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Reflections on ego-loss
    #1772577 -

Since my experience with ego-loss, I have been thinking about what it's purpose is.

If I am not mistaken, I think that Buddhism teaches the way to peace is dissolution of our ego, the loss of self. (Can someone expand on their concepts of this?)

Why? What is the of purpose of this? Is this something that should be realized every day? Or should we only venture to this realm on special occasions, with whatever frequency is deemed neccesary? Is this the source of spritual energy, and does "tapping" into it from time to time, provide us with some sort of benefit?

The experience for me, at the time felt truly life-changing. I felt like I had confirmation of the connection we all share, be it God, the oversoul, or whatever else you want to call it.

There were many other insights I had that night, but this is the only one I came away with that I can remember.

And as I said, at the time, I really felt like I could "touch", the entity of our collective consciousness. But is it real?

Is it possible that the reason we feel and see this connection, is our brains are hard-wired function, with an indentity? Is it simply our mind trying to latch on to something with which to define ourselves? Is the feeling that many have described as touching god, just an
illusion?

This also has me curious as to the mechanics involved with mushrooms and ego-loss. How is it, that so much of our cognitive processes, abstract reasoning, some verbal ability, and motor coordination, remain intact, albeit at an altered level of functioning. I suspect that the same part of the brain that functions to provide our self-indentity, also plays a large part in the operation of our language centers.

For me, at the level of ego-loss, and even in level 4 trips, verbal ability seems to be the most effected. I seem to think very profound thoughts, but see them only in the abstract, they are simply concepts that I can't find the words to describe.

But why should we attempt to lose our ego's? What is there to be gained by this? I took alot from my experience, but it isn't one I am sure I want to relive. However, I find myself thinking about it all the time, and doing it again, to see if I can provide myself some answers.

I approach all things as possible, and there are few things I have written of as impossible, I just tend to think that some things are more likley than others. If, there is some sort of unseen spritual force that everyone is subject
to, I feel like the possibility of a collective consciousness is the most likely answer. But if it is the source of my spirit/soul, and I am gonna go back to it upon my death, shouldn't my self-indentify, and the experiences that all reference this, be something I embrace while I am here?


--------------------
I keep it real because I think it is important that a highly esteemed individual such as myself keep it real lest they experience the dreaded spontaneous non-existance of no longer keeping it real. - Hagbard Celine

Edited by HagbardCeline (08/02/03 12:16 PM)

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: HagbardCeline]
    #1772601 -


I'm not a neurobiologist, but I wish I knew. The brain is very complex and mysterious. It will be a while before science can get a good grasp on the brain.

Also, I don't know why anyone would want to live a life wanting enlightenment and no desire for anything. I do think that desire can and does (in most cases) creates dispair. I'm not easily hurt by not having things, so I'm okay in that area. But what good is a life if you live it to not live it? Desire is nessasary to form an ego, and an ego is a good thing to have imo. Loosing your ego at least once in your life is a very good thing thow.

In some ways, I think becoming one with the universe is like no longer existing. This is why I think the ego is a good thing.




--------------------
What if everything around you
Isn't quite as it seems?
What if all the world you think you know,
Is an elaborate dream?
And if you look at your reflection,
Is it all you want it to be?


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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Murex]
    #1772675 -

In my opinion, from my life studies and what I've learned - the ego is a product of the mind for survival. It is a tool - however, much like anyother tool, can be harmful if used incorrectly.

When we are unaware we are using ego, which almost everyone is, we are misusing it, and it is harmful.

If we are unaware we are holding a knife, that can be VERY harmful. If we are unaware of the food we are eating, it can be VERY harmful.


The ego itself isnt harmful. Being unaware of it in any moment is what harms us and others.

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Murex]
    #1772708 -

In Buddhism, dissolution of the ego is sought as a means of unconvering one's Buddha-nature. Buddha-nature is something that it's believed all sentient beings possess, a sort of pure and truth-set mind, like a jewel that cannot be destroyed.



On Egolessness:

The concept of an "ego-personality" is something that has been imagined by a discriminating mind which first grasped it and then became attached to it, but which must abandon it. On the contrary, Buddha-nature is something indescribable that must first be discovered. In one sense, it resembles an "ego-personality", but it is not the"ego", in the sense of "I am", or "mine".

To believe in the existence of the ego is an erroneous belief that supposes the existence of non-existence; to deny the Buddha-nature is wrong, for it supposes that existence is non-existence.



On Buddha-nature:

Buddha-nature is always pure and tranquil no matter how varied the conditions and surroundings of people may be. Just as milk is always white regardless of the colour of the cow's hide, either red, white, or black, so it does not matter how differently their deeds may condition people's life or what effects may follow their acts and thoughts.

The diamond, the hardest of known substances, cannot be crushed. Sand and stones can be ground to powder but diamonds remain unscathed. Buddha-nature is like the diamond, and thus cannot be broken.

Pure gold is produced by melting ore and removing all impure substances. If people would melt the ore of theire minds and remove all the impurities of worldly passion and egoism, they would all recover the same pure Buddha-nature.



On Suffering:

If everyone has Buddha-nature, why is there so much suffering from people cheating one another and killing one another? And why are there so many distinctions of rank and wealth, rich and poor?

There is a story of a wrestler who used to wear an ornament on his forehead of a precious stone. One time when he was wrestling, the stone was crushed into the flesh of his forehead. He thought he had lost the gem and went to a surgeon to have the wound dressed. When the surgeon came to dress the wound, he found the gem embedded in the flesh and covered over with blood and dirt. He held up a mirror and showed the stone to the wrestler.

Buddha-nature is like the precious stone of this story: it becomes covered over by the dirt and dust of other interests and people think that they have gone from it, but a good teacher recovers it again for them.

Buddha-nature exists in everyone no matter how deeply it may be covered over by greed, anger, and foolishness, or buried by his own deeds and retribution, Buddha nature cannot be lost or destroyed; and when all defilements are removed, sooner or later it will reappear.

Like the wrestler in the story who was shown the gem buried in his flesh and blood by means of a mirror, so the people are shown their Buddha nature, buried beneath their worldly desires and passions, by means of the light of Buddha.

From: The Teaching of Buddha, Bukkyo Dendo Kyokai, The Japanese Society for Buddhist Understanding



So Buddha-nature is something buried inside of us, beneath all of our "defilements". Defilements are worldly passions that we chase and attempt to possess. It would include materialism, the desire for power and control, wealth, drug and alcohol abuse, sexual abuse and other misdeeds. Karma plays a big role here. These things cloud our perceptions and lead us into the world of delusion and illusion, of suffering. The object of following Buddha's teaching is to walk the path of the Middle Way, the fine point between all extremes. It is to purge our minds of distorting influences, and become one with that which understands no lies.

I'm fascinated by the metaphor illustrated suggesting that melting the ore of the mind will allow the gold to come apart from the undesirable impurities. Truly, when I experience psychedelic drugs, the ore of my mind feels melted. I believe there is merit to the cross-referencing of Buddhism and psychedelia.

But that's just my take on things.



The Story of Buddha:

Shakayamuni Buddha, Siddartha Gautama, the first Buddha, was born into a luxurious royal life. He lived apart from the real world of competition and suffering. When he was a teenager, he was taken into the city for the first time in his life. Prince Siddartha's father, the King, cleared the city streets of beggars and the old, the sick. He wanted his son not to ever experience suffering. But his efforts failed, and Siddartha found his eyes on an old, dying woman. Confused, he fled his chariot and followed her and her children to the river, where many were starving, ridden with disease. Siddartha then discovered compassion.

Siddartha disowned his royal status, seeking a life of understanding. Wandering India's countryside on foot, he came across a group of Yogis, and they instructed him in the way of Yoga. For years he lived on insects and tree bark, seeking enlightenment by depriving his body of the resources it needs to assert itself.

One day, along the river came some peasant women with food to eat and clean water to drink. They called to Siddartha, and offered him a meal, which he accepted. It was then that he understood that he had swung from one extreme to another, from the lap of luxury to self-starvation. He realized, and imparted to his Yogi teachers, that the path to Enligtenment is the Middle Way, the path between all extremes. They deemed him disloyal, having given to temptation, and left him.

It was then that Siddartha made his resolve, to sit under the Bodhi tree and meditate until he reached enlightenment. After having battled day and night with the illusions of his ego, his desires, his instincts for hunting and sexual conquest, he succeeded. Siddartha Gautama, The Lord Buddha, then wandered India spreading his teachings until he died of natural causes at age 81.

The term "Buddha" was coined much after his sitting at the Bodhi tree. It is meant to say "The Awakened one", or in modern terms "The first guy who figured out what the fuck is going on here."






--------------------


:poison: Dark Triangles - New Psychedelic Techno Single - Listen on Soundcloud :poison:
Gyroscope full album available SoundCloud or MySpace

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Ped]
    #1772766 -

actually, its not definite who was alive first, Laozi or Buddha, So Buddha could very well be the second guy who figure out what the fuck is going on here.



--------------------
enjoy the entertaining indentity i have constructed for you while you can.

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: HagbardCeline]
    #1773141 -

I don't think the goal of Buddhism is to lose the ego permanently (how could you), but to lose in temporarily/at will in order to realize that the ego is only a small part of our whole true selves.


--------------------
Without everything wouldn't nothing be everything and without nothing wouldn't everything be nothing.I am the beginning and the end,the source and the void, the light and the darkness,i am but a small drop of the ocean yet i am an ocean unto myself

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: 3eyedgod]
    #1773473 -


Hey 3eyedgod! I haven't seen you in a while. Welcome back. :laugh:


--------------------
What if everything around you
Isn't quite as it seems?
What if all the world you think you know,
Is an elaborate dream?
And if you look at your reflection,
Is it all you want it to be?


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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Murex]
    #1774662 -

Bunch of nonsense bullshit. If ego is the conscious model of the self, then an ego-less state is not experiencing anything (unconscious). Please redefine your term.

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Phencyclidine]
    #1777612 -

> I don't think the goal of Buddhism is to lose the ego permanently

In Zen Buddhism, there is no goal.

Do mice run from cats because they are trying to survive, or simply because mice run from cats?

> then an ego-less state is not experiencing anything

It is a state of not experiencing anything with respect to anything else. Each experience is taken for what it is, not for what it is compared to another experience.

> the ego is a product of the mind for survival

The ego is a byproduct of want and desire...

Does a mouse want to survive, or does it simply live in a way such that its survival is likely?

> I don't know why anyone would want to live a life wanting enlightenment and no desire for anything.

Either do I. Wanting enlightenment is yet another trapping of the ego.

> But what good is a life if you live it to not live it?

When I am hungry, I eat. When I am tired, I sleep. Is this not living?

> Desire is nessasary to form an ego, and an ego is a good thing to have imo.

While sitting and watching the snow fall, I notice that I am cold. I think to myself, "Gee, I wish I had a coat. If I had a coat, I wouldn't be cold right now". Looking down the way, I see my neighbor wearing a coat. Thinking to myself, "Gee, I deserve a coat more than my neigbor does. I am a much better person." Etc...

-or-

While sitting and watching the snow fall, I notice that I am cold. The wind blows stirring the snow flakes to dance in the air.


--------------------
Just another spore in the wind.

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Phencyclidine]
    #1777652 -

Quote:
Bunch of nonsense bullshit.  If ego is the conscious model of the self, then an ego-less state is not experiencing anything (unconscious).  Please redefine your term.


No, an ego-less state is when there is consciousness about perceptions without having the self-model involved.

And regarding the usefulness of the ego: of course it's useful, it keeps you alive! :laugh:

The problem is that it has this tendency to haunt you and to make you do silly things in order to convince yourself that you're not wasting away your life as a mortal. The cure is to consciously free yourself from all worldly attachements.
 

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Rhizoid]
    #1777656 -

Quote:
No, an ego-less state is when there is consciousness about perceptions without having the self-model involved.



Have you ever experienced this state? If so how do you recall it? What function did you use to commit it to memory?


--------------------
Always Smi2le

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Seuss]
    #1777660 -

What happens on ego-loss?
Pure awareness and ecstatic freedom from all game (and biological) involvements. ["Games" are behavioral sequences defined by roles, rules, rituals, goals, strategies, values, language, characteristic space-time locations and characteristic patterns of movement. Any behavior not having these nine features is non- game: this includes physiological reflexes, spontaneous play, and transcendent awareness.]
So ego = game-playing.

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: ShroomyJ]
    #1777916 -

Ego is commonly thought of as the lone mediator between us an our environment. To extinguish the ego is to completely seperate us from our ability to interact with our environment. This is not true.

The ego-personality is a biased partisan to desires, compulsive drives, and delusions. It is the illusion of "us-and-them", of "me-in-the-world". It is a mediator between us and our world, but it is not the mediator.

It's loss is not your own extinction.




--------------------


:poison: Dark Triangles - New Psychedelic Techno Single - Listen on Soundcloud :poison:
Gyroscope full album available SoundCloud or MySpace

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Seuss]
    #1780583 -

Quote:
It [ego loss] is a state of not experiencing anything with respect to anything else. Each experience is taken for what it is, not for what it is compared to another experience.


Pretentious nonsense.

Ego loss is not experiencing anything with respect to one's self, however, since ego is a functional necessity of experience, this can't occur. Ego is a functional necessity of experience because experiences are not things that float around an accumulate, they occur to things. Any experience requires some sort of identification with an experiencing entity.

I simply think that what you say about the experience being taken for what it is, is complete bullshit. Or, at least, it's entirely based on faith and can't be verified.

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Rhizoid]
    #1780585 -

Rhizoid said:
No, an ego-less state is when there is consciousness about perceptions without having the self-model involved.


Correct, but you can't have an experience which doesn't occur to something. As long as you are experiencing, your brain is still constructing the experience as occuring to something. Ego is a functional necessity of experience, thus ego loss requires unconsciousness.

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: ShroomyJ]
    #1780587 -

ShroomyJ said:
What happens on ego-loss?
Pure awareness and ecstatic freedom from all game (and biological) involvements. ["Games" are behavioral sequences defined by roles, rules, rituals, goals, strategies, values, language, characteristic space-time locations and characteristic patterns of movement. Any behavior not having these nine features is non- game: this includes physiological reflexes, spontaneous play, and transcendent awareness.]
So ego = game-playing.


I've read that book. I don't see anything correct about it. It's a model, like Leary said. Please think for yourself instead of copying out of a book.

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Phencyclidine]
    #1780590 -

Tearing up the boards tonight, ah Phencyclidine?





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sez alan watts: [Re: cdchriscd]
    #1780746 -

Narrowed, serial consciousness, the memory-stored stream of impressions, is the means by which we have the sense of ego. It enables us to feel that behind thought there is a thinker and behind knowledge a knower --- an individual who stands aside from the changing panorama of experience to order and control it as best he may. If the ego were to disappear, or rather, to be seen as a useful fiction, there would no longer be the duality of subject and object, experiencer and experience. There would simply be a continuous, self-moving stream of experiencing, without the sense of either an active subject who controls it or of a passive subject who suffers it. The thinker would be seen to be no more than the series of thoughts, and the feeler no more than the feelings.
(from _nature, man and woman_ 1958)


--------------------
old enough to know better
not old enough to care

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: Phencyclidine]
    #1780854 -

> Pretentious nonsense.
> I simply think that what you say about the experience being taken for what it is, is complete bullshit. Or, at least, it's entirely based on faith and can't be verified.

I used to think the same thing.  :smile:

> Ego is a functional necessity of experience, thus ego loss requires unconsciousness.

Not at all.  Perhaps ego is needed to judge an experience, but not to have an experience.  When I daydream, I loose all connection with what is happening around me, yet I am not unconscious.  In the same respect, egoloss does not require unconsciousness.


--------------------
Just another spore in the wind.

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Re: Reflections on ego-loss [Re: GazzBut]
    #1784229 -

Quote:
Have you ever experienced this state? If so how do you recall it? What function did you use to commit it to memory?


Yes, twice so far, both times on mushrooms.

I wrote down some notes while coming down on both occasions, this helps me recall some portions of it. Afterwards I spent a couple of weeks wondering about what's possible to bring back from such an experience. I think what is brought back is a sort of imprint, or a kind of projection of the experience.

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