| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 01/07/2013 : 14:47:50
This thread will offer some of the best quotes from the work of Ekhart Tolle. See also: http://tmshelp.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=8097
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From Ekhart Tolle's "A New Earth: Awakening to your Life's Purpose." -- Pages 135 - 137
EMOTIONS AND THE EGO
The ego is not only the unobserved mind, the voice in the head which pretends to be you, but also the unobserved emotions that are the body's reaction to what the voice in the head is saying.
We have already seen what kind of thinking the egoic voice engages in most of the time and the dysfunction inherent in the structure of its thought processes, regardless of content. This dysfunctional thinking is what the body reacts to with negative emotion.
The voice in the head tells a story that the body believes in and reacts to. Those reactions are the emotions. The emotions, in turn, feed energy back to the thoughts that created the emotion in the first place. This is the vicious circle between unexamined thoughts and emotions, giving rise to emotional thinking and emotional storymaking.
The emotional component of ego differs from person to person. In some egos, it is greater than in others. Thoughts that trigger emotional responses in the body may sometimes come so fast that before the mind has had time to voice them, the body has already responded with an emotion, and the emotion has turned into a reaction. Those thoughts exist at a pre verbal stage and could be called unspoken, unconscious assumptions. They have their origin in a person's past conditioning, usually from early
childhood. “People cannot be trusted” would be an example of such an unconscious assumption in a person whose primordial relationships, that is to say, with parents roe siblings, were not supportive and did not inspire trust. Here are a few more common unconscious assumptions: “Nobody respects and appreciates me. I need to fight to survive. There is never enough money. Life always lets you down. I don't deserve abundance. I don't deserve love.” Unconscious assumptions create emotions in the body which in turn generate mind activity and/or instant reactions. In this way, they create your personal reality.
The voice of the ego continuously disrupts the body's natural state of wellbeing. Almost every human body is under a great deal of strain and stress, not because it is threatened by some external factor but from within the mind. The body has an ego attached to it, and it cannot but respond to all the dysfunctional thought patterns that make up the ego. Thus, a stream of negative emotion accompanies the stream of incessant and compulsive thinking.
What is a negative emotion? An emotion that is toxic to the body and interferes with its balance and harmonious functioning. Fear, anxiety, anger, bearing a grudge, sadness, hatred or intense dislike, jealousy, envy – all disrupt the energy flow through the body, affect the heart, the immune system, digestion, production of hormones, and so on. Even mainstream medicine, although it knows very little about how the ego operates yet is
beginning to recognize the connection between negative emotional states and physical disease. An emotion that does harm to the body also infects the people you come into contact with and indirectly, though a process of chain reaction, countless others you never meet. There is a generic term for all negative emotions: unhappiness.
Do positive emotions then have the opposite effect on the physical
body? Do they strengthen the immune system, invigorate and heal the body? They do, indeed, but we need to differentiate between positive emotions that are egogenerated and deeper emotions that emanate from your natural state of connectedness with Being.
Positive emotions generated by the ego already contain within themselves their opposite into which they can quickly turn. Here are some examples. What the ego calls love is possessiveness and addictive clinging that can turn into hate within a second. Anticipation about an upcoming event, which is the ego's overvaluation of future, easily turns into its opposite – letdown or disappointment – when the event is over or doesn't fulfill the ego's expectations. Praise and recognition make you feel alive and happy one
day; being criticized or ignored make you dejected and unhappy the next. The pleasure of a wild party turns into bleakness and a hangover the next morning. There is no good without bad, no high without low.
Egogenerated emotions are derived from the mind's identification with external factors which are of course, all unstable and liable to change at any moment. The deeper emotions are not really emotions at all but states of Being. Emotions exist within the realm of opposites. States of Being can be obscured, but they have no opposite. They emanate from within you as the love, joy, and peace that are aspects of your true nature. |
| 20 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/13/2013 : 06:18:19
ENLIGHTENMENT: RISING ABOVE THOUGHT
As you grow up, you form a mental image of who you
are, based on your personal and cultural conditioning.
We may call this phantom self the ego. It consists
of mind activity and can only be kept going through
constant thinking. The term ego means different things
to different people, but when I use it here it means a
false self, created by unconscious identification with
the mind.
To the ego, the present moment hardly exists. Only
past and future are considered important. This total
reversal of the truth accounts for the fact that in the ego
mode the mind is so dysfunctional. It is always con¬
cerned with keeping the past alive, because without it
— who are you? It constantly projects itself into the
future to ensure its continued survival and to seek some
kind of release or fulfillment there. It says: "One day,
when this, that, or the other happens, I am going to be
okay, happy, at peace."
Even when the ego seems to be concerned with the
present, it is not the present that it sees: It misperceives
it completely because it looks at it through the eyes of
the past. Or it reduces the present to a means to an end,
an end that always lies in the mind-projected future.
Observe your mind and you'll see that this is how it
works.
The present moment holds the key to liberation. But
you cannot find the present moment as long as you are
your mind.
Enlightenment means rising above thought. In the
enlightened state, you still use your thinking mind when
needed, but in a much more focused and effective way
than before. You use it mostly for practical purposes, but
you are free of the involuntary internal dialogue, and
there is inner stillness.
When you do use your mind, and particularly
when a creative solution is needed, you oscillate every
few minutes or so between thought and stillness,
between mind and no-mind. No-mind is conscious¬
ness without thought. Only in that way is it possible to
think creatively, because only in that way does thought
have any real power. Thought alone, when it is no
longer connected with the much vaster realm of con¬
sciousness quickly becomes barren, insane, destructive.
(Practicing the Power of Now) --- Ekhart Tolle |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/13/2013 : 06:04:46
Not to be able to stop thinking is a dreadful affliction, but we don't
realize this because almost everybody is suffering from it, so it is considered normal. This incessant mental noise prevents you from finding that realm of inner stillness that is inseparable from Being. It also creates a false mind-made self that casts a shadow of fear and
suffering.
Identification with your mind creates an opaque
screen of concepts, labels, images, words, judgments,
and definitions that blocks all true relationship. It comes
between you and yourself, between you and your fellow
man and woman, between you and nature, between you
and God. It is this screen of thought that creates the illu¬
sion of separateness, the illusion that there is you and a
totally separate "other." You then forget the essential fact
that, underneath the level of physical appearances and
separate forms, you are one with all that is.
(Practicing the Power of Now) --- Ekhart Tolle
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| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/10/2013 : 13:18:50
LOSE YOURSELF TO FIND YOURSELF
From: A New Earth
Inner space also arises whenever you let go of the need to emphasize
your formidentity. That need is of the ego. It is not a true need. We have
already touched briefly upon this. Whenever you relinquish one of these
behavior patterns, inner space emerges. You become more truly yourself. To
the ego it will seem as if you were losing yourself, but the opposite is the
case. Jesus already taught that you need to lose yourself to find yourself.
Whenever you let go of one of these patterns, you deemphasize who you are
on the level of form and who you are beyond form emerges more fully. You
become less, so you can be more.Here are some ways in which people unconsciously try to emphasize
their formidentity. If you are alert enough, you may be be to detect some of
these unconscious patterns within yourself: demanding recognition for
something you did and getting angry or upset if you don't get it; trying to get
attention by talking about your problems, the story of your illnesses, or
making a scene; giving your opinion when nobody has asked for it and it
makes no difference to the situation; being more concerned with how the
other person sees you than with the other person, which is to say, using other
people for egoic reflection or as as ego enhancers; trying to make an
impression on others through possessions, knowledge, good looks, status,
physical strength,and so on; bringing about temporary ego inflation through
angry reaction against something to someone; taking things personally,
feeling offended; making yourself right and others wrong through futile
mental or verbal complaining; wanting to be seen, or to appear important.
Once you have detected such a pattern within yourself, I suggest that
you conduct an experiment. Find out what it feels like and what happens if
you let go of that pattern. Just drop it and see what happens.
Deemphasizing who you are on the level of form is another way of
generating consciousness. Discover the enormous power that flows through
you into the world when you stop emphasizing your form identity
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“Nonresistance, nonjudgment, and nonattachment are the
three aspects of true freedom and enlightened living” -- Ekhart Tolle |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/07/2013 : 15:46:37
ALLOWING THE DIMINISHMENT OF THE EGO
From Ekhart Tolle -- A New Earth
The ego is always on guard against any kind of perceived diminishment.
Automatic egorepair mechanisms come into effect to restore the mental
form of “me.” When someone blames or criticizes me, that to the ego is a
diminishment of self, and it will immediately attempt to repair its diminished
sense of self through selfjustification, defense, or blaming. Whether the
other person is right or wrong is irrelevant to the ego. It is much more
interested in selfpreservation than in the truth. This is the preservation of
the psychological form of “me.” Even such a normal thing as shouting
something back when another driver calls you “idiot” is an automatic and
unconscious egorepair mechanism. One of the most common egorepair
mechanisms is anger, which causes a temporary but huge ego inflation. All
repair mechanisms make perfect sense to the ego but are actually
dysfunctional. Those that are most extreme in their dysfunction are physical
violence ad selfdelusion in the form of grandiose fantasies.
A powerful spiritual practice is consciously to allow the
diminishment of ego when it happens without attempting to restore it. I
recommend that you experiment with this from time to time. For example,
when someone criticizes you, blames you, or calls you names, instead of
immediately retaliating or defending yourself – do nothing. Allow the self
image to remain diminished and become alert to what that feels like deep
inside you. For a few seconds, it may feel uncomfortable, as if you had
shrunk in size. Then you may sense an inner spaciousness that feels intensely
alive. You haven't been diminished at all. In fact, you have expanded. You
may then come to an amazing realization: When you are seemingly
diminished in some way and remain in absolute nonreaction, not just
externally but also internally, you realize that nothing real has been
diminished, that through becoming “less,” you become more. When you no
longer defend or attempt to strengthen the form of yourself, you step out of
identification with form, with mental selfimage. Through becoming less (in
the ego's perception), you in fact undergo an expansion and make room for
Being to come forward. True power, who you are beyond form, can then
shine through the apparently weakened form. this is what Jesus means when
he says, “Deny yourself” or “Turn the other cheek.”
This does not mean, of course, that you invite abuse or turn yourself
into a victim of unconscious people. Sometimes a situation may demand that
you tell someone to “back off” in no uncertain terms. Without egoic
defensiveness, there will be power behind your words, yet no reactive force.
If necessary, you can also say not to someone firmly and clearly, and it will
be what I call a “highquality no” that is free of all negativity.
If you are content with being nobody in particular, content not to stand
out, you align yourself with the power of the universe. What looks like
weakness to the ego is in fact the only true strength. This spiritual truth is
diametrically opposed to the values of our contemporary culture and the way
it conditions people to behave. Instead of trying to be the mountain, teaches the ancient Tao Te Ching, “Be the valley of the universe.”
In this way, you are restored to wholeness and so “All things will come to you.”
Similarly, Jesus, in one of his parables, teaches that “When you are
invited, go and sit in the lowest place so that when your host comes, he may
say to you, friend, move up higher. Then you will be honored in the presence
of all who sit at table with you. For everyone who exalts himself will be
humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Another aspect of this practice is to refrain from attempting to strengthen the self by showing off, wanting to stand out, be special, make an impression, or demand attention. It may include occasionally refraining from expressing your opinion when everybody is expressing his or hers, and seeing what that feels like.
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“The snow falls, each flake in its appropriate place.” |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/06/2013 : 15:14:04
GOOD AND BAD
From Ekhart Tolle (A New Earth)
At some point in their lives, most people become aware that there is
not only birth, growth, success, good health, pleasure, and winning, but also
loss, failure, sickness, old age, decay, pain and death. Conventionally these
are labeled “good” and “bad,” order and disorder. The “meaning” of people's
lives is usually associated with what they term the “good,” but the good is
continually threatened by collapse, breakdown, disorder; threatened by
meaninglessness and the “bad,” when explanations fail and life ceases to
make sense. Sooner or later, disorder will irrupt into everyone's life no
matter how many insurance policies he or she has. It may come in the form
of loss or accident, sickness, disability, old age, death. However, the
irruption of disorder into a person's life, and the resultant collapse of a
mentally defined meaning, can become the opening into a higher order.
“The wisdom of this world is folly with God,” says the Bible.
What is the wisdom of this world? The movement of thought, and meaning that is
defined exclusively by thought.
Thinking isolates a situation or event and calls it good or bad, as if it
had a separate existence. Through excessive reliance on thinking, reality
becomes fragmented. This fragmentation is an illusion, but it seems very real
while you are trapped in it. And yet the universe is an indivisible whole in
which all things are interconnected, in which nothing exists in isolation.
The deeper interconnectedness of all things and events implies that the
mental labels of “good” and bad” are ultimately illusory. They always imply
a limited perspective and so are true only relatively and temporarily. This is
illustrated in the story of a wise man who won an expensive car in a lottery.
His family and friends were very happy for him and came to celebrate. “Isn't
it great!” they said. “You are so lucky.” The man smiled and said “Maybe.”
For a few weeks he enjoyed driving the car. Then one day a drunken driver
crashed into his new car at an intersection and he ended up in the hospital,
with multiple injuries. His family and friends came to see him and said,
“That was really unfortunate. “ Again the man smiled and said, “Maybe.”
While he was still in the hospital, one night there was a landslide and his
house fell into the sea. Again his friends came the next day and said,
“Weren't you lucky to have been here in hospital.” Again he said, “Maybe.”
The wise man's “maybe” signifies a refusal to judge anything that
happens. Instead of judging what is, he accepts it and so enters into
conscious alignment with the higher order. He knows that often it is
impossible for the mind to understand what place or purpose a seemingly
random event has in the tapestry of the whole. But there are no random
events, nor are there events or things that exist by and for themselves, in
isolation. The atoms that make up your body were once forged inside stars,
and the causes of even the smallest event are virtually infinite and connected
with the whole in incomprehensible ways. If you wanted to trace back the
cause of any event, you would have to go back all the way to the beginning
of creation. The cosmos is not chaotic. The very word cosmos means order.
But this is not an order the human mind can ever comprehend, although it
can sometimes glimpse it.
NOT MINDING WHAT HAPPENS
J. Krishnamurti, the great Indian philosopher and spiritual teacher,
spoke and traveled almost continuously all over the world for more than fifty
years attempting to convey through words which are content – that which is
beyond words, beyond content. At one of his talks in the later part of his life,
he surprised his audience by asking, “Do you want to know my secret?”
Everyone became very alert. Many people in the audience had been coming to listen to him for twenty or thirty years and still failed to grasp the essence
of his teaching. Finally, after all these years, the master would give them the
key to understanding. “This is my secret,” he said. “I don't mind what
happens.”
He did not elaborate, and so I suspect most of his audience were even
more perplexed than before. The implications of this simple statement,
however, are profound.
When I don't mind what happens, what does that imply? It implies
that internally I am in alignment with what happens. “What happens,” of
course, refers to the suchness of this moment, which always already is as it
is. It refers to content, the form that this moment – the only moment there
ever is – takes. To be in alignment with what is means to be in a relationship
of inner nonresistance with what happens. It mean not to label it mentally as
good or bad, but to let it be. Does this mean you can no longer take action to
bring abut change in your life? On the contrary. when the basis for your
actions is inner alignment with the present moment, your actions become
empowered by the intelligence of Life itself.
*************************
“The snow falls, each flake in its appropriate place.” |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/06/2013 : 14:50:49
BREAKING FREE OF THE PAINBODY -- from A New Earth
A question people frequently ask is, “How long does it take to become
free of the painbody?” The answer is, of course, that it depends both on the
density of an individual's painbody as well as the degree or intensity of that
individual's arising Presence. But it is not the painbody, but identification
with it that causes the suffering that you inflict on yourself and others. It is
not the painbody but identification with the painbody that forces you to
relive the past again and again and keeps you in a state of unconsciousness.
So a more important question to ask would be this: “How long does it take to
become free of identification with the painbody?”
And the answer to that question: It takes no time at all. When the pain
body is activated, know that what you are feeling is th painbody in you. This
knowing is all that is needed to break your identification with it. And when
identification with it ceases, the transmutation begins. The knowing prevents
the old emotion from rising up in your head and taking over not only the
internal dialogue, but also your actions as well as interactions with other
people. This mean the painbody cannot use you anymore and renew itself
through you. The old emotion may then still live in you for a while and come
up periodically. It may also still occasionally trick you into identifying with
it again and thus obscure the knowing, but not for long. Not projecting the
old emotion into situations means facing it directly within yourself. It may
not be pleasant, but it won't kill you. Your Presence is more than capable of
containing it. The emotion is not who you are.
When you feel the painbody, don't fall into the error of thinking there
is something wrong with you. Making yourself into a problem – the ego
loves that. The knowing needs to be followed by accepting. Anything else
will obscure it again. Accepting means you allow yourself to feel whatever it
is you are feeling at that moment. It is part of the isness of the Now. Youcan't argue with what is.
Well, you can, but if you do, you suffer. Through
allowing, you become what you are: vast, spacious. You become whole. You
are not a fragment anymore, which is how the ego perceives itself. Your true
nature emerges, which is one with the nature of God.
Jesus points to this when he says, “Be ye whole, even as your Father in
Heaven is whole.”
The New Testament's “Be ye perfect” is a mistranslation
of he original Greek word, which means whole. This is to say, you don't need
to become whole, but be what you already are – with or without the pain
body. |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/04/2013 : 17:07:14
CARRYING THE PAST
In Ekhart Tolle`s -- A New Earth
The inability or rather unwillingness of the human mind to let go of
the past is beautifully illustrated in the story of two Zen monks, Tanzan and Ekido,
who were walking along a country road that had become extremely
muddy after heavy rains. Near a village, they came upon a young woman
who was trying to cross the road, but the mud was so deep it would have
ruined the silk kimono she was wearing. Tanzan at once picked her up and
carried her to the other side.
The monks walked on in silence. Five hours later, as they were
approaching the lodging temple, Ekido couldn't restrain himself any longer.
“Why did you carry that girl across the road?” he asked. “We monks are not
supposed to do things like that.”
“I put the girl down hours ago,” said Tanzan. “Are you still carrying
her?”
Now imagine what life would be like for someone who lived like
Ekido all the time, unable or unwilling to let go internally of situations,
accumulating more and more “stuff' inside, and you get a sense of what life
is like for the majority of people on our planet. What a heavy burden of past
they carry around with them in their minds.
The past lives in you as memories, but memories in themselves are not
a problem. in fact, it is through memory that we learn from the past and from
past mistakes. It is only when memories, that is to say, thoughts about the
past, take you over completely that they turn into a burden, turn problematic,
and become part of your sense of self. Your personality, which is conditioned
by the past, then becomes your prison. Your memories are invested with a
sense of self, and your story becomes who you perceive yourself to be. This
“little me” is an illusion that obscures your true identity as timeless and
formless Presence.
Your story, however, consists not only of mental but also of emotional
memory – old emotion that is being revived continuously. As in the case of
the monk who carried the burden of his resentment for five hours by feeding
it with his thoughts, most people carry a large amount of unnecessary
baggage, both mental and emotional, throughout their lives. They limit
themselves through grievances, regret, hostility, guilt. Their emotional
thinking has become their self, and so they hang on to the old emotion
because it strengthens their identity.Because of the human tendency to perpetuate
old emotion, almost everyone carries in his or her energy filed an accumulation of old emotional
pain, which I call “the pain body.”
We can, however, stop adding to the pinbody that we already have.
We can learn to break the habit of accumulating and perpetuating old
emotion by flapping our wings, metaphorically speaking, and refrain from
mentally dwelling on the past, regardless of whether something happened
yesterday or thirty years ago. We can learn not to keep situations or events
alive in our minds, but to return our attention continuously to the pristine,
timeless present moment rather than be caught up in mental movie making.
Our very Presence then becomes our identity, rather than our thoughts and
emotions.
Nothing ever happened in the past that can prevent you from being
present now; and if the past cannot prevent you from being present now,
what power does it have? |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/04/2013 : 06:46:50
THE DUCK WITH A HUMAN MIND
In Ekhart Tolle`s -- A New Earth
In The Power of Now, I mentioned my observation that after two ducks
get into a fight, which never lasts long, they will separate and float off in
opposite directions. Then each duck will flap its wings vigorously a few
times; thus releasing the surplus energy that built up during the fight. After
they flap their wings, they float on peacefully, as if nothing had ever
happened.
If the duck had a human mind, it would keep the fight alive by
thinking, by storymaking. This would probably be the duck's story: “I don't
believe what he just did. He came to within five inches of me. He thinks he
owns this pond. He has no consideration for my private space. I'll never trust
him again. Next time he'll try something else just to annoy me. I'm sure he's
plotting something already. But I'm not going to stand for this. I'll teach him
a lesson he won't forget.” And on and on the mind spins its tales, still
thinking and talking about it days, months, or years later. As far as the body
is concerned, the fight is still continuing, and the energy it generates in
response to all those thoughts is emotion, which in turn generates more
thinking. This becomes the emotional thinking of the ego. you can see how
problematic the duck's life would become if it had a human mind. But this is
how most humans live all the time.
No situation or event is ever really finished. The mind and the mind
made “me and my story” keep it going.
We are a species that ahas lost its way. everything natural, every
flower or tree, and every animal have important lessons to teach us if we
would only stop, look and listen. Our duck's lesson is this: Flap your wings –
which translates as “let go of the story” and return to the only place of
power: the present moment. |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/03/2013 : 07:03:27
From A New Earth --- by Ekhart Tolle
PATHOLOGICAL FROMS OF EGO
As we have seen, the ego is in its essential nature pathological, if we
use the word in its wider sense to denote dysfunction and suffering. Many
mental disorders consist of the same egoic traits that operate in a normal
person, except that they have become so pronounced that their pathological
nature is now obvious to anyone, except the sufferer.
For example, many normal people tell certain kinds of lies from time
to time in order to appear more important, more special, and to enhance this
image in the mind of others: who they know, what their achievements,
abilities, and possessions are, and whatever else the ego uses to identify
with. Some people, however, driven by the ego's feeling of insufficiency and
its need to have or be “more,” lie habitually and compulsively. Most of what
they tell you about themselves, their story, is a complete fantasy, a fictitious
edifice the ego has designed for itself to feel bigger, more special. Their
grandiose and inflated selfimage can sometimes fool others, but usually not
for long. It is then quickly recognized by most people as a compete fiction.
The mental illness that is called paranoid schizophrenia, or paranoia
for short, is essentially an exaggerated form of ego. It usually consists of a
fictitious story the mind has invented to make sense of a persistent
underlying feeling of fear. The main element of the story is the belief that
certain people (sometimes large numbers or almost everyone) are plotting
against me, or are conspiring to control or kill me. The story often has an
inner consistency and logic so that it sometimes fools others into believing it
too. Sometimes organizations or entire nations have paranoid belief systems
at their very basis. The ego's fear and distrust of other people, its tendency to
emphasize the “otherness” of others by focusing on their perceived faults
and make those faults into their identity, is taken a little further and makes
others into inhuman monsters. The ego needs others, but its dilemma is that
deep down it hates and fears them. JeanPaul Sartre's statement “Hell is
other people” is the voice of the ego. The person suffering from paranoia
experiences that hell most acutely, but everyone in whom the egoic patterns
still operate will feel it to some degree. The stronger the ego in you, the more
likely it is that in your perception other people are the main source of
problems in your life. It is also more than likely that you will make life
difficult for others. But, of course, you won't be able to see that. It is always
others who seem to be doing it to you.
The mental illness we call paranoia also manifests another symptom
that is an element of every ego, although in paranoia it takes on a more
extreme form. The more the sufferer sees himself persecuted, spied on, or
threatened by others, the more pronounced becomes his sense of being the
center of the universe around whom everything revolves, and the more
special and important he feels as the imagined focal point of so many
people's attention. His sense of being a victim, of being wronged by so many
people, makes him feel very special. In the story that forms the basis of his
delusional system, he often assigns to himself the role of both victim and
potential hero who is going to save the world or defeat the forces of evil.
The collective ego of tribes, nations, and religious organizations also
frequently contains a strong element of paranoia: us against the evil others. It
is the cause of much human suffering. Th Spanish Inquisition, the
persecution and burning of heretics and “witches,” the relations between
nations leading up to the First and Second World wars, Communism
throughout its history, the “Cold War,” McCarthyism in America in the
1950's, prolonged violent conflict in the Middle East are all painful episodes
in human history dominated by extreme collective paranoia.
The more unconscious individuals, groups, or nations are, the more
likely it is that egoic pathology will assume the form of physical violence.
Violence is a primitive but still very widespread way in which the ego
attempts to assert itself, to prove itself right and another wrong. With very
unconscious people, arguments can easily lead to physical violence. What is
an argument? Two or more people express their opinions and those opinions
differ. Each person is so identified with the thoughts that make up their
opinion, that those thoughts harden into mental positions which are invested
with a sense of self. In other words: Identity and thought merge. Once this
has happened, when I defend my opinions (thoughts), I feel and act as if I
were defending my very self. Unconsciously, I feel and act as if I were
fighting for survival and so my emotions will reflect this unconscious belief.
they become turbulent. I am upset, angry, defensive, or aggressive. I need to
win at all costs lest I become annihilated. That's the illusion. The ego doesn't
know that mind and mental positions have nothing to do with who you are
because the ego is he unobserved mind itself.
In Zen they say: “Don't seek the truth. Just cease to cherish opinions.”
What does that mean? Let go of identification with your mind. Who you are
beyond the mind then emerges by itself.
|
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/02/2013 : 06:56:30
From A New Earth --- by Ekhart Tolle
"The ego loves its resentment of reality. What is reality? Whatever is. Buddha called it tatata – the suchness of life, which is no more than the suchness of this moment. Opposition toward that suchness is one of the main features of the ego. It creates the negativity that the ego thrives on, the unhappiness that it loves. In this way, you make yourself and others suffer and don't even know that you are doing it, don't know that you are creating hell on earth. To create suffering without recognizing it – this is the essence of unconscious living; this is being totally in the grip of the ego. The extent
of the ego's inability to recognize itself and see what it is doing is staggering and unbelievable. It will do exactly what it condemns others for and not see it. When it is pointed out, it will use angry denial, clever arguments, and self justifications to distort the facts. People do it, corporations do it, governments do it. When all else fails, the ego will resort to shouting or even to physical violence. Send in the marines. We can now understand the deep wisdom in Jesus' words on the cross: “Forgive them for they know not what they do.” |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/02/2013 : 06:27:15
THE PATHOLOGICAL EGO
In a wider sense of the word, the ego itself is pathological, no matter
what form it takes. When we look at the ancient Greek root of the word
pathological, we discover just how appropriate that term is when applied to
the ego. Although the word is normally used to describe a condition of
disease, it is derived from pathos, which means suffering. This is, of course,
exactly what the Buddha already discovered 2,600 years ago as a
characteristic of the human condition. A person in the grip of ego, however, does not recognize suffering as suffering, but will look upon it as the only appropriate response in any given situation. The ego in is blindness is incapable of seeing the suffering it
inflicts on itself and on others. Unhappiness is an egocreated mental
emotional disease that has reached epidemic proportions. It is the inner
equivalent of the environmental pollution of our planet. Negative states, such
as anger, anxiety, hatred, resentment, discontent, envy, jealousy, and so on,
are not recognized as negative but as totally justified and are further
misperceived not as selfcreated but as caused by someone else or some
external factor. “I am holding you responsible for my pain.” This is what by
implication the ego is saying.
The ego cannot distinguish between a situation and its interpretation
of and reaction to that situation. You might say, “What a dreadful day,”
without realizing that the cold, the wind, and the rain or whatever condition
you react to are not dreadful. They are as they are. What is dreadful is your
reaction, your inner resistance to it, and the emotion that is created by That
resistance. In Shakespeare's words, “There is nothing either good or bad, but
thinking makes it so.”
What is more, suffering or negativity is often
misperceived by the ego as pleasure because up t the point the ego
strengthens itself through it.
For example, anger or resentment strengthen the ego enormously by
increasing the sense of separateness, emphasizing the otherness of others
and creating a seemingly unassailable fortresslike mental position of
“rightness.” If you were able to observe the physiological changes that take
place inside your body when possessed by such negative states, how they
adversely affect the functioning of the heart, the digestive and immune
systems, and countless other bodily functions, it would become abundantly
clear that such states are indeed pathological, are forms of suffering and not
pleasure.
Whenever you are in a negative state, there is something in you that
wants the negativity, that perceives it as pleasurable, or that believes it will
get you what you want. Otherwise, who would want to hang on to negativity,
make themselves and others miserable, and create disease in the body? So,
whenever there is negativity n you, if you can be aware at that moment that
there is something in you that takes pleasure in it or believes it has a useful
purpose you are becoming aware of the ego directly. The moment this happens,
your identity has shifted from ego to awareness. This means the
ego is shrinking and awareness is growing.
If in the midst of negativity you are able to realize “At this moment I
am creating suffering form myself” it will be enough to raise you above the
limitations of conditioned egoic states and reactions. It will open up infinite
possibilities which come to you when there is awareness other vastly more
intelligent ways of dealing with any situation. You will be free to let go of
your unhappiness the moment you recognize it as unintelligent. Negativity is
not intelligent. It is always of the ego. The ego may be clever, but it is not
intelligent. Cleverness pursues its own little aims. Intelligence sees the larger
whole in which all things are connected. Cleverness is motivated y self
interest, and it is extremely shortsighted. Most politicians and
businesspeople are clever. Very few are intelligent. Whatever is attained
through cleverness is shortlived and always turns out to be eventually self
defeating. Cleverness divides; intelligence unites.
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| shawnsmith |
Posted - 03/01/2013 : 14:58:28
From: A New Earth
GIVING UP ROLE PLAYING
To do whatever is required of you in any situation without it becoming
a role that you identify with is an essential lesson in the art of living that
each one of us is here to learn. You become most powerful in whatever you
do if the action is performed for its own sake rather than as a means to
protect, enhance, or conform to your role identity. Every role is a fictitious
sense of self, and through it everything becomes personalized and thus
corrupted and distorted by the mindmade “little me” and whatever role it
happens to be playing. Most of the people who are in positions of power in
this world, such as politicians, TV personalities, business as a well as
religious leaders, are completely identified with their role, with a few notable
exceptions. They may be considered VIPs, but they are no more than
unconscious players in the egoic game, a game that looks so important yet is
ultimately devoid of true purpose. It is, in the words of Shakespeare, “a tale
told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
1 Amazingly,
Shakespeare arrived at this conclusion without having the benefit of
television. If the egoic earth drama has any purpose at all, it is an indirect
one: It creates more and more suffering on the planet, and suffering,
although largely egocreated, is in the end also egodestructive. It is the fire
in which the ego burns itself up.
In a world of role playing personalities, those few people who don't
project a mind made image – and other are some even on TV, in the media,
and the business world – but function from the deeper core of their Being,
those who do not attempt to appear more than they are but are simply
themselves, stand out as remarkable and are the only ones who truly make a
difference in this world. They are the bringers of the new consciousness.
Whatever they do becomes empowered because it is in alignment with the
purpose of the whole. Their influence, however, goes far beyond what they
do, far beyond their function. Their mere presence – simple, natural,
unassuming – has a transformational effect on whoever they come into
contact with.
When you don't play roles, it means there is no self (ego) in what you
do. There is no secondary agenda: protection or strengthening of yourself.
As a result, your actions have far greater power. You are totally focused on
the situation. You become one with it. You don't try to be anybody in
particular. You are most powerful, most effective, when you are completelyyourself. But don't try to be yourself That's another role. It's called “natural,
spontaneous me.” As soon as yo are trying to be this or that, you are playing
a role. “Just be yourself” is good advice, but it can also be misleading. the
mind will come in and say, “Let's see. How can I be myself?” Then, the mind
will develop some kind of strategy: “How to be myself.” Another role.
“How
can I be myself?” is, in fact, the wrong yourself. It implies you have to do
something to be yourself. But how doesn't apply here because you are
yourself already. Just stop adding unnecessary baggage to who you already
are. “But I don't know who I am. I don't know what it means to be myself.” If
you can be absolutely comfortable with not knowing who you are, then
what's left is who you are – the Being behind the human, a field of pure
potentiality other than something that is already defined.
Give up defining yourself – to yourself or to others. You won't die.
You will come to life. And don't be concerned with how others define you.
When they define you, they are limiting themselves, so it's their problem.
Whenever you interact with people, don't be there primarily as a function or
a role, but as a field of conscious Presence.
Why does the ego play roles? Because of one unexamined assumption,
one fundamental error, one unconscious thought. That thought is: I am not
enough. Other unconscious thoughts follow: I need to play a role in order to
get what I need to be fully myself; I need to get more so that I can be more.
But you cannot be more than you are because underneath your physical and
psychological form, you are one with Life itself, one with Being. In form,
you are and will always be inferior to some, superior to others. In essence,
you are neither inferior nor superior to anyone. True self esteem and true
humility arise out of that realization. In the eyes of the ego, selfesteem and
humility are contradictory. In truth, they are one and the same. |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 02/28/2013 : 07:54:49
Yeah, the drama is more exciting, but my body says no, so I have to listen. |
| tennis tom |
Posted - 02/28/2013 : 06:30:14
Definitely prefer drama, peace is more boring then sleeping.  |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 02/28/2013 : 05:27:55
DO YOU WANT PEACE OR DRAMA?
You want peace. There is no one who does not want peace. Yet there is
something else in you that wants the drama, wants the conflict. You may not
be able to feel it at this moment. You may have to wait for a situation or even
just a thought that triggers a reaction in you: someone accusing you of this or
that, not acknowledging you, encroaching on your territory, questioning the
way you do things, an argument about money.... Can you then feel the
enormous surge of force moving through you, the fear, perhaps being masked
by anger or hostility? Can you hear your own voice becoming harsh or shrill,
or louder and a few octaves lower? Can you be aware of your mind racing to
defend its position, justify, attack, blame? In other words, can you awaken at
that moment of unconsciousness? Can you feel that there is something in
you that is at war, something that feels threatened and wants to survive at all
cost, that needs the drama in order to assert its identity as the victorious
character within that theatrical production? Can you feel there is something
in you that would rather be right than at peace? |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 02/28/2013 : 05:26:42
WAR IS A MINDSET
In certain cases, you may need to protect yourself or someone else
from being harmed by another, but beware of making it your mission to
“eradicate evil,” as you are likely to turn into the very thing you are fighting
against. Fighting unconsciousness will draw you into unconsciousness
yourself. Unconsciousness, dysfunctional egoic behavior, can never be
defeated by attacking it. Even if you defeat your opponent, the
unconsciousness will simply have moved into you, or the opponent reappears
in a new disguise. Whatever you fight, you strengthen, and what you resist,
persists.
These days you frequently hear the expression “the war against” this
or that, and whenever I hear it, I know that it is condemned to failure. There
is the war against drugs, the war against crime, the war against terrorism, the
war against cancer, the war against poverty, and so on. For example, despite
the war against crime and drugs, there has been a dramatic increase in crime
and drugrelated offenses in the past twentyfive years. The prison
population of the United States has gone up from just under 300,000 in 1980
to a staggering 2.1 million in 2004.4 The war against disease has given us,
amongst other things, antibiotics. At first, they were spectacularly successful,
seemingly enabling us to win the war against infectious diseases. Now many
experts agree that the widespread and indiscriminate use of antibiotics has
created a time bomb and that anti biotic resistant strains of bacteria, so called
super bugs, will in all likelihood bring about a reemergence of those diseases
and possibly epidemics. According to the Journal of the American Medical
Association, medical treatment is the thirdleading cause of death after heart
disease and cancer in the United States. Homeopathy and Chinese medicine
are two examples of possible alternative approaches to disease that do not
treat the illness as an enemy and therefore do not create new diseases.War is a
mindset, and all action that comes out of such a mindset
will either strengthen the enemy, the perceived evil, or, if the war is won,
will create a new enemy, a new evil equal to and often worse than the one
that was defeated. There is a deep interrelatedness between your state of
consciousness and external reality. When you are in the grip of a mindset
such as “war,” your perceptions become extremely selective as well as
distorted. In other words, you will see only what you want to see and then
misinterpret it. You can imagine what kind of action comes out of such a
delusional system. Or instead of imagining it, watch the news on TV tonight.
Recognize the ego for what it is: a collective dysfunction, the insanity
of the human mind. When you recognize it for what it is, you no longer
misperceive it as somebody's identity. Once you see the ego for what it is, it
becomes much easier to remain nonreactive toward it. you don't take it
personally anymore. there is no complaining, blaming, accusing, or making
wrong. Nobody is wrong. It is the ego in someone, that's all. Compassion
arises when you recognize that all are suffering from the same sickness of
the mind, some more acutely than others. You do not fuel the drama
anymore that is part of all egoic relationships. What is its fuel? Reactivity.
The ego thrives on it. |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 02/27/2013 : 15:52:56
Conscious Suffering (From A New Earth -- Ekhart Tolle)
If you have young children, give them help, guidance, and protection to the best f your ability, but even more important, give them space – space to be. They come into this world through you, but they are not “yours.” The belief “I know what's best for you” may be true when they are very young, but the older they get, the less true it becomes. The more expectations you have of how their life should unfold, the more you are in your mind instead of being present for them. Eventually, they will make mistakes, and they will experience some form of suffering, as all humans do. In fact, they may be mistakes only from your perspective. What to you is a mistake may be exactly what your children need to do or experience. Give them as much help and guidance as you can, but realize that you may also at times have to allow them to make mistakes, especially as they begin to reach adulthood. At times, you may also have to allow them to suffer. Suffering may come to them out of the blue or it may come as the consequence of their own mistakes.
Wouldn't it be wonderful if you could spare them from all suffering? No, it wouldn't. They would not evolve as human beings and would remain shallow, identified with the external form of things. Suffering drives you deeper. The paradox is that suffering is caused by identification with form and erodes identification with form. A lot of it is caused by the ego, although eventually suffering destroys the ego – but not until you suffer consciously.
Humanity is destined to go beyond suffering, but not in the way the ego thinks. One of the ego's many erroneous assumptions, one of its many deluded thoughts is “I should not have to suffer.” Sometimes the thought gets transferred to someone close to you: “My child should not have to suffer.”
That thought itself lies at the root of suffering. Suffering has a noble purpose: the evolution of consciousness and the burning up of the ego. the man on the Cross is an archetypal image. He is every man and every woman.
As long as you resist suffering, it is a slow process because the resistance creates more ego to burn up. When you accept suffering, however, there is an acceleration of that process which is brought about by the fact that you suffer consciously. You can accept suffering for yourself, or you can accept it for someone else, such as your child or parent. In the midst of conscious suffering, there is already the transmutation. The fire of suffering becomes the light of consciousness.
The ego says, “I shouldn't have to suffer,” and that thought makes you suffer so much more. It is a distortion of the truth, which is always paradoxical. The truth is that you need to say yes to suffering before you can transcend it.
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| shawnsmith |
Posted - 02/27/2013 : 15:46:12
From "A New Earth"
Be alert. Are some of the thoughts that go through your mind the
internalized voice of your father or mother, saying perhaps something like,
“You are not good enough. You will never amount to anything,” or some
other judgment or mental position? If there is awareness in you, you will be
able to recognize that voice in your head for what it is: an old thought,
conditioned by the past. If there is awareness in you, you no longer need to
believe in every thought you think. It's an old thought, no more.
Awareness means Presence, and only Presence can dissolve the unconscious past in you.”
“If you think you are so enlightened,” Ram Dass said, “go and spend a
week with your parents.” That is good advice. The relationship with your
parents is not only the primordial relationship hat sets the tone for all
subsequent relationships, it is also a good test for your degree of Presence.
The more shared past there is in a relationship, the more present you need to
be; otherwise, you will be forced to relive the past again and again. |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 02/27/2013 : 12:38:09
HAPPINESS AS A ROLE VS. TRUE HAPPINESS (From "A New Earth")
“How are you?” “Just great. Couldn't be better.” True or false?
In many cases, happiness is a role people play, and behind the smiling
facade, there is a great deal of pain. Depression, breakdowns, and
overreactions are common when unhappiness is covered up behind a smiling
exterior and brilliant white teeth, when there is denial, sometimes even to
one's self, that there is much unhappiness.
“Just fine” is a role the ego plays more commonly in America than in
certain other countries where being and looking miserable is almost the
norm and therefore more socially acceptable. It is probably an exaggeration,
but I am told that in the capital of one Nordic country you run the risk of
being arrested for drunken behavior if you smile at strangers in the street.
If there is unhappiness in you, first you need to acknowledge that it is
there. But don't say, “I'm unhappy.” Unhappiness has nothing to do with who
you are. Say: “There is unhappiness in me.” Then investigate it. A situation
you find yourself in may have something to do with it. Action may be
required to change the situation or remove yourself from it. If there is
nothing you can do, face what is and say, “Well, right now, this is how it is. I
can either accept it, or make myself miserable.” The primary cause of
unhappiness is never the situation but your thoughts about it. Be aware of the
thoughts you are thinking. Separate them from the situation, which is always
neutral, which always is as it is. There is the situation or the fact, and here
are my thoughts about it. Instead of making up stories, stay with the facts.
For example, “I am ruined” is a story. It limits you and prevents you from
taking effective action. “I have fifty cents left in my bank account” is a fact.
Facing facts is always empowering. Be aware that what you think, to a large
extent, creates the emotions that you feel. See the link between your thinking
and your emotions. Rather than being your thoughts and emotions, be the
awareness behind them.
Don't seek happiness. If you seek it, you won't find it, because seeing
is the antithesis of happiness. Happiness is ever elusive, but freedom from
unhappiness is attainable now, by facing what is rather than making up
stories about it. Unhappiness covers up your natural state of wellbeing and
inner peace, the source of true happiness.
*************************
"The urge to just be done with what we are doing and to go on to the next task is the number one cause of tms and everything is compounded on top of this. It is so ingrained that most will not see it even when they are told that it is there. It took me a long time to see this and figure this out through deductive reasoning. It also explains why our society has a lot of back pain but it is non-existent in the tribal community." --- Ace |
| shawnsmith |
Posted - 02/27/2013 : 08:01:56
VILLAIN, VICTIM, LOVER (from "A New Earth")
Some egos, if they cannot get praise or admiration, will settle for other
forms of attention and play roles to elicit them. If they cannot get positive
attention, they may seek negative attention instead, for example, by
provoking a negative reaction in someone else. Some children already do
that too. They misbehave to get attention. The playing of negative roles
becomes particularly pronounced whenever the ego is magnified by an active
painbody, that is to say, emotional pain from the past that wants to renew
itself through experiencing more pain. Some egos perpetrate crimes in their
search for fame. They seek attention through notoriety and other people's
condemnation. “Please tell me that I exist, that I am not insignificant,” they
seem to say. Such pathological forms of ego are only more extreme versions
of normal egos.
A very common role is the one of victim, and the form of attention it
seeks is sympathy or pity or others' interest in my problems, “me and my
story.” Seeing oneself as a victim is an element in many egoic patterns, such
as complaining, being offended, outraged, and so on. Of course, once I am
identified with a story in which I assigned myself the role of victim, I don't
want it to end, and so, as every therapist knows, the ego does not want an
end to its “problems” because they are part of its identity. If no one will
listen to my sad story, I can tell it to myself in my head, over and over, and
feel sorry for myself, sand so have an identity as someone who is being
treated unfairly by life or other people, fate or God. It gives definition to my
self image, makes me into someone, and that is all that matters to the ego.
In the early stages of many socalled romantic relationships, role
playing is quite common in order to attract and keep whoever is perceived by
the ego as the one who is going to “make me happy, make me feel special,
and fulfill all my needs.” “I'll play who you want me to be, and you'll play
who I want you to be.” That's the unspoken and unconscious agreement.
However, role playing is hard work, and so those roles cannot be sustained
indefinitely, especially once you start living together. When those roles slip,
what do you see? Unfortunately, in most cases, not yet the true essence of
that being, but that which overs up the true essence: the raw ego divested of
its roles, with its painbody, and its thwarted wanting which now turns into
anger, most likely directed at the spouse or partner for having failed to
remove the underlying fear and sense of lack that is an intrinsic part of the
egoic sense of self.
What is commonly called “falling in love” is in most cases and
intensification of egoic wanting and needing. You become addicted to
another person, or rather to your image of that person. It has nothing to do
with true love, which contains no wanting whatsoever. The Spanish language
is the most honest in regard to conventional notions of love: Te quiero means
“I want you” as well as “I love you.” The other expression for “I love you,” te
amo, which does not have this ambiguity, is rarely used – perhaps because
true love is just as rare.
*************************
"The urge to just be done with what we are doing and to go on to the next task is the number one cause of tms and everything is compounded on top of this. It is so ingrained that most will not see it even when they are told that it is there. It took me a long time to see this and figure this out through deductive reasoning. It also explains why our society has a lot of back pain but it is non-existent in the tribal community." --- Ace |
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