it is the Ego.

I didn't see a crisis. I saw you describe a meditative experience and was simply pointing out that awakening is from the experiential framework and not a person in it. Relatively speaking obviously my thoughts are mine and yours are yours, and when these thoughts are different it's called a disagreement. Trump and Hilary really do disagree with each other in Maya.

It is the innate tendencies of the mind which cause the thoughts to go out and assign name and form and substance to what we perceive. This is the creation of maya.

Mind is nothing but thought/emotion, and so to call thought the cause of itself would be a misnomer. Apparent movement (which is singular) appearing to the non-appearing witness (which isn't 'actually separate') allows identification with an object, the mind.

So, consciousness is the cause of the mind, as opposed to the mind being the cause of itself.

Thought is the substratum of all belief/concept. When the thoughts are made silent through meditation (or any other means which can accomplish this) then the beliefs/concepts have no substance to subsist on and disappear. This gives the Ego absolutely nothing to identify with. What is left is an unalloyed, pristine state of pure am-ness.



What is left is a mind state without thought, and that is exactly what the Ego identifies with. The thing in the mind state is the person, and the thing identified with a personal experience of am-ness is the Ego. Are you the only one having this experience or can other people have it too?


"I am x." No matter what you assign to the variable 'x' in that sentence, it denotes an identification with something and that defines, implicitly or explicitly, an Ego.


How do you define awakening? What awakens and to what state?

I would say awakening is a loss of identification with the mind or person. You could say consciousness awakens from identification with the person, who is unconscious.

Awakening isn't a state of consciousness, however. The state of the person exists in awakened consciousness.

[DreamKey]

The question that pops into mind is; What is the person becoming conscious of?
Can say that the person is becoming aware of oneself, yet what comprises this?



The person isn't becoming conscious of anything. Consciousness becomes conscious of unconsciousness. Or you could say, consciousness transmutes unconsciousness into itself. Unconsciousness can be anything from mental dynamics to actual energy.

As far as the merging experience into oneness, you could say awareness is becoming aware it is not the person in awareness.

What makes up a person seems complex. Some things just take time to unfold and to make sense of. A person may not be ready to face certain things about him/ her self at the moment, so it gets placed on the back burner.

I have found have come across information and been told certain things about me in the past, but it took some experience and maturing to bring understanding and acceptance of these. Other things have been dropped. Getting at that it is an on going process.

A process that not only involves the mind, but the body and the connection however felt to life ( spirit).

Yes, thoughts influence ones perceptive and feelings. The body also holds emotion. What is forgotten or repressed in the mind is held in the body.
Find this to be true when doing message work and the person has an emotional release.



Those emotions are what are being made conscious.

This is what leads me to state it is all connected. Focusing on one aspect may help, but if not considering the other aspects of my being this person. To me can be damanging as well. Further expanding my view on this.

Can agree, noticing the thoughts and what they may bring is a good start.
Would venture to say it is not only the thoughts, but also being conscious of how one acts upon these. To distinguish whether they serve to motivate and/or bring more understanding or they hinder/and cause more division seems to be what I get through noticing thoughts.



Sure, noticing the division can initiate the willingness to surrender the divisive thoughts. In this sense surrender does not result from doing anything, but noticing and being conscious.

Where yes fear can be a factor. Look at it this way can either face the fear or be stuck in the same pattern until I do. Or have the pain grow in me until there is no choice but to face it or have it make me sick. For with the pain comes held emotions, which is held energy, which will eventually go somewhere. Which would venture to say the course chosen to take is affected by ones thinking.

Right, no choice. Noticing leading to willingness giving way to allowing.

[guthrio]

Wow! I did not expect all those interesting replies. I shall take my time to digest them.

Thanks,

Tony.

Tony,

Am glad that so many respondents to your OP have provided such interesting replies about ego.

I'd like to provide yet another reply for your digestion, in addition to my earlier posts within this thread...but which you may find to be more to-the-point than references to "dawning realizations".

I invite you to look at the PDF version of the reference, below, received through channeler Jane Roberts, entitled, The Nature of Personal Reality.

Incidentally, this reference more satisfactorily answered many of my own questions, such as from an earlier post in this thread about finding solutions to the ego-generated problems of the human condition.

I believe many of your questions about ego can be answered in this reference....even some of those you raised in a 2nd post pertaining to drugs, personality, etc,. (You may find it helpful to apply the "find" function to pinpoint paragraphs among the 468 pages containing the words "ego", "purpose", "drugs", and "problems").

The 2nd reference is aptly named, A Compilation of Exercises, and includes guidance from some of Jane Roberts' other books about dealing with many of Life's problems....by applying knowledge that has always been available to us, but has historically (and purposely) been blocked out of our cultural awareness, to deny us its benefits.

Hope these help...

Reference: http://www.shemeam.com/pdf/Jane_Roberts-The_Nature_of_Personal_Reality.pdf The Nature of Personal Reality

Reference: http://www.gestaltreality.com/downloads/Compilation%20of%20Exercises%20-%20Seth%20and%20Jane%20Roberts.pdf A Compilation Of Exercises

Reference: http://www.spiritualforums.com/vb/showpost.php?p=855336&postcount=10 The Silent Knowledge

[Wagner]

I didn't see a crisis. I saw you describe a meditative experience and was simply pointing out that awakening is from the experiential framework and not a person in it. Relatively speaking obviously my thoughts are mine and yours are yours, and when these thoughts are different it's called a disagreement. Trump and Hilary really do disagree with each other in Maya.
I was being facetious by my use of the word "crisis." Trust me. ;)

Mind is nothing but thought/emotion, and so to call thought the cause of itself would be a misnomer. Apparent movement (which is singular) appearing to the non-appearing witness (which isn't 'actually separate') allows identification with an object, the mind.

So, consciousness is the cause of the mind, as opposed to the mind being the cause of itself.

What is left is a mind state without thought, and that is exactly what the Ego identifies with. The thing in the mind state is the person, and the thing identified with a personal experience of am-ness is the Ego. Are you the only one having this experience or can other people have it too?

Yet these are all still just thoughts. This is what I'm saying. These thoughts themselves, with our awareness going through them and assimilating them, as one reads the words of a storybook, is samsara. Maybe that is what you refer to as an "Experiential Framework", DreamKey?

Anything that you can say or that I can say is all concepts existing in thought. And all of these concepts are ultimately garbage, save in so far as they can lead us to cultivating that experience which obtains before and beyond the ratiocinating faculty.

Everything that we think we are exists in thoughts: memories, sensations, beliefs, feelings, etc. The mind is nothing more than the sum of all of these, anchored, as it were, to an illusory identity that calls itself "I."

Now, this mind, tethered as it is to the central illusion of "I" or Ego, is cast upon a background of pure, blissful being-ness or consciousness (which are the same thing, semantics aside; the Silent Witness this background has been called). The experience of that being-ness, when totally bereft of definition or modification, is called samadhi. (Samadhi as meant in the Hindu sense, not the Buddhist. They are different.)

Again, my words are all garbage because words can only convey a suggestive counterfeit, which is nothing compared to the experience.

I would say awakening is a loss of identification with the mind or person. You could say consciousness awakens from identification with the person, who is unconscious.

Awakening isn't a state of consciousness, however. The state of the person exists in awakened consciousness.
Then it seems we both agree that eventually one needs to experience nirvikalpa samadhi, as the Hindus call it. The Buddhists call it nirodha samapatti. In either case the terms are identical in practical meaning and refer to the utter cessation of all being.

You are Buddhist, DreamKey? I'm a practicing Jnani...in progress of course.

That said, obviously it is up to the individual to agree or disagree with what we say as they wish. I will aver that I am not under the delusion that my words (or any words) can foster truth. Again and again I repeat, echoing the words of St. Thomas Aquinas: "My words are as straw."

I can but exhort anyone who wishes to experience these things for themselves, beyond the realm of mere intellectual interest, to still the thoughts and silence the mind, lest you get lost in The Endless Jungle of Words and Concepts.

That's just my unworthy opinion, and commentary on my own words and opinions is clearly stated above. :)

Peace to all.

[DreamKey]

I was being facetious by my use of the word "crisis." Trust me. ;)




Give me a reason to trust you and I will.

Yet these are all still just thoughts. This is what I'm saying. These thoughts themselves, with our awareness going through them and assimilating them, as one reads the words of a storybook, is samsara. Maybe that is what you refer to as an "Experiential Framework", DreamKey?



Sometimes thoughts are logical and rational, while sometimes they lack both those qualities. The former are products of a conscious mind, the latter products of the unconsciously mind identified. They are still just thoughts, not what you are, but I always do my best to point one to the former, and point one away from the latter.

As far as experiential framework, I mean the framework of time and space. I also mean that the mind state without thought is in that framework, while what is aware of the framework is not. Whether or not you are thinking does not affect the fact that what you are not the thinker. A quiet mind may be a byproduct of consciousness realization, but it is not the path to it.

Anything that you can say or that I can say is all concepts existing in thought. And all of these concepts are ultimately garbage, save in so far as they can lead us to cultivating that experience which obtains before and beyond the ratiocinating faculty.

Everything that we think we are exists in thoughts: memories, sensations, beliefs, feelings, etc. The mind is nothing more than the sum of all of these, anchored, as it were, to an illusory identity that calls itself "I."



Ok but what is prior to the faculties is not an experience you perceive with your faculties. You mention cultivating an experience of awareness and I am saying awareness is having an experience of the person. To point toward awareness as an experience is misguided.

Now, this mind, tethered as it is to the central illusion of "I" or Ego, is cast upon a background of pure, blissful being-ness or consciousness (which are the same thing, semantics aside; the Silent Witness this background has been called). The experience of that being-ness, when totally bereft of definition or modification, is called samadhi. (Samadhi as meant in the Hindu sense, not the Buddhist. They are different.)



I agree there is a witness to experience and I also agree in the absence of the conceptual overlay mind states of samadhi arise. I'm also saying the feeling of bliss/beingness is in your body, and in that sense the feeling is entirely personal, and also, witnessed. The witness is not a feeling witnessed.

On a certain level, you could say awareness permeates everything appearing in awareness, but it is in no way shape or form limited to any one feeling, particularly bliss/beingness.

Again, my words are all garbage because words can only convey a suggestive counterfeit, which is nothing compared to the experience.


I don't think your words are garbage. They convey a level of consciousness that I can appreciate. The direct experience of Samadhi can be conceptualized as both blissful and even sacred. It is also, logically speaking, an experience in the time space framework. The awareness I'm pointing toward is not in that framework.

Along that line, Samadhi isn't a key to the realization that awareness is not the person, which is what I'm talking about. The idea that a person is going into and out of Samadhi based on whether or not he or she is thinking (which is what you seem to be saying), actually, can be the biggest obstacle to self realization. The reason for that is the mind's tendency to divide itself into a thinking mind and a silent mind, and call the silent mind 'direct experience of awareness'. Then the direct experience of awareness is used to re-enforce a new identity to shield and cope with the effects of the apparent limitations of the emotional body. This is not a conscious thing.

Then it seems we both agree that eventually one needs to experience nirvikalpa samadhi, as the Hindus call it. The Buddhists call it nirodha samapatti. In either case the terms are identical in practical meaning and refer to the utter cessation of all being.



I don't think anyone needs to experience anything. I am saying freedom from suffering is possible and realizable, it just isn't attainable except through any other means than a loss, and not a gain.

You are Buddhist, DreamKey? I'm a practicing Jnani...in progress of course.



If you're practicing, does that not make one still ajnani? No, I'm not Buddhist. I have spiritual lines in Hinduism and Christianity, but consider myself more of a wandering mystic.

That said, obviously it is up to the individual to agree or disagree with what we say as they wish. I will aver that I am not under the delusion that my words (or any words) can foster truth. Again and again I repeat, echoing the words of St. Thomas Aquinas: "My words are as straw."



Ok but words really can embody delusion. Saying all words are ultimately speaking garbage can be a great way to bypass scrutinizing what one is thinking. Meaning, within a certain context, all words are not garbage. Some can be quite direct, sharp, useful, and informative. Other can be uplifting and jovial. Others can be mean spirited and divisive. What is the expression? Throwing the baby out with the bath water?

I can but exhort anyone who wishes to experience these things for themselves, beyond the realm of mere intellectual interest, to still the thoughts and silence the mind, lest you get lost in The Endless Jungle of Words and Concepts.

That's just my unworthy opinion, and commentary on my own words and opinions is clearly stated above. :)

Peace to all.

Well it's not that clearly stated. You say things and then reiterate everything you say is garbage. Then you proclaim yourself as a pointer toward mystical union, which makes it seem as if your ego has co-opted your experience in order to perpetuate an ongoing identification issue of which you seem completely unconscious. In order to remain unconscious, you brush off probes to your reason and intellect, re-state your original conclusion that words are garbage (a dismissive conclusion with little basis in argument as posited by you), declare you are not your intellect, but hold onto the idea that you can use your intellect to help others transcend the intellect and directly experience oneness. It's a big giant con job, and while you may not be able to see it, I'm sure others can.