02-05-2013, 06:36 PM
I come from an ACIM background like the OP, so I agree that there are pejorative connotations to the ego that exceed what those of Ra indicated. It seems that you cannot function in third density without a personality complex of some kind -- I like the Jungian definition that zenmaster recites -- and yet this is a perennial distortion of the highest magnitude.
I'm a bit unique since I come from an individualist political background and find a philosophy called "egoism" intriguing -- not least for its spiritual utility. Having grown up in an ACIM household, my parents would probably be more comfortable with Scientology or Satanism than something aggrandizing the ego. But I find a lot to recommend a focus on the individual ego in matters of values, ethics, and politics because it focuses you to break down this self that modern humanistic society holds in such high esteem.
Perhaps there is a distinction to be made between (A) the broader personality complex of identity and familiarity and (B) the ego as a particular set of thought patterns. It's something I'm very interested in because one of my big challenges has been trying to balance the ego without losing all initiative completely. Much of the ambition that drives us through life originates in the ego -- and, therefore, many of the lessons to be learned. In fact, I abandoned ACIM largely because I found its attitude towards the ego too manichean; it's all about building this abstract system out of a consistent set of precision concepts, whereas the Law of One hints at systems but shies away from reductionism.
My operating philosophy is to regard the ego as another "spook" inside of me like all sorts of learned thought patterns, innate influences, ideas I heard on TV, "things coming in from above", etc. Once we know that this is a conversation with many participants and not with just this one "ego", things become less judgey for me personally. The ego is not good or bad, it just needs to be accepted for what it is, so that it can be released during what must be some absolutely sublime moments of transcendence (I've experienced something like this before and it was weird as ____). This acceptance is not just for forgiveness and love, but also so it can be distinguished from other parts of the self, and so the self can be seen as an ecosystem rather than some hierarchy with a limited sense of self sitting at the top.
The interesting thing is that you might find that the you observing the ego isn't the ego anymore, though if you try to pay attention to that it switches back. It's this sense that the ego is tied to a particular quality of awareness that seems pregnant with some answers. I think maybe it has something to do with the narrative, "believe what you see" empiricism built into the mammalian survival instinct. We attempt to make sense out of an incomplete sensory picture in order to survive, and that promotes a stable selfhood that is biologically superior but spiritually conservative (since it filters out what it cannot make direct use of).
Perhaps what we think of as the ego is the subject-object mode of consciousness that grew out of mammalian/reptilian survival instincts. This orange-ray instinctual self/otherself dichotomy pattern of thinking took on more and more significance as social bonds and cooperation increased in importance in yellow-ray hird density. Indeed, a lot of our ego's thinking centers on crafting the externally perceived self, and perhaps the ego started as an mental avatar of sorts, so that we could model the external social reality by perceiving ourselves the way others do. As we internalized all the complex social signaling inherent in human social intercourse, we began to elevate the ego's social relevance to a paramount place within, burying other matters and "signals" as confusing or distracting.
This is all mysterious, this is all beyond words, and simply noticing the weather inside is such a hard won battle to begin with. I'm trying to figure out what the material prerequisites are, in other words, to even ask the right question about the ego. My thoughts on evolutionary biology are very primitive and surely rather limited, but it doesn't hurt to throw them at the wall to see how slowly they slide down.
Thanks for bringing this topic up.
I'm a bit unique since I come from an individualist political background and find a philosophy called "egoism" intriguing -- not least for its spiritual utility. Having grown up in an ACIM household, my parents would probably be more comfortable with Scientology or Satanism than something aggrandizing the ego. But I find a lot to recommend a focus on the individual ego in matters of values, ethics, and politics because it focuses you to break down this self that modern humanistic society holds in such high esteem.
Perhaps there is a distinction to be made between (A) the broader personality complex of identity and familiarity and (B) the ego as a particular set of thought patterns. It's something I'm very interested in because one of my big challenges has been trying to balance the ego without losing all initiative completely. Much of the ambition that drives us through life originates in the ego -- and, therefore, many of the lessons to be learned. In fact, I abandoned ACIM largely because I found its attitude towards the ego too manichean; it's all about building this abstract system out of a consistent set of precision concepts, whereas the Law of One hints at systems but shies away from reductionism.
My operating philosophy is to regard the ego as another "spook" inside of me like all sorts of learned thought patterns, innate influences, ideas I heard on TV, "things coming in from above", etc. Once we know that this is a conversation with many participants and not with just this one "ego", things become less judgey for me personally. The ego is not good or bad, it just needs to be accepted for what it is, so that it can be released during what must be some absolutely sublime moments of transcendence (I've experienced something like this before and it was weird as ____). This acceptance is not just for forgiveness and love, but also so it can be distinguished from other parts of the self, and so the self can be seen as an ecosystem rather than some hierarchy with a limited sense of self sitting at the top.
The interesting thing is that you might find that the you observing the ego isn't the ego anymore, though if you try to pay attention to that it switches back. It's this sense that the ego is tied to a particular quality of awareness that seems pregnant with some answers. I think maybe it has something to do with the narrative, "believe what you see" empiricism built into the mammalian survival instinct. We attempt to make sense out of an incomplete sensory picture in order to survive, and that promotes a stable selfhood that is biologically superior but spiritually conservative (since it filters out what it cannot make direct use of).
Perhaps what we think of as the ego is the subject-object mode of consciousness that grew out of mammalian/reptilian survival instincts. This orange-ray instinctual self/otherself dichotomy pattern of thinking took on more and more significance as social bonds and cooperation increased in importance in yellow-ray hird density. Indeed, a lot of our ego's thinking centers on crafting the externally perceived self, and perhaps the ego started as an mental avatar of sorts, so that we could model the external social reality by perceiving ourselves the way others do. As we internalized all the complex social signaling inherent in human social intercourse, we began to elevate the ego's social relevance to a paramount place within, burying other matters and "signals" as confusing or distracting.
This is all mysterious, this is all beyond words, and simply noticing the weather inside is such a hard won battle to begin with. I'm trying to figure out what the material prerequisites are, in other words, to even ask the right question about the ego. My thoughts on evolutionary biology are very primitive and surely rather limited, but it doesn't hurt to throw them at the wall to see how slowly they slide down.
Thanks for bringing this topic up.
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