I agree with redgreenvines, and would add that I think it wise to titrate (adjust downward) your medication, in order to find the minimal optimal dosage - one that works but has the least unwanted side effects. Bipolar used to be classified as an "affective psychosis," in DSM III, but changed it to a major mood disorder in DSM IV-R, There, you can see type I &II, hypomanic, manic, hypermanic episodic phases. Whatever. Bipolar is highly correlated with chemical imbalances, and not to be a party-pooper, psychedelics are contraindicated (forever, if one is a psychiatrist who is responsible for his/her patient), but at least until you are older and stabilized. Technically, you are still in adolescence until you are 25 years old. That is the age that car rental places and automobile insurance companies recognize adult development for their purposes, and they're based on developmental findings.
Ego is a word first popularized by Freud, but which has different meanings when applied by different theorists. In a nutshell, one's ego constitutes one's conscious, waking life. It is a cohesive psychic structure which forms one's individual identity. One's embodied ego is characterized by one's identification with one's physical body and body image. The "egoic-mind" as Eckhart Tolle explains it, is a useful concept. I recommend reading The Power of Now if you haven't. John Lennon tried to 'kill his ego' in a misunderstanding of the reading of The Psychedelic Experience, and he complained bitterly about almost ruining his very creative life (ego)! The cessation [Sanskrit: Nirvana] of the individual identity characterizes a range of transpersonal or transcendental experiences. In Hindu and Buddhist thought, such an experience is symbolized by the 'seed syllable' OM. In such an experience, the limited identity of one's body, and the mundane aspects of mind (sensations, thoughts, emotions) are temporarily annihilated. In place of one's individual identity, a "hyperpranic" or "psychocosmic" reality of light, ecstasy, sound with a seemingly universal and eternal nature is experienced at the Brain Center. It is an identity of Pure Consciousness (a PCEvent).
The experience of Infinity/Eternity can only maintain for so long. It is very radiant, pure, ethereal, but ultimately sterile. It is like standing at the 'peak' of Mt. Everest. One cannot live in that rarified, ultraviolet irradiated iciness for long. It is a 'peak' experience in both cases, the inner taking its name from the latter. Like a mountaineer, one needs to descend the mountain (like the mythical Moses) after having an Enlightenment experience, communicate (Throat Center) this experience to others (there are 'others' again, when at the peak, there was only ONE[NESS]). One returns to the Human sphere (Heart Center), and this is the place where the Infinite has descended into the finitude of the human heart. In Buddhist yoga, this movement is symbolized by the syllables OM-AH-HUM, and symbolizes the Brain-Throat-Heart centers respectively.
Bringing 'OM' from Brain to Heart, it becomes 'HUM', and represents the 'plateau' on which human beings must dwell. The temporary annihilation of one's ego must result in a 'resurrection' of the ego, and this a deeply significant if one applies the above process to the gospel stories about experiences at Pentacost, or with the baptism (of the Holy Spirit), death, resurrection and ascension stories about Jesus that are described as outer events. Esoteric Christianity recognizes these so-called events as inner moments of spiritual development. They are universal, not just Buddhist or Christian. Ancient Egypt had the earliest version.
In other words: one NEEDS a strong but resilient ego in order to develop spiritually. After an Enlightenment or peak experience, however, one's ego becomes 'enlightened' by the descending 'energies' at the peak. One's Body-Speech-Mind (Brain-Throat-Heart) become transformed into vehicles of Enlightened Mind. IF, one applies Psychedelic Experience to classical spiritual experience, then we are talking about the same thing. But again, this requires effort so as not 'backslide' into one's old personality. The parables about the sower in the NT speak to what happens when people who 'receive the word [logos] of God,' and then regress back to the old nature of the unenlightened egoic-mind. You do not want to kill your ego. The result would be called decompensation - a disintegration of the personality. The body-ego and the egoic-mind still need to operate on the first three chakra motivations of survival, sex and social interest, else one finds himself in a state hospital, jacking off publicly, throwing feces and drooling from the psychotropic medication. You may want to read about the "egoic-mind" from Tolle's book.
"For you are clearly a letter of Christ, the fruit of our work, recorded not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in stone, but in s of flesh." - 2 Corinthians 3:3
Best wishes, MtG
Edited by MarkostheGnostic (07/07/11 03:06 PM)
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