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quinn
some kinda love


Registered: 01/02/10
Posts: 6,799
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ego stuff
#17077746 - 10/22/12 08:14 AM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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you know what's hard about the ego? first just believing that it exists. sometimes i try to forget it exists and sometimes that works a bit... thinking it exists and thinking about 'it', or trying to get rid of 'it', to exorcise 'it' from my system, seems to keep me trapped in it and sometimes makes things worse...
the other thing that is hard about the ego is that in some clear sense it does exist... and what is even harder are the ugly things i see, and am known by other people for, that are a result of my ego's ugly head, or are a mask to cover it's ugly face...
but even harder still is that that persona that was caused by my ego is not in itself bad, and the masks are not bad either but they are so engrained in my character, that i will be often be reminded and suspect my ego is behind it even if it sometimes isnt... and this will make me paranoid and defensive, dwelling on myself and self bitterness... which just kind of reinforces the ego i suppose... round in a cycle.
i personally dont think thinking more about these ego things is helpful . i think thinking about nothing is helpful and sometimes i try do that, like meditation. it seems to work pretty well.
i think spirituality sometimes sells this idea of 'revelation' and complete break from the ego and it's effects, but this seems unrealistic if not impossible imo, in some sense the damage is done and the effects are there... i could be wrong tho...
-------------------- dripping with fantasy
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crkhd
☾☼☽

Registered: 12/28/08
Posts: 2,401
Loc: A human sphere enfolding ...
Last seen: 9 months, 2 days
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Re: ego stuff [Re: quinn]
#17077858 - 10/22/12 08:47 AM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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Actually it is certainly possible. I witness it happening day by day; the ego slowly dissolving away. You are right that the damage is done and the effects are there. Imagine that is precipitate in a glass, dissolving the ego via spiritual practice is essentially like pouring in water and emptying the whole cup so it is now spotlessly clean.
The fundamental is to eliminate the sources of negative karmas in your daily life. The main aspect of this is to choose your friends/relationships wiser than wisely. Your friends/family/acquaintances control your reality and by continually only seeking the highest quality of souls can you place yourself in a position where your ego dissolves. In fact if you hang around with assholes, even the slightest negativity on their part seeps into your own mind via the firing of mirror neurons; we take on the mannerisms and accent and personality traits of our closest friends whoever they may be.
Remember when you were a child? Pure egolessness? That perspective can be reattained with the added benefit of years of wisdom and developed intellect. To do this you must climb the spiritual mountain above in such a way that allows your mind to totally encompass in understanding the actions of your past, from all sides & perspectives without taking any sides. Then you shine your compassion and illuminate the entire situation and thus the karmas dissolve away; you will feel your neurons rewire themselves in real time.
But above all, you must be relentless in doing good works because to not do so is to stagnate and to stagnate is to fall into the clutches of the ego irrespective of however much you may have deceived yourself into thinking you are a good person. I mean I know plenty of people who claim "I'm a good person, I'm OK" but they lie, cheat, steal without a care and they do not even notice.
One must dispel ALL illusions of being a good or a bad person and start from scratch. Remember all those bombs we dropped on Iraq, Afghanistan and a boatload of other nations? One million people marched in protest against those wars. But guess what? They paid for those bombs. Standing around in the city centre shouting at walls, then to go home and transfer money into the hands of trained killers: which of these two tactics creates more pronounced results? Your clothes? Slave labour. Your food? Animal torture. Indirectly supporting evil is directly supporting evil; to claim "I'm not responsible for bombing Iraq because someone else abused my tax money" is to try and escape the fact that you paid the tax with your own sovereignty. Indeed, claiming your evils are the work of others' is a total relinquishment of your status as a sovereign individual.
Remember, you are dying with each breath. Every single day you do not go TWO steps forward in yourself is a day that you have gone one step back, towards your grave.
-------------------- "Everything there is, and all that there is, is a Pattern of unspeakable proportion. The Pattern contains everything that is, completely fixed in succession, all the minimal particles interconnected in every way that is. Every way that is is not every conceivable way, because not everything that can be conceived is manifest in the pattern." "THE Human, you, is a miniscule but essential part of that pattern. In it lies complete fulfillment. It will never become something it is not, but it will never need to be anything else." - Wiccan_Seeker "If boring drudgery was the way of the universe, everything would have killed itself long ago." - Spacerific
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PocketLady



Registered: 01/18/10
Posts: 1,773
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Re: ego stuff [Re: quinn]
#17078016 - 10/22/12 09:26 AM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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I used to believe the spiritual concept/ideology of getting rid of the ego, but now I think your ego is actually just your sense of self, it is what makes you you. Without the ego you would have no concept of "I". The ego is what separates us from animals, this sense of self awareness, so why would we want to get rid of it?
Obviously there are parts of our personalities that are distorted and not our "true selves" but I think to label them ego is a misnomer. But I do agree that often people are not their true selves , and I think that happens for a lot of different reasons. The secret (and I am still working on this myself!) seems to be getting to the bottom of why these undesirable traits exist. What has happened in my life that has stopped me from/made me scared of/meant I can't be my true self? If I truly unconditionally loved myself would I still prevent myself from being the real me?
Have you heard of the Emotional Freedom Technique? It's a really great way of releasing attachment to things that don't make us happy.
-------------------- Love is from the infinite, and will remain until eternity. The seeker of love escapes the chains of birth and death. Tomorrow, when resurrection comes, The heart that is not in love will fail the test. ~ Rumi The day we start giving Love instead of seeking Love, we will have re-written our whole destiny. ~ Swami Chinmayanada Saraswatir
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quinn
some kinda love


Registered: 01/02/10
Posts: 6,799
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Re: ego stuff [Re: crkhd]
#17078060 - 10/22/12 09:36 AM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
The fundamental is to eliminate the sources of negative karmas in your daily life. The main aspect of this is to choose your friends/relationships wiser than wisely. Your friends/family/acquaintances control your reality and by continually only seeking the highest quality of souls can you place yourself in a position where your ego dissolves. In fact if you hang around with assholes, even the slightest negativity on their part seeps into your own mind via the firing of mirror neurons; we take on the mannerisms and accent and personality traits of our closest friends whoever they may be.
well i really like this, (and the mirror neuron thing is pretty interesting, tho i do believe that the people you hang around with and their egoish thoughts should not be able to effect your own or even have you view those friends negatively... people are just people, any bad judgement i hold over them is usually just a reflection of myself and my ego)...
i have totally found tho that positive interaction with other people has transformed me more than any personal pondering has been able to...
Quote:
Remember when you were a child? Pure egolessness? That perspective can be reattained with the added benefit of years of wisdom and developed intellect. To do this you must climb the spiritual mountain above in such a way that allows your mind to totally encompass in understanding the actions of your past, from all sides & perspectives without taking any sides. Then you shine your compassion and illuminate the entire situation and thus the karmas dissolve away; you will feel your neurons rewire themselves in real time.
But above all, you must be relentless in doing good works because to not do so is to stagnate and to stagnate is to fall into the clutches of the ego irrespective of however much you may have deceived yourself into thinking you are a good person. I mean I know plenty of people who claim "I'm a good person, I'm OK" but they lie, cheat, steal without a care and they do not even notice.
i dont want to climb spiritual mountains. at least not for now.
when i was a child i was very egoic and expected everything to be done for me. i was generally happy and free, but sometimes i was also cruel
i think part of the problem is that you learn this idea of ego and how it is something wrong or bad and retrospectively see it in you. and you feel you need to expunge this badness from you, that there is something wrong with you. and the thread of that idea is what i would pick out of your post: being 'relentless in doing goodness' sounds like some kind of compensation, or attonement, or deletion of this 'badness'.
dont you think it would be better to stop thinking there is something wrong with you in the first place? to just forget the idea of the ego altogether?
Quote:
One must dispel ALL illusions of being a good or a bad person and start from scratch.
ah there you said it
Quote:
Remember all those bombs we dropped on Iraq, Afghanistan and a boatload of other nations? One million people marched in protest against those wars. But guess what? They paid for those bombs. Standing around in the city centre shouting at walls, then to go home and transfer money into the hands of trained killers: which of these two tactics creates more pronounced results? Your clothes? Slave labour. Your food? Animal torture. Indirectly supporting evil is directly supporting evil; to claim "I'm not responsible for bombing Iraq because someone else abused my tax money" is to try and escape the fact that you paid the tax with your own sovereignty. Indeed, claiming your evils are the work of others' is a total relinquishment of your status as a sovereign individual.
Remember, you are dying with each breath. Every single day you do not go TWO steps forward in yourself is a day that you have gone one step back, towards your grave.
idk man. what you say is cool and people should take responsibility. then again i wouldnt blame all the bad goings on on EGO. Slavoj Zizek wrote something about how buhddist egolessness was used in (some asian country) to help soldiers focus on mindfully loading and firing their guns... i dont think egolessness is all that related to the greater world, and i think it is a very complex thing to understand or see what your position in the world is, what control over any of it you really have. as i see it i'd rather focus on the people who are close to me or im in contact with , rather than the world at large which seems out of my control...
-------------------- dripping with fantasy
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quinn
some kinda love


Registered: 01/02/10
Posts: 6,799
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Quote:
PocketLady said: I used to believe the spiritual concept/ideology of getting rid of the ego, but now I think your ego is actually just your sense of self, it is what makes you you. Without the ego you would have no concept of "I". The ego is what separates us from animals, this sense of self awareness, so why would we want to get rid of it?
Obviously there are parts of our personalities that are distorted and not our "true selves" but I think to label them ego is a misnomer. But I do agree that often people are not their true selves , and I think that happens for a lot of different reasons. The secret (and I am still working on this myself!) seems to be getting to the bottom of why these undesirable traits exist. What has happened in my life that has stopped me from/made me scared of/meant I can't be my true self? If I truly unconditionally loved myself would I still prevent myself from being the real me?
Have you heard of the Emotional Freedom Technique? It's a really great way of releasing attachment to things that don't make us happy.
it is a bit of a doozey... whether to accept your defects and inhibitions and just get on with it and work around them, (like my mum has always been very shy and hates public speaking, and she still lacks that true confidence but has been able to train herself now to lead whole lectures)... or shoot for some kind of perfect uninhibited true self?
idk...
no i havent heard of that technique.
-------------------- dripping with fantasy
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PocketLady



Registered: 01/18/10
Posts: 1,773
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Re: ego stuff [Re: quinn]
#17078241 - 10/22/12 10:28 AM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
quinn said:
Quote:
PocketLady said: I used to believe the spiritual concept/ideology of getting rid of the ego, but now I think your ego is actually just your sense of self, it is what makes you you. Without the ego you would have no concept of "I". The ego is what separates us from animals, this sense of self awareness, so why would we want to get rid of it?
Obviously there are parts of our personalities that are distorted and not our "true selves" but I think to label them ego is a misnomer. But I do agree that often people are not their true selves , and I think that happens for a lot of different reasons. The secret (and I am still working on this myself!) seems to be getting to the bottom of why these undesirable traits exist. What has happened in my life that has stopped me from/made me scared of/meant I can't be my true self? If I truly unconditionally loved myself would I still prevent myself from being the real me?
Have you heard of the Emotional Freedom Technique? It's a really great way of releasing attachment to things that don't make us happy.
it is a bit of a doozey... whether to accept your defects and inhibitions and just get on with it and work around them, (like my mum has always been very shy and hates public speaking, and she still lacks that true confidence but has been able to train herself now to lead whole lectures)... or shoot for some kind of perfect uninhibited true self?
idk...
no i havent heard of that technique.
Yeah I guess that's it. Can you be completely accepting of yourself with those traits or does something need to change? Personally I think t's really important to accept things/ourselves as they are right now, but it doesn't mean those things can't be changed as we go along.
The EFT is great. You basically tap certain points on your body while saying a statement like:
Even though I ....................... ( e.g am a nervous public speaker) I completely love and accept myself And choose to ......................... (e.g stand to my full height and embrace confidence.)
It's a great technique because you are indeed creating an acceptance of whatever the issue is, and lessening it's impact. For example I've had issues in social situations before and found that after I used the technique not only was I more relaxed in public but on the occasion when I wasn't it didn't bother me so much either.
-------------------- Love is from the infinite, and will remain until eternity. The seeker of love escapes the chains of birth and death. Tomorrow, when resurrection comes, The heart that is not in love will fail the test. ~ Rumi The day we start giving Love instead of seeking Love, we will have re-written our whole destiny. ~ Swami Chinmayanada Saraswatir
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quinn
some kinda love


Registered: 01/02/10
Posts: 6,799
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cool, thanks. interesting
-------------------- dripping with fantasy
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deff
just love everyone



Registered: 05/01/04
Posts: 9,412
Loc: clarity
Last seen: 5 hours, 24 minutes
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Re: ego stuff [Re: quinn]
#17079125 - 10/22/12 01:38 PM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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i think the ego is like a mirage - it's apparent to perception but when sought out intently it seems to vanish
so the approach of trying to remove the ego/mirage in fact only strengthens the ignorance that perceives the mirage, at least initially. it might be successful, but to me it seems like it'd elicit quite a fight and may even make things worse. instead, i think a better approach might be to sit down and intently try and find the ego.
this can take the form of 'self inquiry' by continually asking "who am i?" and refining and refining what arises as answers, just keep asking it and examining the sense of self and ego from different angles. what does the ego feel like? what does it look like? what colour is it? how big is it? and when you come up with answers, look into who sees the answer. if the ego was you, how is it seen? keep playing around with questions and analyses like these and see what happens. if ego is in fact like a mirage, then just like going up to a mirage in person to investigate it, the ego will naturally vanish when scrutinized.
if you start with the base assumption that the ego is some independent inherently existing 'thing' - that's like mistaking the mirage for water and then trying to fight the water, or something
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deff
just love everyone



Registered: 05/01/04
Posts: 9,412
Loc: clarity
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Re: ego stuff [Re: deff]
#17079233 - 10/22/12 01:55 PM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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to add - since the mind is that which generates the illusion of ego, it has to be trained to stop generating it. so this analytical meditation does that... it may be easy to see through the ego when investigating it but then it seems to re-arise right when you stop. but if you keep this kind of meditation going over and over, throughout the day - this kind of inquisitiveness about the self and ego, over time the mind's tendency to project the mirage of ego diminishes and perhaps one day ceases altogether.
it's said that buddha's first words upon achieving enlightenment were:
"Seeking but not finding the house builder, I traveled through the round of countless births. Oh, painful is birth ever and again! House builder you have now been seen. You shall not build the house again. Your rafters have been broken down; your ridge-pole is demolished too. My mind has now attained the unformed nibbana and reached the end of every kind of craving."
so one has to dismantle this 'house builder' until it no longer can build the house of ego/identity
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circastes
Big Questions Small Head


Registered: 01/14/10
Posts: 8,781
Loc: straya
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Re: ego stuff [Re: deff]
#17079335 - 10/22/12 02:10 PM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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Sounds good.
Maharshi says during self-inquiry "something comes up from the depths after a while, and that is the Self."
-------------------- My solitude... My shield... My armour... TESTED WITH FULL FORCE
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quinn
some kinda love


Registered: 01/02/10
Posts: 6,799
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Re: ego stuff [Re: deff]
#17080582 - 10/22/12 05:54 PM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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Cheers deff 
That was a very clear and thoughtful response
-------------------- dripping with fantasy
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quinn
some kinda love


Registered: 01/02/10
Posts: 6,799
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Re: ego stuff [Re: deff]
#17081825 - 10/22/12 09:02 PM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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it is so slippery between dismantling it, which like a house is looking at the parts feeling them out and how they work, then slowly loosening them apart and 'fighting' it or destroying it. you cant demolish the house it just leaves a mess... and because you are a part of it you become a mess too, and can even get lost, buried somewhere in the rubble 
frist id like to make friends with my house, clear it up a lil... maybe even invite people over from time to time...
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cbub
it


Registered: 10/17/10
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Re: ego stuff [Re: quinn]
#17082146 - 10/22/12 09:44 PM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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yea, it's a misconception. You don't fight it. It's not an enemy. Fighting it feeds it. It's your friend. It's not even alive. It's like fighting a toaster when it launches your toast out on the floor. It will only do more damage.
it's just like this Prince of Persia solution: Okay, Shadow. It's you and me now. No tricks, no traps and certainly nowhere to run. Shadow fights like any ordinary guard, with the exception of when he gets injured, so do you. If you injure him by one life bullet, you lose one life bullet too. He only has 4 life bullets. So now, if he dies, you die too. If you push him down heaven-knows-how-many floors, you die too. On the other hand, if you die, he dies too. Eh? What's this? If you put your sword down, he does too. Hey! Now, when he is in Neutral mode, jump into him! Yeah, that's the stuff! You and the Shadow become one again!
Edited by cbub (10/22/12 10:16 PM)
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quinn
some kinda love


Registered: 01/02/10
Posts: 6,799
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Re: ego stuff [Re: cbub]
#17083039 - 10/23/12 12:39 AM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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nice.
i fought the toaster and the fork won
-------------------- dripping with fantasy
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dude1787
requires a pickle hat


Registered: 10/06/12
Posts: 378
Loc: Canada
Last seen: 11 years, 2 months
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Re: ego stuff [Re: quinn]
#17083297 - 10/23/12 02:40 AM (11 years, 4 months ago) |
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I've lived below my ego, I've lived above my ego, I've bursted through me ego, I've had my ego shattered into a thousand tiny pieces. I've lived in my ego bubble, hell I've even separated from my ego to where it turned into it's own being and ran around and did things but for now I will stay in my bubble. Until people decide to evolve a bit. Cool thread.
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