Thoughts on Ego

[Baile]

Originally Posted by Rayden_Greywolf

Are we meant to view individuation as a bad thing to be avoided or destroyed at all cost?

Monks and nuns from centuries past followed a religious path and cloistered themselves away from society, in essence to destroy their ego and individuality. Are we meant to forever live in a consciousness state comparable to that of a 10th-century religious individual? Or has human consciousness evolved since then? Those would be my questions as they relate to the topic.

[youngnostic]

Originally Posted by Rayden_Greywolf

Are we meant to view individuation as a bad thing to be avoided or destroyed at all cost?

My take on it, is that I AM connected to ALL including the allness within the unmanifest, or even perhaps that first and foremost, which means an individual self is an illusion.

[youngnostic]

Originally Posted by Baile

I just read your first post in your "Merging" thread. Now I understand a bit more. I would suggest smoking seriously inhibits the ability to see life and reality as the means whereby we can come to experiential wisdom. Altering one's consciousness like that, is altering one's essential (human) relationship to reality. Altering essential reality in that way, makes reality "not real." That's the reason most people smoke and drink in fact, to avoid the reality of the world.

I don't smoke, I'm anti-mind-altering of any kind actually. But I'm not bringing this up for that reason. I'm pointing this out to explain why it is impossible to have an authentic dialogue with you on this topic. I'm standing on the beach talking to you, and you're out in the water beneath the waves, trying to communicate with me. Under these circumstances -- these two entirely different consciousness-perspectives we're each coming from -- I can't hear you, you can't hear me, and everything we say to each other is garbled.

I have no problem with those who wanna label subjective reality as objective or real.
The illusion is definitely practical and seems real by all intents and purposes.
As for the mind altering drugs; I wouldn't hold such black and white thinking that compartmentalizes others... these are just surface things, part of the illusion, part of the Matrix.
You eat food, you breathe air, you bathe in the sun... all these things are mind altering. But thanks for your input nevertheless.

[iamthat]

Originally Posted by youngnostic

My take on it, is that I AM connected to ALL including the allness within the unmanifest, or even perhaps that first and foremost, which means an individual self is an illusion.

Perhaps we have to differentiate between individual consciousness and the idea of the personal self.

We are Being, experiencing creation as individualised consciousness which manifests in form as some kind of personal identity.

When consciousness identifies with personality in form, that personal identity seems real.

When consciousness rests in itself, the personal identity is seen to be an illusion.

When consciousness identifies with Being then consciousness knows itself to be one with everything.

But even within this unity, individual consciousness remains.

Peace.

[Jyotir]

Originally Posted by iamthat

Perhaps we have to differentiate between individual consciousness and the idea of the personal self.

We are Being, experiencing creation as individualised consciousness which manifests in form as some kind of personal identity.

When consciousness identifies with personality in form, that personal identity seems real.

When consciousness rests in itself, the personal identity is seen to be an illusion.

When consciousness identifies with Being then consciousness knows itself to be one with everything.

But even within this unity, individual consciousness remains.

Peace.

A good suggestion and synopsis iamthat, hopefully one that spiritual aspirants of the forum will heed and apply.

I would also add that misguided 'ego-defenders' would benefit enormously by not equating ego with individualization exclusively, and take the time and effort to refine the understanding of terms they seem to casually employ in discussion - but also importantly, must necessarily be employing those self-conflicted confusions in practice as a result.

The 'ego' is the separative consciousness within the differentiated individual human being which must be annihilated, which is precisely what the ego is fearful of - because it sees itself falsely as separate AND sovereign within 'reality', and if separative consciousness is annihilated, then self and reality is annihilated as well, e.g., 'the game' is over. Not true, and that is the illusion.

Ego is inherently ignorant of Truth because it sees reality in and through the very falsehood and limitation that it is. It must be annihilated because any trace of that separative consciousness is a sustainment and perpetuation of ignorance (or illusion/'unreal').

On the other hand, the soul (jivatman) is the fully conscious aspect of the individuated human being which is permanently one with all Being in truth consciousness.

As is suggested, it is the identification by the individual with either the separative consciousness (ego) leading to worldly strife, or the soul which leads to the realization of One Self which the soul intrinsically possesses - consciously.

True: we are uniquely differentiated individuals of and within One Self.
But 'ego' does not represent the totality of that individuation.
iow...Individual self does not represent illusion - separate self does.

~ J