Best Of

Good post @lobster

It is hard to define what sanity really is, it is easier to look at what is insanity. Somehow there is some agreement over insanity — like repeating behaviour that is harmful to yourself. I think to be sane is to be free from these compulsive behaviours.

Any type of addiction or compulsive repetition has elements of insanity. Sanity is to be found in liberation and a thorough understanding of what is beneficial. Kindness comes after that, in bringing first an understanding of what is beneficial, and then real freedom to others.

The mind is first of all a survival machine, that is its main purpose. It picks up on the needs of the body, which generates emotion in response to thought. You can release yourself from these things, survival is just of the body, in whatever form “the body” takes in the mind. The mind works hard at this, but it is ultimately a futile pursuit.

It seems to @Jeroen

It seems to agree with psychology and psychiatry that part of the spectrum of human experience is covered by insanity and dysfunction. This seems true on the scale of nations as well as individuals.

Strangely enough, I live in an insane world, with insane people everywhere. And
I am one of them.

• In other words it is a question of how crazy our nation, our social experience and our interior function is
• Do our thoughts, emotions, support structures etc. help or increase our insanity/dysfunction?
• What in us is (ideally) sane?

For me sanity is simple:

• Being kind and putting others before our inflation
• Offering wisdom, whatever the source (the saner and less hypocritical the better)
• To be sane is a hard job.
• Don't expect anything in returns, is a good start

...and now back to the 'Agony Ants' or is it aunts...

Eckhart Tolle is another person who talks at length about the ego and dysfunctional patterns in the mind. If we take the Bodhidharma quote, understanding the mind means understanding its dysfunction as well.
I find it interesting to read about these dysfunctional patterns, all the ways in which ego can steer the mind to go awry, and to stir deep emotions which otherwise wouldn’t exist. For example if you were sitting at a restaurant and you heard a car in the car park had been crashed into, it might raise mild interest. But if you heard it was “your car”, you’d probably feel quite different. It’s amazing what a difference a little word like “my” might cause.
It is in large part about owning, about identification with, about making-into-yourself and the psychology of loss. For example your reputation is something you might or might not have thought about at length, but if a newspaper was going to place an article which was going to cast you as a liar and a cheat, you might suddenly be concerned.
The ego uses all kinds of tricks to make itself bigger, to try and increase its importance. It is always worried about survival, because it is a thing built of illusions and shadows, fragile when you recognise it. As long as you identify with it, make it’s thoughts your thoughts, it steers you and causes no end of trouble.
But when you start being careful about saying what you own, when you look at renouncing, at letting go of things and mental constructs, then you start deconstructing the ego. The ego’s basic move is to “make things yours” mentally, to make it feel like it matters when something that is yours gets damaged, to expand your “self” to include “things”.