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@federica said:
I wouldn't like to say.
I still have my memory, so I couldn't possibly comment for sure....
but just as our emotions do not define who we are, neither does what we remember.
Actions, define who we 'are'.
I would say experience defines who we are. You can't have an action without something to act on.
If I touch a tree, me and the tree create the touching. Not just the action. This may be what you were saying though!
@MeisterBob I have often wondered if babies have a sense of self. They haven't been taught anything, voluntary and involuntary wouldn't exist to them I'd imagine.
Sometimes I ego. I resist what is, the moment, and it causes me suffering. But I also try not to resist the egoing itself, because that just causes even more suffering. Ultimately I try to diffuse it, by journaling or meditating, but sometimes it seems my ego is too strong. Sometimes it just wants to ego, and that's that. It's part of life. And I try to not resist it, laugh, and giggle at the struggle my ego is creating for itself. And I try and focus on the benefits of egoing.
It provides contrast. It's just part of life. In the end it helps me to re-define my priorities.
What do you think, what are the benefits of egoing?
It could be seen as any number of things, (as the answers in this thread indicate) but in the end it's just a "thought" .....And if I'm wrong you can blame it on my somewhat over inflated ego .:D ..
Metta Shoshin
0
Toraldris -`-,-{@ Zen Nud... Buddhist @}-,-`- East Coast, USAVeteran
edited June 2014
@Mateeah said:
Sometimes I ego. I resist what is, the moment, and it causes me suffering. But I also try not to resist the egoing itself, because that just causes even more suffering. Ultimately I try to diffuse it, by journaling or meditating, but sometimes it seems my ego is too strong. Sometimes it just wants to ego, and that's that. It's part of life. And I try to not resist it, laugh, and giggle at the struggle my ego is creating for itself. And I try and focus on the benefits of egoing.
It provides contrast. It's just part of life. In the end it helps me to re-define my priorities.
What do you think, what are the benefits of egoing?
>
First time I've ever heard "ego" used as a verb. Care to define that?
I agree with @federica that memory is unreliable because your memories, as your feelings (or your ability to remember or your ability to feel) keep changing as you tread and as you yourself change. Except, precisely, to perpetuate a false sense of an ego to which you strive hard to hold onto as if for dear life.
You don't love at thirty the way you loved with fifteen. And at forty you don't suffer bereavement as hard as when you were a child. You even remember those events in a different way as time goes by.
As Thanissaro Bhikku's quotation by @federica states above, there's nothing wrong with a wholesome, functioning ego that gives you a certain sense of identity.
The problem is when your ego's false sense of permanence separates you from external reality as it constantly evolves, and your inner reality as it also keeps changing. A conditioned ego tries to make reality groove into your puzzle, not the other way around.
Edit: I was responding to @MeisterBob's comment above: "@dharmamom Still it intrigues me that without memory I do not believe that sense of self could exist. Everything we know is memory." When I posted it, it came all the way down.
@Earthninja said:
MeisterBob I have often wondered if babies have a sense of self. They haven't been taught anything, voluntary and involuntary wouldn't exist to them I'd imagine.
On a book on chakras, I read that from conception to the end of the first six months of living, human beings are stuck in the first chakra, the base chakra, which is concerned with having your survival and nutrition needs met. Babies consider the mother an extension of their own person. The whole world revolves around their navel.
Babies are probably ego to the utmost potency.
1
federicaSeeker of the clear blue sky...Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubtModerator
That's actually probably right until they're until around 2 years old.
That's when children become consciously 'spatially aware' and realise their mother/father/carer is actually a separate entity. Before then, they have had no concept of existing alone...
This is why it's called 'the terrible two's' because a lot of the tantrums are to do with loss of control, or not getting their own way. Children become distinctly conscious of the fact that they are not the be all and end of all things: an existence which has hitherto not been challenged, or demonstrated as being mistaken.
I saw a title of a thread that read "Benefits of egoing". I realized it was merged into this one, but anyhow, to answer that title, a benefit I can think of is that you have an opportunity to live and learn by being yourself. You could also become a famous Hollywood celebrity and enjoy the fame and fortune from having a superstar ego, if having an ego and being famous are related.
As how ego relates to meditation, I would say that it does not work at all in meditation, because by " being yourself" means that you follow your feelings and impulses, which I believe is not something you should do in meditation.
@namarupa said:
I saw a title of a thread that read "Benefits of egoing". I realized it was merged into this one, but anyhow, to answer that title, a benefit I can think of is that you have an opportunity to live and learn by being yourself. You could also become a famous Hollywood celebrity and enjoy the fame and fortune from having a superstar ego, if having an ego and being famous are related.
As how ego relates to meditation, I would say that it does not work at all in meditation, because by " being yourself" means that you follow your feelings and impulses, which I believe is not something you should do in meditation.
Jon Kabot-Zinn uses the term "selfing" which I thought of when I read "egoing".
"
"I," "me," and "mine" are products of our thinking. My friend Larry Rosenberg, of the Cambridge Insight Meditation Center, calls it "selfing," that inevitable and incorrigible tendency to construct out of almost everything and every situation an "I," a "me," and a "mine," and then to operate in the world from that limited perspective which is mostly fantasy and defense. Hardly a moment passes that this doesn't
happen, but it is so much a part of the fabric of our world that it goes completely unnoticed, much as the proverbial fish has no knowledge of water, so thoroughly is it immersed in it. You can see this for yourself easily enough whether you are meditating in silence or just living a five-minute segment of your life. Out of virtually any and every moment and experience, our thinking mind constructs "my" moment, "my" experience, "my" child, "my" hunger, "my" desire, "my" opinion, "my" way, "my" authority, "my" future, "my" knowledge, "my" body, "my" mind, "my" house, "my" land, "my" idea,
"my" reelings, "my" car, "my" problem.
If you observe this process of Selfing with sustained attention and inquiry, you will see that what we call "the self is really a construct of our own mind, and hardly a permanent one, either. If you look deeply for a stable, indivisible self, for the core "you" that underlies "your" experience, you are not likely to find it other than in more thinking. You might say you are your name, but that is not quite accurate. Your name
is just a label. The same is true of your age, your gender, your opinions, and so on. None are fundamental to who you are. " Jon Kabot-Zinn
Thanks how, & i like what you say there..Of course i will always have an ego, & it's my ego that's typing this..Also my ego is useful, & i couldn't function in this dimension without it..So it's my intent & how i use my ego (& not my ego using me), that defines who i am at any point in time..I'd never suggest trying to "kill off" one's ego, & that would be a big mistake..My ego is really supposed to be neutral, & help me find things i love & love doing..I can either do things from & for my heart (none ego), or from & for my mind & or body (ego's opinion of the minds self).
Hey MasterBob on your comment I'd say that if you want to have a sense of self, then you can't & won't be at the time referencing your memories....You have to completely empty your mind first, & then that is your true self..I mean it does depend which self your referring to because the minds self does need memories to define itself, whereas the real "i" when mindful knows I'm "i"....So what you have instead is a knowing of yourself, a real sense of i that doesn't need to be questioned or referred to, because at the time of mindfulness you are who you are without thoughts.
"I think therefor i am", mean't the observer the real i could be identified..So we can eliminate the mind as the real i by training, & then silencing our ego mind..As our ego mind becomes more still & fairly none existent, it then becomes fairly obvious to us that our mind isn't who we really are..Just remember our ego (emotional) mind isn't even talking to us, it's only ever talking to itself..Just to clarify when i say ego mind i mean the negative thoughts about ourselves & others, & any bad deed that we do are caused by this negative ego mind.
This question in a thread that is on page 2 (74 comments!) and nobody has even mentioned the Dependent Origination??? My goodness. Must be some kind of record! Shame on you! :shake: .
Then there is this... you run of the mill people you!
"He assumes feeling to be the self, or the self as possessing feeling, or feeling as in the self, or the self as in feeling.
"He assumes perception to be the self, or the self as possessing perception, or perception as in the self, or the self as in perception.
"He assumes (mental) fabrications to be the self, or the self as possessing fabrications, or fabrications as in the self, or the self as in fabrications.
"He assumes consciousness to be the self, or the self as possessing consciousness, or consciousness as in the self, or the self as in consciousness.
"Thus, both this assumption & the understanding, 'I am,' occur to him. And so it is with reference to the understanding 'I am' that there is the appearance of the five faculties — eye, ear, nose, tongue, & body (the senses of vision, hearing, smell, taste, & touch).
federicaSeeker of the clear blue sky...Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubtModerator
@Daveadams said:
"I think therefor i am", mean't the observer the real i could be identified..So we can eliminate the mind as the real i by training, & then silencing our ego mind..As our ego mind becomes more still & fairly none existent, it then becomes fairly obvious to us that our mind isn't who we really are..Just remember our ego (emotional) mind isn't even talking to us, it's only ever talking to itself..Just to clarify when i say ego mind i mean the negative thoughts about ourselves & others, & any bad deed that we do are caused by this negative ego mind.
>
The most important thing to realise is that our ego is not a separate entity.
It's all 'us'. Putting it in the third person seems to absolve us of the responsibility of administering control.
It's not separate, it doesn't in fact HAVE a 'mind of its own'.
There IS no separation or division.
The buck stops right here.
The most important thing to grasp is that our ego is built by our mind, & we are not our mind..Our mind is nothing more than a storage device for our memories, & an operating system there to be referred to for ideas & problem solutions etc..& should be totally neutral & none emotional, depending on the facts & evidence it sees at any one time..So any reference to our self by our mind at any one time, is just using the past to define us now & so we always just miss ourselves..So i can't ever define myself in words i can only just do, & what i do defines me instead.....So "i do therefor i am"!lol
@Daveadams said:
Hey MasterBob on your comment I'd say that if you want to have a sense of self, then you can't & won't be at the time referencing your memories....You have to completely empty your mind first, & then that is your true self..I mean it does depend which self your referring to because the minds self does need memories to define itself, whereas the real "i" when mindful knows I'm "i"....So what you have instead is a knowing of yourself, a real sense of i that doesn't need to be questioned or referred to, because at the time of mindfulness you are who you are without thoughts.
Try typing without using your memory lol!... As long as I live in the relatively real world I'll be using a sense of self to operate within it. The important thing , for me, is not to be fully invested in it,identified with it, take it too seriously. Easier said than done sometimes... perhaps you might say it is the illusion I navigate this illusion with.
"Reality is an illusion albeit a very persistent one." Albert Einstein
Thank Buddha I have no independent self to be shamed. :buck: .
Most of us have to evaluate each of our myriad selves to see their inherent emptiness of being. It is clinging to identity, that is the basis of our shared, yet deluded insistence that we are:
A set of memories, a set of aspirations, our sensations and opinions, some distinct expression etc.
We of course find the emptiness through practice. This is why meditation is not about developing calm or serenity. Those are just side benefits. The real task is to find what is going on and on and on . . .
Memory is also an illusion @MeisterBob; after all if you reside in the present moment, where there is no past, and no future, what are you remembering? ... ...
@Daveadams said:
The most important thing to grasp is that our ego is built by our mind, & we are not our mind..Our mind is nothing more than a storage device for our memories, & an operating system there to be referred to for ideas & problem solutions etc..& should be totally neutral & none emotional, depending on the facts & evidence it sees at any one time..So any reference to our self by our mind at any one time, is just using the past to define us now & so we always just miss ourselves..So i can't ever define myself in words i can only just do, & what i do defines me instead.....So "i do therefor i am"!lol
That is a purely Western mechanistic perspective, perhaps you meant the brain is a storage device, in which case you may be correct, that is not the mind. As previously stated, there is no separate ego; that's the illusion, and identifying with an illusion is a delusion.
@anataman said:
Memory is also an illusion MeisterBob; after all if you reside in the present moment, where there is no past, and no future, what are you remembering? ... ...
Well, yes ,of course. The illusions of the illusion in the illusion.... To navigate this illusion those illusions are necessary. But seriously its an illusion full of wonder! Bob
I don't want to derail my own thread, but, focussing on and trying to define the ego, in my view, detracts from the fact that you are merely your thoughts and feelings as they arise.
@dharmamom said:
I agree with federica that memory is unreliable because your memories, as your feelings (or your ability to remember or your ability to feel) keep changing as you tread and as you yourself change. Except, precisely, to perpetuate a false sense of an ego to which you strive hard to hold onto as if for dear life.
You don't love at thirty the way you loved with fifteen. And at forty you don't suffer bereavement as hard as when you were a child. You even remember those events in a different way as time goes by.
As Thanissaro Bhikku's quotation by federica states above, there's nothing wrong with a wholesome, functioning ego that gives you a certain sense of identity.
The problem is when your ego's false sense of permanence separates you from external reality as it constantly evolves, and your inner reality as it also keeps changing. A conditioned ego tries to make reality groove into your puzzle, not the other way around.
Edit: I was responding to MeisterBob's comment above: "@dharmamom Still it intrigues me that without memory I do not believe that sense of self could exist. Everything we know is memory." When I posted it, it came all the way down.
I like that 'make reality groove into your puzzle' @dharmamom. When I first had my mental illness I had a revelation of how people weren't like cartoon characters. I think I released a lot of energy before I was ready and my grasping at high states turned a perfectly normal revelation into a dangerous situation. I hope I will get back to the beautiful realization I had but without the grasping to high states.
@Daveadams said:
"I think therefor i am", mean't the observer the real i could be identified..So we can eliminate the mind as the real i by training, & then silencing our ego mind..As our ego mind becomes more still & fairly none existent, it then becomes fairly obvious to us that our mind isn't who we really are..Just remember our ego (emotional) mind isn't even talking to us, it's only ever talking to itself..Just to clarify when i say ego mind i mean the negative thoughts about ourselves & others, & any bad deed that we do are caused by this negative ego mind.
In buddhism we only know we are thinking. Because it is evident right here. The 'I am' part is the content of thinking/awareness, but the content of thought can be any number of beliefs and dreams. Buddhism is waking from thoughts and seeing the nature of thought. Thoughts are the only game in town, but we need to know the difference between 'I think' and 'I am'. 'I am' is a content and 'thinking' is evident right here and now.
@Jeffrey said:
When I first had my mental illness I had a revelation of how people weren't like cartoon characters. I think I released a lot of energy before I was ready and my grasping at high states turned a perfectly normal revelation into a dangerous situation. I hope I will get back to the beautiful realization I had but without the grasping to high states.
Too much, too fast and no context or map. Buddhism provides what we require in terms of stabilisation, map, teaching, context and means. Mental illness is not an obstacle to our development. Just as being an alcoholic, cushion fetishist or constipated dogmatist is all we are . . .
For what it is worth you seem to inspire a lot of people. Just don't think that is a high state . . .
:wave: .
@Jeffrey said:
In buddhism we only know we are thinking. Because it is evident right here. The 'I am' part is the content of thinking/awareness, but the content of thought can be any number of beliefs and dreams. Buddhism is waking from thoughts and seeing the nature of thought. Thoughts are the only game in town, but we need to know the difference between 'I think' and 'I am'. 'I am' is a content and 'thinking' is evident right here and now.
The I think therefore I am is kind of saying that because there is a movie on the screen therefore there is a projector. That is true but the projector has no characteristics as a movie does. It is there but it is a mirror and has no qualities itself. And it is not accurate to say it is there from the same level of reality as the movie.
Mental illness is not an obstacle to our development.
Like any form of obscuration this depends on the degree. In a similar way everyone is awake at core but this does not mean the Buddha Nature is shining through. Many of us cling to our ignorance, dukkha and personas fragmentation. In one sense this personal attachment to form, our form is ego. The Buddha Ego/Nature is not of this nature.
This is why the personal ego must align or resonate with the Three Jewels independent of its base inclinations mired in lotus mud. Are we rooted and ready to flower or just rearranging the mud?
@lobster said:
Mental illness is not an obstacle to our development.
The degree of delusion is the obstacle. Or the degree to which you cling to that delusion.
Mental illness could be an obstacle according to how much it contributes to that delusion.
Comments
The man with no memory
I would say experience defines who we are. You can't have an action without something to act on.
If I touch a tree, me and the tree create the touching. Not just the action. This may be what you were saying though!
@MeisterBob I have often wondered if babies have a sense of self. They haven't been taught anything, voluntary and involuntary wouldn't exist to them I'd imagine.
Sometimes I ego. I resist what is, the moment, and it causes me suffering. But I also try not to resist the egoing itself, because that just causes even more suffering. Ultimately I try to diffuse it, by journaling or meditating, but sometimes it seems my ego is too strong. Sometimes it just wants to ego, and that's that. It's part of life. And I try to not resist it, laugh, and giggle at the struggle my ego is creating for itself. And I try and focus on the benefits of egoing.
It provides contrast. It's just part of life. In the end it helps me to re-define my priorities.
What do you think, what are the benefits of egoing?
Kia Ora @anataman,
It could be seen as any number of things, (as the answers in this thread indicate) but in the end it's just a "thought" .....And if I'm wrong you can blame it on my somewhat over inflated ego .:D ..
Metta Shoshin
>
First time I've ever heard "ego" used as a verb. Care to define that?
It can be a great problem solver!
Greetings, @Mateeah, nice to see you!
As we already have a thread on the Ego, I thought I would combine your post with it.
Why do you see ego as being separate from you, as if it's something you can or cannot at times, control?
I agree with @federica that memory is unreliable because your memories, as your feelings (or your ability to remember or your ability to feel) keep changing as you tread and as you yourself change. Except, precisely, to perpetuate a false sense of an ego to which you strive hard to hold onto as if for dear life.
You don't love at thirty the way you loved with fifteen. And at forty you don't suffer bereavement as hard as when you were a child. You even remember those events in a different way as time goes by.
As Thanissaro Bhikku's quotation by @federica states above, there's nothing wrong with a wholesome, functioning ego that gives you a certain sense of identity.
The problem is when your ego's false sense of permanence separates you from external reality as it constantly evolves, and your inner reality as it also keeps changing. A conditioned ego tries to make reality groove into your puzzle, not the other way around.
Edit: I was responding to @MeisterBob's comment above: "@dharmamom Still it intrigues me that without memory I do not believe that sense of self could exist. Everything we know is memory." When I posted it, it came all the way down.
If I was not in particular, me,
And all of you, the others
How would the universal see
within it, wee sisters and brothers.
... \ lol / ...
On a book on chakras, I read that from conception to the end of the first six months of living, human beings are stuck in the first chakra, the base chakra, which is concerned with having your survival and nutrition needs met. Babies consider the mother an extension of their own person. The whole world revolves around their navel.
Babies are probably ego to the utmost potency.
That's actually probably right until they're until around 2 years old.
That's when children become consciously 'spatially aware' and realise their mother/father/carer is actually a separate entity. Before then, they have had no concept of existing alone...
This is why it's called 'the terrible two's' because a lot of the tantrums are to do with loss of control, or not getting their own way. Children become distinctly conscious of the fact that they are not the be all and end of all things: an existence which has hitherto not been challenged, or demonstrated as being mistaken.
No -not enough information processed yet ,memory. It develops quickly though. Bob
Inasmuch as 'ego' relates to any concept found in Buddaharma, it is an activity. Not an entity.
Perception of ones's self is an activity...
identifying with one's self is an error.
Perhaps, but I don't think that was in question.
It may not have been; it was merely a statement in response to yours.
I saw a title of a thread that read "Benefits of egoing". I realized it was merged into this one, but anyhow, to answer that title, a benefit I can think of is that you have an opportunity to live and learn by being yourself. You could also become a famous Hollywood celebrity and enjoy the fame and fortune from having a superstar ego, if having an ego and being famous are related.
As how ego relates to meditation, I would say that it does not work at all in meditation, because by " being yourself" means that you follow your feelings and impulses, which I believe is not something you should do in meditation.
Jon Kabot-Zinn uses the term "selfing" which I thought of when I read "egoing".
"
"I," "me," and "mine" are products of our thinking. My friend Larry Rosenberg, of the Cambridge Insight Meditation Center, calls it "selfing," that inevitable and incorrigible tendency to construct out of almost everything and every situation an "I," a "me," and a "mine," and then to operate in the world from that limited perspective which is mostly fantasy and defense. Hardly a moment passes that this doesn't
happen, but it is so much a part of the fabric of our world that it goes completely unnoticed, much as the proverbial fish has no knowledge of water, so thoroughly is it immersed in it. You can see this for yourself easily enough whether you are meditating in silence or just living a five-minute segment of your life. Out of virtually any and every moment and experience, our thinking mind constructs "my" moment, "my" experience, "my" child, "my" hunger, "my" desire, "my" opinion, "my" way, "my" authority, "my" future, "my" knowledge, "my" body, "my" mind, "my" house, "my" land, "my" idea,
"my" reelings, "my" car, "my" problem.
If you observe this process of Selfing with sustained attention and inquiry, you will see that what we call "the self is really a construct of our own mind, and hardly a permanent one, either. If you look deeply for a stable, indivisible self, for the core "you" that underlies "your" experience, you are not likely to find it other than in more thinking. You might say you are your name, but that is not quite accurate. Your name
is just a label. The same is true of your age, your gender, your opinions, and so on. None are fundamental to who you are. " Jon Kabot-Zinn
Thanks how, & i like what you say there..Of course i will always have an ego, & it's my ego that's typing this..Also my ego is useful, & i couldn't function in this dimension without it..So it's my intent & how i use my ego (& not my ego using me), that defines who i am at any point in time..I'd never suggest trying to "kill off" one's ego, & that would be a big mistake..My ego is really supposed to be neutral, & help me find things i love & love doing..I can either do things from & for my heart (none ego), or from & for my mind & or body (ego's opinion of the minds self).
Hey MasterBob on your comment I'd say that if you want to have a sense of self, then you can't & won't be at the time referencing your memories....You have to completely empty your mind first, & then that is your true self..I mean it does depend which self your referring to because the minds self does need memories to define itself, whereas the real "i" when mindful knows I'm "i"....So what you have instead is a knowing of yourself, a real sense of i that doesn't need to be questioned or referred to, because at the time of mindfulness you are who you are without thoughts.
Maybe "ego" works better as a verb.
"I think therefor i am", mean't the observer the real i could be identified..So we can eliminate the mind as the real i by training, & then silencing our ego mind..As our ego mind becomes more still & fairly none existent, it then becomes fairly obvious to us that our mind isn't who we really are..Just remember our ego (emotional) mind isn't even talking to us, it's only ever talking to itself..Just to clarify when i say ego mind i mean the negative thoughts about ourselves & others, & any bad deed that we do are caused by this negative ego mind.
This question in a thread that is on page 2 (74 comments!) and nobody has even mentioned the Dependent Origination??? My goodness. Must be some kind of record! Shame on you! :shake: .
Here you go http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/dn/dn.15.0.than.html
Then there is this... you run of the mill people you!
from
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn22/sn22.047.than.html
>
The most important thing to realise is that our ego is not a separate entity.
It's all 'us'. Putting it in the third person seems to absolve us of the responsibility of administering control.
It's not separate, it doesn't in fact HAVE a 'mind of its own'.
There IS no separation or division.
The buck stops right here.
The most important thing to grasp is that our ego is built by our mind, & we are not our mind..Our mind is nothing more than a storage device for our memories, & an operating system there to be referred to for ideas & problem solutions etc..& should be totally neutral & none emotional, depending on the facts & evidence it sees at any one time..So any reference to our self by our mind at any one time, is just using the past to define us now & so we always just miss ourselves..So i can't ever define myself in words i can only just do, & what i do defines me instead.....So "i do therefor i am"!lol
Try typing without using your memory lol!... As long as I live in the relatively real world I'll be using a sense of self to operate within it. The important thing , for me, is not to be fully invested in it,identified with it, take it too seriously. Easier said than done sometimes... perhaps you might say it is the illusion I navigate this illusion with.
"Reality is an illusion albeit a very persistent one." Albert Einstein
Thank Buddha I have no independent self to be shamed. :buck: .
Most of us have to evaluate each of our myriad selves to see their inherent emptiness of being. It is clinging to identity, that is the basis of our shared, yet deluded insistence that we are:
A set of memories, a set of aspirations, our sensations and opinions, some distinct expression etc.
We of course find the emptiness through practice. This is why meditation is not about developing calm or serenity. Those are just side benefits. The real task is to find what is going on and on and on . . .
Now back to the selfies . . . :wave: .
Memory is also an illusion @MeisterBob; after all if you reside in the present moment, where there is no past, and no future, what are you remembering? ...
...
That is a purely Western mechanistic perspective, perhaps you meant the brain is a storage device, in which case you may be correct, that is not the mind. As previously stated, there is no separate ego; that's the illusion, and identifying with an illusion is a delusion.
Well, yes ,of course. The illusions of the illusion in the illusion.... To navigate this illusion those illusions are necessary. But seriously its an illusion full of wonder! Bob
Indeed, it IS and it ISN'T. ... \ lol / ...
Is "ego" the same as "self"?
For me ego and sense of self are the same. Bob
We would have to define our terms, and the way that these discussions usually go we would end up with no consensus anyway...
Just different people quoting different sources.
I don't want to derail my own thread, but, focussing on and trying to define the ego, in my view, detracts from the fact that you are merely your thoughts and feelings as they arise.
I like that 'make reality groove into your puzzle' @dharmamom. When I first had my mental illness I had a revelation of how people weren't like cartoon characters. I think I released a lot of energy before I was ready and my grasping at high states turned a perfectly normal revelation into a dangerous situation. I hope I will get back to the beautiful realization I had but without the grasping to high states.
The ego is just layers of conceptual thought. You cannot kill it, but you can just realize that it is 'chatter' of the mind.
In buddhism we only know we are thinking. Because it is evident right here. The 'I am' part is the content of thinking/awareness, but the content of thought can be any number of beliefs and dreams. Buddhism is waking from thoughts and seeing the nature of thought. Thoughts are the only game in town, but we need to know the difference between 'I think' and 'I am'. 'I am' is a content and 'thinking' is evident right here and now.
Too much, too fast and no context or map. Buddhism provides what we require in terms of stabilisation, map, teaching, context and means. Mental illness is not an obstacle to our development. Just as being an alcoholic, cushion fetishist or constipated dogmatist is all we are . . .
For what it is worth you seem to inspire a lot of people. Just don't think that is a high state . . .
:wave: .
The I think therefore I am is kind of saying that because there is a movie on the screen therefore there is a projector. That is true but the projector has no characteristics as a movie does. It is there but it is a mirror and has no qualities itself. And it is not accurate to say it is there from the same level of reality as the movie.
Just as being an alcoholic, cushion fetishist or constipated dogmatist, non checking cructacean is NOT all we are . . .
Where ever ego, I go!..or is that where ever I go , ego... Bob
I have a super big ego. Then, I put on a red underwear and pretend to fly round the earth to help people in need.
Like any form of obscuration this depends on the degree. In a similar way everyone is awake at core but this does not mean the Buddha Nature is shining through. Many of us cling to our ignorance, dukkha and personas fragmentation. In one sense this personal attachment to form, our form is ego. The Buddha Ego/Nature is not of this nature.
This is why the personal ego must align or resonate with the Three Jewels independent of its base inclinations mired in lotus mud. Are we rooted and ready to flower or just rearranging the mud?
The degree of delusion is the obstacle. Or the degree to which you cling to that delusion.
Mental illness could be an obstacle according to how much it contributes to that delusion.
Judging what is or isn't development for another requires an accurate view of the karmic load that they are working with?
It sure isn't a skill that I have.
"I observe my thoughts, therefore I am not," could be the Buddhist equivalent of Descartes' "I think, therefore I am."
Well, however far more accurate that is, the question then comes, "Well, if 'you' are not, therefore who exactly is observing....?"