3 ms·
I will try but any incoherence is just my lack of understanding ;) Why prove that the self is a delusion and it does not exist. First lets try a simple example
by haltingproblem 6y ago
I will try but any incoherence is just my lack of understanding ;)
Why prove that the self is a delusion and it does not exist. First lets try a simple example of refutation of the self - I am putting a car together part by part, first the chassis, then the engine block, then the tires. At each point I turn to ask you "is it a car yet". You say no but at some point, you say "its a car now". The notion of "this is a car now" is created in your mind the moment the last part was added. The last part by itself does not contain "car" any more than other parts. Similarly, we can explain the notion of self. It is an illusion formed in the mind. Once we understand that it does not exist but is simply a collection of physical and mental phenomena - we have reached no-self.
Why bother with this? The realization of no-self creates the space to understand that we can be anything because we lack a fixed nature (self).
Of course, this leads to many apparent contradictions. Why should the present me bother to help the future me if the self is illusory and changing (i.e. not fixed) ;)
- perfmode 6y ago"Present me and future me..." "why should..." all these... also thoughts... questions like these... undecidable... * thoughts are the words of your language in your mind. * The ego is thought. * The ego is the I-thought. * "I am happy", "I am sad", "I did this", "I did that". There are so many sentences that are thought of with the word I in them. That thought "I" in each of those sentences is the ego. * The root of thought is the I thought. * Disconnected the I-thought from the external sense objects to which it attaches, and all other thoughts will fall away. * Follow the I-thought to its source. * To turn the attention that normally goes out to the world around 180 degrees and to look inward, towards awareness watching awareness. * Disconnected from external sense objects, the I-thought becomes unstable and retreats to the source and disappears. * What remains is the Self!
- haltingproblem 6y agoI wish removing the ego was as simple as pulling a linguistic trick of dropping the "I" in a sentence or saying just dont think of the I.