I Know Nothing

[Milo]

Everything I have built psychologically is falling apart. Something is happening. I cannot explain it. I knew before that I could not know anything because of my epistemology class, but I am beginning to lose all hopes of every truly knowing myself.

I have lost all hope.

The mental tools I have been using are useless.

I am shutting down emotionally.

I don't know who I am or what I want...

I never did.

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

First I've got to point out that your threads over time have helped form my own belief system, so thanks for that. *LURKS MOAR!*

What are your thoughts on chaos? Might unpredictability (the existence of which does not imply that there isn't an overarching deterministic mechanism, just that it cannot be known) be the only thing we can predictably rely upon?

I've come to believe that this is a key component of collective consciousness, which has led me to Discordianism, my most recent destination.

I would venture to say that you "are" (e.g. life is quite literally what you make it). Nothing else. I could tell you to "be", to live in the present because if nothing else it's the only thing you can do. I could tell you that the Self doesn't exist and that awareness and Free Will is merely the action of a larger unknowable system reflecting upon itself at a given locus.

But I'm not sure myself, and never can be (Especially that last one. Da Blob has linked me to some reading on the formation of the Self that I haven't really gotten to other than a quick skim that leads me to believe I'm headed in the right direction). http://www.intpforum.com/showpost.php?p=335401&postcount=16

 

[Moocow]

Everything I have built psychologically is falling apart. Something is happening. I cannot explain it. I knew before that I could not know anything because of my epistemology class, but I am beginning to lose all hopes of every truly knowing myself.

I have lost all hope.

The mental tools I have been using are useless.

I am shutting down emotionally.

I don't know who I am or what I want...

I never did.

I like this thread already.
How exactly did you ever picture this self-knowledge to work anyways? What would it do for you if you had it, as opposed to now?

Do you see any contradiction in your present statements?

 

[Milo]

I thought it would help me find a purpose, something that kept me from constant depression, something that allowed me to connect with the rest of the world.

If I had it, I would do what it is I want, but I don't want anything but to find direction. I need to identify my Self, or attach it to something I can never lose, something I can hold on to to remind me of something that gives me a reason to keep living.

I am a character in a movie with no plot, no intentions that are my own. I sit waiting for a quest, but there are no problems in the world that I feel called upon. My talents and skills rendered useless to both me and everyone else.

 

[snafupants]

I thought it would help me find a purpose, something that kept me from constant depression, something that allowed me to connect with the rest of the world.

If I had it, I would do what it is I want, but I don't want anything but to find direction. I need to identify my Self, or attach it to something I can never lose, something I can hold on to to remind me of something that gives me a reason to keep living.

I am a character in a movie with no plot, no intentions that are my own. I sit waiting for a quest, but there are no problems in the world that I feel called upon. My talents and skills rendered useless to both me and everyone else.

Ego-mind only seeks, and ego-mind's pursuits are insatiable and unsatisfactory. You would find more meaning in doffing ego-mind and inhabiting, or merely tasting, cosmic consciousness. Nothing you do with/in ego-mind is of any consequence whatsoever. You approximate ego-mind by noticing your specific defense mechanisms and dampening these habitual responses. Eventually, you will experience a spontaneous insight or meta-perspective of ego-mind's moment to moment myth making. Since ego-mind can't deliberately see and transcend ego-mind (imagine the impossibility of someone seeing themselves as another person), you need to commit to inner work, which isn't synonymous with ego-mind seeking, and wait to be touched by grace. When you experience this spontaneous insight, your past self - what you now fancy as ego-mind - will be totally obliterated and you will slake your thirst with cosmic consciousness, which is love/bliss. Listen to this post and discount anyone who tries to tear it down with ego-mind limited logic. Edit: Ha, like SpaceYeti who just posted.

 

[SpaceYeti]

Everything I have built psychologically is falling apart. Something is happening. I cannot explain it. I knew before that I could not know anything because of my epistemology class, but I am beginning to lose all hopes of every truly knowing myself.

I have lost all hope.

The mental tools I have been using are useless.

I am shutting down emotionally.

I don't know who I am or what I want...

I never did.

Or you're just being overly dramatic. Getting to know yourself is easy; After you do something, ask yourself if you liked it or disliked it, or neither. Note your answer. You just learned something about yourself (or at least compiled more data on that one subject). If you find yourself wanting something, simply admit to liking it. Learn about yourself the way you would anything else; Observe it.

 

[Milo]

So everything I have ever posted, has been my ego protecting itself?

What is this grace like?

 

[snafupants]

What is this grace like?

An explosion of white light near the heart. An intuitive realization. A gift. People who haven't experienced it naturally discount the phenomenon.

 

[snafupants]

So everything I have ever posted, has been my ego protecting itself?

I hate to say it, but yes. Pre-realization everything is a lie. Maya, if you like.

 

[Milo]

I will try. Is there a meditative technique I could use?

 

[snafupants]

I will try. Is there a meditative technique I could use?

Haha, there's no technique. That's more seeking! Stop seeking and you would experience Reality.

 

[Milo]

Is it like this? http://lifeininfinity.blogspot.com/2013/01/how-to-get-rid-of-ego.html

 

[Milo]

And what makes it cosmic?? I don't understand?!?!!

But I have hope, or my ego does?

 

[snafupants]

Is it like this? http://lifeininfinity.blogspot.com/2013/01/how-to-get-rid-of-ego.html

Anything that does not give you a feeling of belongingness, towards any human being - that is ego. Ego means nothing but a wall between you and others. So even if you are shy - that is nothing but ego; If you are arrogant - that is ego, If you are jealous - that is ego.

I will read the entire thing in a moment, but in a crude form, yes, such is ego. It seems like the article's author mistakes the symptom for the thing itself though.

I realised that ego is something else; and I am something else.

Very true. Most people mistake the ego-mind for self. You're really divine consciousness love.

I found out that there is a Mind, Ego, Intellect, Memory, Body, thoughts and me. You are already different from Mind, Ego, Intellect, Body, Memory and thoughts.

But who is you? haha This author doesn't say because s/he doesn't know. You are love.

A unique quality of these tools is that they keep giving credit to you. So say for example, someone compliments you that you are looking very nice; the mind and ego becomes happy - and they give credit to you. Here you only have to realise that 'You' are only a witness and give back the credit to the body and mind. Similarly say if you are bored/angry/frustrated, realise that its the mind who is getting bored/frustrated/angry - Not you!

That's elementary. Nobody talks about what the Essential Self or Real You is...the answer is love/bliss/cosmic consciousness. Completely stop seeking and report back haha.

 

[Milo]

Completely stop seeking and report back haha.

Whaaa? Uhhh??! How??!

 

[snafupants]

Yes indeed, being the witness is the key. Nicely written. Look forward to next post!

Someone posted this well-meaning and entirely vague comment down below. It's clever and it's stupid. Who is the witness? How do you witness? Answer: You find out the impediments to love - i.e., your particular ego structure - and decimate them. All of these activities are still part of seeking; you're not there yet! When you tamp them down enough, an extreme fear will ensue. The ego-mind assumes death awaits at its destruction. But cosmic consciousness catches you! You become filled with light! Ego-mind is duality delusion incarnate. The spontaneous meta-perspective of ego-mind is itself not ego-mind, which is an ostensible paradox the rationalists love to quibble over. The insight is granted through grace, not stealth via meditation or drugs.

 

[Milo]

Someone posted this well-meaning and entirely vague comment down below. It's clever and it's stupid. Who is the witness? How do you witness? Answer: You find out the impediments to love - i.e., your particular ego structure - and decimate them. When you tamp them down enough, an extreme fear will ensue. The ego-mind assumes death awaits at its destruction. But cosmic consciousness catches you! You become filled with light! Ego-mind is duality delusion incarnate. The intuitive awareness of ego-mind is not itself ego-mind, which is an ostensible paradox the rationalists love to quibble over. The insight is granted through grace, not stealth via meditation or drugs.

I feel like this counts as seeking??? Lol

 

[snafupants]

I feel like this counts as seeking??? Lol

Define this. I called seeking seeking above. Look again.

 

[snafupants]

I feel like this counts as seeking??? Lol

I'm telling you how enlightenment normally ensues.

Haha, I could start from birth if you like. With Ramana Maharshi, things would move from seeking to the enlightenment process. I have talked about both.

 

[Milo]

Wait, I missed the part where you said it was... haha

 

[snafupants]

Wait, I missed the part where you said it was... haha

You might not be ready to hear these things. Suffice it to say, all is love and ego-mind breeds resentment and false boundaries to love.

 

[Milo]

I'm telling you how enlightenment normally ensues.

Haha, I could start from birth if you like. With Ramana Maharshi, things would move from seeking to the enlightenment process. I have talked about both.

Yeah, that would be great. Although, I have read about this birth thing and I never get it.

 

[snafupants]

Wait, I missed the part where you said it was... haha

Please continue.

 

[Milo]

I just don't get it at all...

How do I stop seeking? I can't comprehend this!

 

[snafupants]

I feel like this counts as seeking??? Lol

Incorrect. I characterized seeking as seeking and the insight as spontaneously occurring. There's nothing to seek with the latter because you have no framework for conceptualizing cosmic consciousness in ego-mind duality.

 

[snafupants]

I just don't get it at all...

How do I stop seeking? I can't comprehend this!

The desire to cease seeking is itself seeking. All wishes come from pain, however slight. Once the ego-mind is sufficiently understood as a pain causing and perpetually seeking machine, the insight arises and the duality drops away. There's really no formula for making the insight happen. I'm delineating what worked for me and people like me.

 

[snafupants]

I just don't get it at all...

How do I stop seeking? I can't comprehend this!

Let me put it this way: if you wiped away all ego-mind, you would experience love-bliss.

 

[Milo]

So I can't even just try to be observing my own ego? Is that just my intellect?

 

[Milo]

Let me put it this way: if you wiped away all ego-mind, you would experience love-bliss.

I'm not exactly sure on how to go about wiping it away. I don't even notice the defense mechanisms. Do I have to activate them to notice them?

 

[Milo]

Another thing, is this something I must keep doing, or will it become permanent?

 

[snafupants]

So I can't even just try to be observing my own ego? Is that just my intellect?

The article actually proved necessary but insufficient. You will notice above I connected self-discovery with seeking. It is seeking because ego-mind is seeking to understand itself to eliminate pain. Ego-mind is about pain and pleasure. Your goal right now is not unequivocal love. It's an egoic pursuit to avoid pain. The article sees witnessing the ego-mind as more of a telos. I see cosmic consciousness and extended ego boundaries as the ultimate realization. So, what am I saying? For me, the order went self-discovery, conceptualizing the ego structure more abstractly, the ego-mind dampening in importance as I increasingly understood my ego-mind (its triggers, etc.) and realized ego-mind as a bad program predicated on childhood defense mechanisms, apparent cessation of ego-mind, touched heart via divine grace, and cosmic consciousness. Because I understood ego-mind as a bad program beforehand, I didn't experience the fear that Ramana Maharshi reports immediately prior to total ego dissolution. It's just not logical to believe ego = life or that you will die without your bullshit but the ego makes you believe that line. Hence, illusion, maya. The ego-mind is destructive and selfish. Look around haha the world is created from ego-mind.

 

[snafupants]

Another thing, is this something I must keep doing, or will it become permanent?

You must unequivocally love. That's it. The ego-mind will fight you like hell though.

Love is your natural state. You - ego-mind = Love. It's that simple. You + ego-mind = duality.

 

[Milo]

Im going to draw a picture to illustrate the ego just to fully conceptualize it.

 

[snafupants]

Im going to draw a picture to illustrate the ego just to fully conceptualize it.

Go for it! I'll be here.

Haha, well, hopefully. Mention me or something.

You can PM the final product if so inclined.

As the sun is hidden by clouds produced by the solar rays but surely, the character of the day is not hidden by those modified dense collection of clouds, so the Self, though pure, (or undefiled) is veiled for a long time by ignorance. But its power of Consciousness in living beings, which is established in this world, is not veiled.

Ignorance is no more nor less than ego-mind. Remove ego-mind and you become light.

 

[Milo]

@snafupants

Can I just actively love hence drowning out the ego?
I feel like I might be close to it already, and that makes it harder for me to see it if you know what I mean with all my buddhist ideas that I have absorbed as well as the ideas from Da Blob.

 

[joal0503]

free your mind. obliterate the infectious ego.

 

[Milo]

I am getting this off and on feeling of warmness inside of me. Is this an indication of something?

 

[Back2Basics]

Everything I have built psychologically is falling apart. Something is happening. I cannot explain it. I knew before that I could not know anything because of my epistemology class, but I am beginning to lose all hopes of every truly knowing myself.

I have lost all hope.

The mental tools I have been using are useless.

I am shutting down emotionally.

I don't know who I am or what I want...

I never did.

this is a good sign; 2 steps forward, one step back. just keep treading and you will look back smiling

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

I just don't get it at all...

How do I stop seeking? I can't comprehend this!

A monk asked Tozan when he was weighing some flax, "What is Buddha?"

Tozan said, "This flax weighs three pounds."

​

 

[snafupants]

I am getting this off and on feeling of warmness inside of me. Is this an indication of something?

You might want to make sure your pants are still dry.

 

[Milo]

You might want to make sure your pants are still dry.

???

 

[Milo]

A monk asked Tozan when he was weighing some flax, "What is Buddha?"

Tozan said, "This flax weighs three pounds."

​

I feel like this example is getting me closer. Thank you!

 

[Matt3737]

@Milo

Part of the difficulty in overcoming ego, desire, and attachment is the inherent paradox in seeking to do so.

We can say that one who desires to be without desire is still caught up in the cycle.

Are you aware of the dichotomy of the virtuous and vicious circle?

Steven Collins, Selfless Persons: Thought and Imagery in Theravada Buddhism." Cambridge University Press, 1982, page 251: "In the end, the flowing streams of sense-desire must be 'cut' or 'crossed' completely; nevertheless, for the duration of the Path, a monk must perforce work with motivational and perceptual processes as they ordinarily are, that is to say, based on desire ... Thus, during mental training, the stream is not to be 'cut' immediately, but guided, like water along viaducts. The meditative steadying of the mind by counting in- and out-breaths (in the mindfulness of breathing) is compared to the steadying of a boat in 'a fierce current' by its rudder. The disturbance of the flow of a mountain stream by irrigation channels cut into its sides it used to illustrate the weakening of insight by the five 'hindrances'."

 

[just george]

A philosopher by the name of Alan Watts said something that I think about everytime I'm being hard on myself and thinking that I'm crap. He said something along the lines of (and im mixing different bits of what he said to make the point) "the universe is perfect. you are part of the universe. wanting to change yourself or get rid of evil is like looking at a constellation of stars and saying that it isnt beautiful because it looks messy".

As much as I butchered what mr Watts said, my view is that all of us are like that messy constellation of stars - a bit all over the place, but fantastic in our own way as we are, even if we dont understand why

 

[Duxwing]

I am getting this off and on feeling of warmness inside of me. Is this an indication of something?

Is there a special someone in your life? Love is warm.

-Duxwing

 

[snafupants]

A philosopher by the name of Alan Watts said something that I think about everytime I'm being hard on myself and thinking that I'm crap. He said something along the lines of (and im mixing different bits of what he said to make the point) "the universe is perfect. you are part of the universe. wanting to change yourself or get rid of evil is like looking at a constellation of stars and saying that it isnt beautiful because it looks messy".

As much as I butchered what mr Watts said, my view is that all of us are like that messy constellation of stars - a bit all over the place, but fantastic in our own way as we are, even if we dont understand why

I understand why, and you have already alluded to it. Every single person is spectacular because behind the ego-mind is cosmic consciousness - aka, bliss/love.

 

[snafupants]

Part of the difficulty in overcoming ego, desire, and attachment is the inherent paradox in seeking to do so.

We can say that one who desires to be without desire is still caught up in the cycle.

Very much so. Well phrased. Ego-mind can't transcend ego-mind. Seeking can't overcome seeking itself. These are all ways of saying the same thing.

 

[Antediluvian]

A philosopher by the name of Alan Watts said something that I think about everytime I'm being hard on myself and thinking that I'm crap. He said something along the lines of (and im mixing different bits of what he said to make the point) "the universe is perfect. you are part of the universe. wanting to change yourself or get rid of evil is like looking at a constellation of stars and saying that it isnt beautiful because it looks messy".

As much as I butchered what mr Watts said, my view is that all of us are like that messy constellation of stars - a bit all over the place, but fantastic in our own way as we are, even if we dont understand why

I suppose I disagree, I view the universe as full of mistakes. Though, this is one man's non-forceful opinion, so don't mind me.

 

[Milo]

Ego-mind only seeks, and ego-mind's pursuits are insatiable and unsatisfactory. You would find more meaning in doffing ego-mind and inhabiting, or merely tasting, cosmic consciousness. Nothing you do with/in ego-mind is of any consequence whatsoever. You approximate ego-mind by noticing your specific defense mechanisms and dampening these habitual responses. Eventually, you will experience a spontaneous insight or meta-perspective of ego-mind's moment to moment myth making. Since ego-mind can't deliberately see and transcend ego-mind (imagine the impossibility of someone seeing themselves as another person), you need to commit to inner work, which isn't synonymous with ego-mind seeking, and wait to be touched by grace. When you experience this spontaneous insight, your past self - what you now fancy as ego-mind - will be totally obliterated and you will slake your thirst with cosmic consciousness, which is love/bliss. Listen to this post and discount anyone who tries to tear it down with ego-mind limited logic. Edit: Ha, like SpaceYeti who just posted.

@snafupants

So by "inner work" what specifically do you mean? I'm having trouble conceptualizing it. I'm pretty sure this enlightenment thing is a way of separating me from the world so that I no longer need a defense mechanism. Am I right?
It is the same as being in love with someone and attaching your Self to them. So as long as you have them, you are untouchable.

Am I close?

 

[snafupants]

@snafupants

So by "inner work" what specifically do you mean? I'm having trouble conceptualizing it. I'm pretty sure this enlightenment thing is a way of separating me from the world so that I no longer need a defense mechanism. Am I right?
It is the same as being in love with someone and attaching your Self to them. So as long as you have them, you are untouchable.

Am I close?

Yeah, that notion is certainly in the right zip code. I liked the later simile but the detail about being untouchable sounds like an exodus from pain, seeking perhaps. Big realizations are more like falling in love without expect it. You're just in a good place and able to share something sweet. By inner work I simply meant understanding the byways and tributaries of what you're currently mistaking for you, ego-mind. Buddhists conceptualize ego-mind as a knot in the heart. When you undo the knot, that's liberation. Right now you're shackled by stale patterns and seeking turmoil, mostly abeyant if you're lucky. By seeing the patterns and undoing the knot, I believe most people may achieve liberation before their biological clock expires. It's not always gumdrops and sundaes, though, and defying the ego comes with risks and anxieties. The crux of the deal is more about removing the ego-mind knot in the heart and allowing Reality to enter you.