"Strong feelings do not necessarily make a strong character. The strength of a man is to be measured by the power of the feelings he subdues not by the power of those which subdue him."
-- William Carleton
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Ego vs. the Intellect
Functions of mind-field
In his Yoga Sutras, Patanjali has defined yoga as “control of the fluctuations of the mind-field” (योगश्चित्त-वृत्ति-निरोधः) – sutra 1.2. In order to learn how to control the mind-field, it will be helpful to understand what this mind-field is and how the mind functions. In our ancient literature, especially the Vedantic texts, this mind-field is given the name “Antahakarana” (the inner instrument). For ease of understanding, this ‘antahakarana’ is considered to be a composite of these four functions:
- Cognitive mind (manas – मनस्): this is the thinking aspect of the mind; it carries out perception and cognition through the five senses as well as activate motor control; it does the willing, wishing, desiring; it has the emotions etc. The manas interacts with the intellect and the outside world through the five senses.
- Intellect (buddhi – बुद्धि): This is the decision-making element in the mind-field. It discriminates between all the dualities – good/bad, hot/cold, honor/dishonor etc. and helps us make ‘intelligent’ decisions. It interacts with the ego (ahamkara) and the chitta (storehouse of memories and past impressions, called samskaras).
- Ego (ahamkara – अहंकार): Ego or ahamkara, literally the I-maker, is the one that identifies the Self with the mind-body complex and gives me the notion of my individuality. It puts labels on everything that we perceive, whether through the five senses, or something pulled from the memory – labels like good/bad, ugly/handsome, father, mother, rich, poor etc. It is the ego which identifies all the likes and dislikes. It interacts with the chitta (memory) and the intellect.
- Storehouse of memories and past impressions (chitta – चित्त): This is where all the memories, past impressions (called samskaras), hidden desires (called vasanas) etc. are stored. Every action that we do, every thought that occurs in the mind, creates an impression which gets stored in the chitta. These impressions lay in the sub-conscious until a suitable trigger pulls them out and brings them as active content of the mind, called ‘pratyaya’ by Patanjali.
How does it all function together?
Let us take an example which will help us understand how the mind functions. Picture this scenario:
At the end of the work day, you come home. You are hungry and walk toward the kitchen. As soon as you get close to the kitchen, you perceive a smell. The smell leads you to the kitchen counter top. You notice that the smell is coming from a piece of cake sitting on the counter top. The mind, at this point, is receiving input from the various sense organs, doing the cognitive function. The first sense that gets engaged is the sense of smell. When you look at the cake, the sense of sight gets engaged. Then you want to engage the sense of touch by dipping your finger into the cake to get to know its texture etc. Next you engage the sense of taste by taking a small sample and putting it in your mouth. At this point the mind has all the necessary sensory input related to the cake. It is now decision time.
Here is how the decision-making process proceeds.
As stated above, the decision making function (discriminatory function) is performed by the intellect (buddhi). So, the mind feeds all this sensual information to the intellect. The intellect has to make a decision what to do with this information. The most obvious choice it has to make is whether to eat the cake or not. Unfortunately, in our current state, the intellect is unable to make an independent decision on its own. It needs to consult with the “boss”, the ego (ahamkara) before making any decision. So it approaches the ego for advice. The ego digs into the memory and pulls out all the information related to this cake from a previous experience. It determines that in the past the experience of eating this cake was a most pleasurable one – the taste, smell, the texture etc. – all was just heavenly! So, the ego advises the intellect to go ahead and order the mind to take necessary actions to eat the cake. The intellect, being the official decision-maker, puts the final decision on hold for a moment and decides to make some independent investigation of its own. It goes and digs into a different section of the memory and finds more information that needs looking into. It finds out that just a couple of days ago, during a visit to the family doctor, the recent blood work showed dangerously high levels of cholesterol in the system. The doctor’s strong advice was to avoid all foods rich in sugar and fat. Now the intellect is in a dilemma as to what the appropriate decision should be since it believes that based on doctor’s advice this cake needs to be avoided. It, therefore, again goes back to the boss, the ego, with this new information for more advice. The ego has already labeled this cake as the ‘best thing in the world’. It counter-argues with the intellect saying that one piece of cake cannot kill anyone; after all it is just one piece. Just go ahead and eat it. Poor intellect, being deeply conditioned to follow the advice of the ego, does as commanded. We are all too familiar with the ultimate consequence of this typical encounter.
This was one single instance where the intellect was completely subdued by the ego. Similar situations happen every single day and every day it is the same advice coming from the ego – one piece of this junk food or that unhealthy (but tasty!) food cannot harm anyone. We all know the result of this type of behavior. This is the behavior that eventually causes physical ailments like heart problems, diabetes and hypertension etc. and even all the mental stresses and strains which manifest as further physical and emotional ailments – depression, anxiety, negative emotions like anger, greed, jealousy etc.
The example above relates to our choices in food/drink etc. If we go a little deeper, we realize that the ego dominates our decision-making process in all spheres of our lives – family, work life, outdoor, travel, shopping, social events etc. The ego always prefers what is obviously pleasant (satisfies the five senses) versus that which is desirable (but may not be enjoyable for the senses). Every such situation eventually leads to varying degrees of stress and physical/mental ailments.
Identifying the problem
Once we study this scenario in detail, we realize that the main problem is the fact that the intellect is completely dominated by the ego and is unable to make independent decisions. So, somehow we have to learn how to disengage the intellect from the ego. This is where we turn to Patanjali who has provided us with all the tools that we need to use so that the intellect becomes sharp as a razor’s edge, pure as a crystal/gem. These tools are given in the form of the eight limbs of yoga, called Ashtanga Yoga. It is by a regular and dedicated practice of these eight limbs that we can develop a sharp intellect and free ourselves from the clutches of the ego. Once we can do that, then we have a better chance of understanding our true reality which is to recognize that we are in fact nothing but pure consciousness and have no real connection with the entire material aspect of our being which includes this mind-body complex.
After you study the above scenario, try to relate it to various situations in your daily life and see if you can identify the involvement of ego in your day-to-day actions. This will slowly develop a better awareness of the functioning of the mind and then you can take adequate measures to avoid similar involvement of the ego in future situations.
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| Meditation is the dissolution of thoughts in Eternal awareness or Pure consciousness without objectification, knowing without thinking, merging finitude in infinity - Voltaire |
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Firstly, let me say I am still on this journey, discovering who or what I (subject) am.
I am gradually coming to the inexorable conclusion that I (subject) am my thoughts (mental objects). The realisation that I am my thoughts is the highest realisation possible for any human. When this is seen, the spiritual journey comes to an end, for this insight is complete. This insight is more complete than any other kind of insight, including the insight that I (subject) am not my thoughts (mental objects). Curiously, both these seemingly contradictory insights work, except that the insight that I am not any of my thoughts, is incomplete. Therefore the latter doesn't bring about continuous freedom from all suffering. It merely brings about momentary relief. The former insight also only brings about momentary relief, but being complete, the momentary relief is repeated uninterruptedy moment after moment.
My biggest obstacle on my spiritual journey is therefore my insight that I am not my thoughts, necessitating a “spiritual journey”.
Both these seemingly contradictory insights are the outcome of self-observation. Self-Observation is the very simple technique of shifting awareness from what I see (apparent objects), to I (subject), to discover what I consist of. I strongly recommend this technique for the purpose of the “spiritual journey”.
The basic human fallacy is the belief that there is an “I” who experiences my thoughts, as if I and my thoughts are separate. To see into this fallacy, to see through it, a “spiritual journey” is undertaken. The spiritual journey is self-awareness - awareness of I - to see through I. Seeing through I means realizing I don't exist, except as my thoughts: memory, verbal thoughts, and the accompanying non-verbal images.
The reality is that who or what is observing, is totally empty and free of any self. This means there is nobody at the center of my consciousness observing. Emptiness is observing. What emptiness observes, is emptiness.
“I” is a concept. Without language no I would be. My thoughts are also concepts. When I turn attention to the centre of consciousness - to who or what my body and mind seemingly appear to - I begin to uncover the nature of the illusion that I am apparently, but not actually, more than my thoughts. I notice when I am not thinking, there is no I. Whenever I think, then “I” appear. The appearance of I coincides with thought, as I (subject) interfering in and attempting to control my thoughts.
The reason I need to control my thoughts is because I am made up of these mental objects. I therefore identify myself in terms of certain thoughts, thinking these thoughts are me, and their opposites are not me. So I consist of being selective with my thoughts, clinging to some, while totally rejecting other thoughts as being not-self. I pick up ideas, and the ideas I embrace, become part of the structure of I. Contrary ideas are rejected as not-I.
Because there is a link between the existence of I and my thoughts, the spiritual journey consists of rejecting all thoughts as not-self. When done with any measure of skill, I am emptied of who or what I (subject) apparently consist of, until no I remains. The centre of my consciousness - where I am looking from - now appears empty, without inside, outside or periphery. I notice when I am not thinking, I am not. This leads to the realization that I am therefore all my thoughts. This is quite a different realization from the realization that I am some of my thoughts. If I am only some of my thoughts - those that I attach to and use - then it means that some of my thoughts are not I. This changes I into a substantial entity: a thinker apparently behind my thoughts, thinking them. Meanwhile, no person here is thinking any thoughts. The thoughts are thinking themselves. The brain is thinking them.
The idea that I don't exist is a scary thought only until I see the truth of it. Our minds tend to translate this possibility as an existential threat. The threat lies in the thought that if I don't exist, how can life have any meaning? If my life has no meaning, because I am an illusion, actually just being a concept, then nihilism must be true. When this body therefore dies, that is the end of me. So we reason when we don't see this truth, merely thinking it. Thus we see the glass as half empty.
On the other hand, once we actually see that “we" are merely our thoughts, we actually experience, quite contrary to our worst fears, that there is nothing in all of existence to worry about. How can an invisible, non-existent person be injured or hurt? Everything designed to hurt just passes straight through this beautiful, ineffable emptiness. If there is nobody here who could be hurt or to suffer, then there is no hurt and no suffering. The glass is therefore actually half full. The truth of the matter - the thinker is all his thoughts- must just be directly realized.
I have often written about the misleading nature of all thoughts, particularly those designed to help me cope with my suffering. These thoughts are called “cherubim” in the allegorical story of the Garden of Eden. Cherubim are seductive, angelic little beings that guard the eastern gate of the Garden, blocking the way to the Tree of Life: our true nature. They prevent me from seeing the truth of the matter: that there is no I, no self.
How do they do it?
Firstly, consider that all advice is cherubim. So, when I read something that seems helpful (advice) and I adopt the advice, applying it to myself, I am thinking right there and then. I am thinking the advice. The advice therefore becomes the centre of action from which I operate. As soon as advice is being applied, “I” am. I have been resurrected. I find myself coming from my advice, looking at the world through this conceptual filter, which is now therefore tainting all my perceptions, including every effort I make. This is the inner contradiction I feel when I apply any idea to myself.
Ordinarily we use knowledge (thoughts) to get from point A to point B: to go to a particular place, to bake a cake, to invent something useful. However, no knowledge can be used to enter the Garden of Eden. The Garden, which is Now, is unknown and unknowable. Our knowledge cannot reach into this at all.
The Garden of Eden represents us as we really are (perfect emptiness; the present) not as we imagine ourselves to be (little selves). Since we, as selves, consist of our thoughts - all those “how to's” relating to us, all our knowledge - no knowledge can enter here to understand ourselves.
This means every idea we pick up and hope to follow, is itself part of our difficulty. Even the idea that we should not follow, is just another idea we follow.
How then can we “unfollow” completely, including unfollowing the idea we mustn't follow? This question represents the starting point, the middle and the end of our “spiritual journey”. We have to gain insight into the fact that every idea - every “how to” we pick up to bake the spiritual cake - is in error, forming part of our suffering.
How will we do this? Not by thought. Remember, no thought can enter spiritual skies.
The only answer is awareness of what we are doing, and the results / effects of so doing. Thus, we must observe ourselves. Sitting in meditation is a great help in all this. We must observe how we pick up any idea, how we try to apply it to ourselves, and the results. Reading this and applying this, is itself following an idea, creating at least some inner contradiction and hence friction. The friction is felt as a negative feeling. We must observe this in ourselves. If we can't observe this, how will we ever realize the truth of this?
If we wish to see, we must direct attention as closely as possible to ourselves. Conscious attention must go from what I am reading here (an apparent object), to I (apparent subject). When this happens, there is awareness of everything I do. There is also awareness of how exactly I pick up this idea that I must observe I, and its effects, at the very moment this idea emerges from I. In this way I am gradually beginning to uncover the nature of I, beginning to understand how I am made up.
Initially, in self-observation, I (subject) and my thoughts (objects) appear totally separate from one another. I therefore appear to be other than all my thoughts. Note that this is different from believing I am SOME of my thoughts: choosing some thoughts, while rejecting all other thoughts (the problem). However, as I observe myself (I, subject), I notice that I am not when there is not a single thought. The structure of “I” (subject) has undergone a radical mutation. In this mutation, there is emptiness and formlessness where I stood a moment before, when I was thinking. This repeated insight, entailing the repeated dissolution of I when the movement of thought ends, reveals that I am not when I am not thinking. Therefore I am ultimately no more and no other than all my thoughts. To the extent I see this, not merely think it, does the spiritual journey end.
In conclusion, I am the past, interfering in the unknown and unknowable present, trying to shape the unknown, to change my future. I am nothing but a movement of memories, thoughts, experiences and all my conditioning. When I subside, which happens when I am not thinking, not picking up a single idea, only ineffable emptiness, whole and full, is here. So, I must observe all my self-talk, realising the error present in every idea I follow or apply to I who am reading this.
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According to the Upaṇiṣads there are four states of consciousness.
jāgrata. The waking state or that condition of consciousness in which one normally acts when awake. It is the externalised cognition which experiences the external universe. It is the world of name & form (nāma-rūpa) in which everything is conceptualized and categorized.
svapna. The sleeping-dreaming state or that condition of consciousness experienced during sleep, or in reverie, a state wherein subtle things are perceived. The inner world of the psyche, ideals and archetypes.
suṣupti. The deep-sleep state, a state of complete lack of awareness or unconsciousness, a state in which there is no awareness of objectivity. The extent of this state is so profound and vast that the conditioned mind cannot hold or record the experiences.
turīya. The fourth state of consciousness, the state of expansive consciousness, a spacious state of mind free from conceptualization and discursive thinking which may be experienced by one in deep meditation, sometimes called samādhi.
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I don't consider the mind to be I. I don't consider the observer to be who I am either.
I feel it is helpful to look at how a child develops a self (the observer) and how this observer later becomes identified with the body and mind (the observed), therefore now causing the ordinary everyday experience that the observer is the observed. The belief that I am my body and mind, a connection which is learnt through language and in no other way, is the cause of all human suffering.
Why?
Because the human body has a natural survival instinct built into it. When I, the observer, become associated with my body, the observed, concluding that I am my body, then I suffer from this survival instinct. I want to know how I can protect and defend myself (body-mind) from extinction.
At birth the non-verbal cry of every newborn babe is:
Heaven above, Earth below, I alone am the most honoured one.
The newborn baby hasn't learned any language. Therefore the baby experiences no observer (no self, no I) and no observed: body, mind, thoughts and feelings. There is only awareness. There is no person or being within this awareness.
Specifically, there is no I, and no association of I (created by language) with this body and mind, thinking that this language-made I am my body-mind. Hence newborn babies don't suffer. They are completely free of all human suffering. They are blank slates without memory. Memory only develops with the learning of language.
On or about the age of 2, every baby develops a very rudimentary sense of self. This is the experience of being an observer. I remember this stage of my “self-development” - the growth of a self, yes - very clearly. This is the birth of I as subject. At this stage of “self-development” there is no association whatsoever between I (the seed self) and my body, mind, thoughts and feelings. I don't suffer from my body, mind, thoughts and feelings, because I am not them, in my own experience as a two year old toddler.
At this stage the self, I as subject, am non-dual. The reason I as subject am non-dual is because I am One. No bifurcation - bifurcation being the later association of I as experienced subject with body and mind as experienced objects - exists. At this stage of childhood development, whenever awareness returns to I, an alternative reaction to what is being experienced, becomes apparent.
I remember this in the following way:
I was forced to nap every afternoon. While I was supposed to be napping I would often begin to cry, as babies often tend to. After crying for an indeterminate period of time without any awareness of I, awareness would suddenly coalesce on I as subject. This would startle me to the extent that I would stop crying. As soon as awareness of I arose on each occasion, my crying would cease instantaneously, in mid-breath. I would then wonder what had caused all that crying.
Later, around age 3 to 5, an increasingly firm association begins to be established in my brain between I and my body. I am repeatedly told I am my body, as my body is pointed out to me. Thus, an association develops between I (Jean) and my body. Anthony De Mello, in his beautiful book “Awareness”, explains the experiencing of I as subject, pre-association:
I told you that St. Teresa of Avila said God gave her the grace of disidentifying herself with herself. You hear children talk that way. A two-year-old says, “Tommy had his breakfast this morning.” He doesn’t say “I,” although he is Tommy. He says “Tommy”—in the third person. Mystics feel that way. They have disidentified from themselves and they are at peace.
Later - in my case I was 10 or 11 - the association between I and my body becomes problematic. A distorted self-image develops. In my case, I was quite smitten with the girl next door. I admired her legs whenever she played around the pool, spying on her over the wall. One day I was sitting on a seat sideways in my parents’ bedroom, and I looked at my body sideways in the mirror. As I looked, I suddenly became aware of my spindly legs, which didn't look anything like the girl's legs next door. Seeing my ugly legs, ugly compared to the beautiful legs of the girl next door, I felt a pain in my heart for the first time about “myself”. I began to suffer. I became self-conscious at that moment, believing I am my body, hating what I was seeing.
The reason I explained this childhood self-development to you, is because I believe understanding the precise sequence can be used to unlearn the self. Basically, the process of unlearning, occurs in reverse sequence to the process of learning the self. Once the self is totally unlearnt, all suffering has been totally unlearnt, of course.
The first step in the process of unlearning the self, is to distinguish between I (subject) and my body, mind, thoughts, feelings, speech and behaviour (objects). In everybody's personal experience, I am not my body, mind, thoughts and feelings. The fact that language learning establishes an association that becomes permanent and very convincing, doesn't make it true in my actual experience.
I know this association is untrue because it creates two of me. It propels me into a dualistic mode of living, in which I am split within, between I (subject) and my body and mind (objects), with which I am firmly associated. As within, so without. Being split within, I now experience the world around me as divided too. Therefore I am now in conflict with the world. To discover how untrue this firm association is, I must observe myself.
I, me, my, myself, the self, are all I (subject), right?
So, when I observe myself as subject, to see what I am doing, I actually see that I am interfering in my own body, mind, thoughts, feelings, speech and behaviour. I am trying to adjust myself (subject) constantly to these objects, which have been associated with I as subject and which I now believe to be I. The fact that I need to adjust myself to it - it being any one or all of these objects - proves that I am none of these objects. My supposed identity as a body and mind, with thoughts and feelings, exhibiting a certain manner of speech and behaviours, is purely by association. It is not a scientific fact that I am my body. It is purely an association forged through language.
The first step, to clear this unscientific premise, and begin the process of dissolving the self - I as subject - is to keep shifting my conscious attention from what I see, think, feel and experience whenever I suffer, to I.
The first thing that happens as I keep doing this, is: I notice my mental and emotional reactions. I begin to observe how I (subject) am always trying to adjust myself (subject) to my body, mind, thoughts, feelings, circumstances, events, the environment and others. I also notice the effects of doing so. I notice the effects comprise my suffering. And so I discover that my suffering doesn't lie in my body, mind, thoughts, feelings, circumstances, events, the environment, or others. These things don't cause my mental and emotional suffering. Instead, my suffering is due to my mental reactions to these things.
Thus self-awareness as I define it - awareness of I as subject, not awareness of my body and mind (objects) - presents a way of breaking the invalid, illusory association between my suffering and my body, mind, thoughts, feelings, circumstances, events, the environment and others. This self-awareness presents a way of substituting this invalid association with a valid association: that my suffering lies only in my own reactions.
Now that I observe my own reactions, through awareness of I as subject, and I see that only they cause my mental and emotional suffering, I see the alternative. I can learn not to react at all. I can learn, if I do react, to react more constructively, in a way that produces only beneficial results.
When I learn not to react at all to my own unpleasant feelings, my unpleasant feelings end. Awareness of unpleasant feelings is the Path. The Path consists of purifying my feelings. In this way I learn how my feelings and suffering are actually associated. The real association between my feelings and my suffering, is through awareness of my own reactions. This awareness leads to the end of suffering, which entails breaking free of my mental and emotional dependence on my body, mind, thoughts, feelings, circumstances, events, the environment and others.
As I (subject) becomes disassociated from all these objects, I am emptied of these associations (objects). Therefore I become increasingly transparent, invisible and indefinable. This doesn't mean that awareness of I become more difficult. On the contrary, it becomes easier and easier, because this awareness of I is increasingly devoid of all suffering. This self-awareness is actually very addictive in that sense.
At some point during this persistent practice of self-awareness, all objects drop off. They vanish. Then only I remain. This is the same experience any two year old baby has: there is pure awareness of I, without any associated objects, such as body and mind, to mar this blissful, pure, non-dual awareness of I.
This purified self-awareness is non-dual because there is no separation within I as subject. If I experience any separation, it is because I am thinking, producing mental objects with which I am identified.
If I now persist with this self-awareness, continuing to empty I of self, then even I as subject sooner or later vanishes. This doesn't mean that the subject vanishes, but rather that I am realised to be “it”. This may give the impression that the subjective experience of subject, becomes an object, but that is not what is experienced. When this deeper self-realization occurs, which corresponds with the memory free awareness of a baby between the ages of 0 to 2, all of reality is now perceived to be empty of any self or self-nature, including I (subject). Therefore this body and mind are now observed to be an empty process, without self, that simply follows natural laws, arising at one point, and coming naturally to an end at some other point.
The disappearance of I, leaving a startling awareness of totally empty ownerless processes, is immensely liberating, more so than the awareness that only I exist (as a rudimentary artifact of language). The reason is because I now experience myself as if I am looking at someone else, for example my neighbour. If I learn my neighbour has terminal cancer I may be very sympathetic and sad, but that sadness is radically different from what I would feel if I learnt that I have terminal cancer. That's the difference. A completely objective, impersonal awareness begins operating.
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