Personality without a person?

[Someone here]

I have a few  question for those who have a good understanding of the ego.. Personality and memory. Awareness and how all these work together and their relationship to personal identity. 

 you are familiar with spirituality and nondual teachings you likely' know' that the sense of individuality or separation is false or illusory. That there isn't an actual separate self inside the organism. Who you think you are is not who you actually are. Who you think are - the ego is literally just a thought. An arising sensation that says "im me here inside this body ".   When this thought disappear.. What is left is pure awareness of various perceptions and sensations without any personal relationship to them. Without "my perception and my sensation" identification. 

My question is.. If there is no you.. Why does it ' seem like ' there is a you..?

You can grasp in direct experience that "you" is false identification with thought.. It is not real. Yet it is the most real thing for you. After all what is more real and important to you in your life then yourself? Right? 

So what exactly is grounding this sense of self? Why does the "I" thought keep arising throughout your whole life even after seeing through the misidentification?  And what is the personality ?  What makes this body-mind here to have a different personality than that body-mind over there even tho there is no "person" to begin with?  What role do memories play in grounding your sense of self?  What is the difference between a memory and a thought? 

Now a whole pack of questions can open up about memory .is the past even real ? No matter where you look you can't find anything but the present and How can we trust our memory if any at all? Etc but I will just stop here. 

For example your entire life story and who you think you are and how you view yourself and your life is just a thought story.. Mostly memories... But those thoughts are not occurring 24/7.. So once they stop occurring even for a second you are left not knowing who you are and how you got there (interesting huh?). And so what prevents you from losing yourself and going Insane is these stories and memories keep arising to ground your sense of self and reality. 

Thoughts? 

[James123]

7 minutes ago, Someone here said:

My question is.. If there is no you.. Why does it ' seem like ' there is a you..?

Because of thoughts. If you do everything in the moment, there will be no you. You will be the moment. Thoughts are your reality now as a human.

 

9 minutes ago, Someone here said:

what exactly is grounding this sense of self? Why does the "I" thought keep arising throughout your whole life even after seeing through the misidentification?  And what is the personality ?  What makes this body-mind here to have a different personality than that body-mind over there even tho there is no "person" to begin with?  What role do memories play in grounding your sense of self?  What is the difference between a memory and a thought? 

Memories are accumulated thoughts. They are identical. If you dont know what is a thought, there will be no memory. There is no such a thing as body and mind. They are still thoughts. 

 

11 minutes ago, Someone here said:

For example your entire life story and who you think you are and how you view yourself and your life is just a thought story.. Mostly memories... But those thoughts are not occurring 24/7.. So once they stop occurring even for a second you are left not knowing who you are and how you got there (interesting huh?). And so what prevents you from losing yourself and going Insane is these stories and memories keep arising to ground your sense of self and reality. 

Thoughts? 

Take this example, you are nothing which has no beginning and no end. It has never started therefore it is infinite. And in awakening you have realize that you have never start. Because your life starts with learning (thoughts again), but when you are awaken you realize that whatever you have learn (your birth, life, awakening, entire universe and duality) is just a process of thoughts. You are nothing which can never be learned, you can just be it. Thats why you are just being in every moment and thoughts are you as nothing. Only difference that you cant understand this now, because you are taking thoughts as personally. Birth has no differences than a chair. 

[Javfly33]

7 minutes ago, Someone here said:

Why does the "I" thought keep arising throughout your whole life even after seeing through the misidentification? 

Very good question. I have questioned myself that several times.

Since I dont find myself qualified to answer this question, here´s Shunyamurti have to say:

Quote

... free yourself from any identity except that of pure awareness itself. From that point, the egosystem will spontaneously modify itself according to the higher order of the intelligence that you have recognized. There is nothing you need to do. 
 

So there it seems to say that the ego is kind of "intelligent" (is not just a dumb robotic system) and it will modify its behavious with the new understanding.

It seems like the ego is neccesary for surviving (If you want to survive in a body, a selfish "I" thought is neccesary to know and interact with the world). But the ego can become self-aware (like it is connected with a ubs-cable to Consciousness Lol) and be less neurotic and have more concious behaviours aligned with the Truth of reality. (But of course, the ironic thing is, that if the ego would be really aligned with this Truth,he would just dissapear Lol).

Ultimately of course there is no duality between ego and conciousness because it´s all Consciousness. But Consciousness is imagining this differences so Consciousness still lives the dream of being a human being I guess  

 

[electroBeam]

One of the things I came to terms with recently was how relative truth actually is. Every spiritual teacher has a different take on what's going on, even though this is meant to be the same because its the absolute. You can justify such things with maps like LOC or someone being more enlightened then the other, but its more complex then that because the order in which you can realize different facets of reality varies between people, and some people have access to states of consciousness that others will never have access to. Psychedelics are a super cool area of research because it literally changes your brain chemistry. Which means your brain turns alien on it. Your hardware changes. And all of this is within the paradox that brains are imaginary and don't actually exist. There's a strange loop between our imaginary brain and the truth we realize, and that strange loop is an amazingly mysterious mechanic of reality. But that strange loop is definitely real.

So my take on this stuff is the following:

6 minutes ago, Someone here said:

My question is.. If there is no you.. Why does it ' seem like ' there is a you..?

Its actually a lot more varied then that (due to infinity) there can seem to be a 'you' and then a realization that there's 'no you', but aliens (or people on psychedelics) can experience things beyond the you vs no you duality. Stuff that you can't comprehend. Stuff that's totally alien.

And such variations can be explained through accessing different states of consciousness, but a more practical answer is perception. You could say, in one context, that we might all be seeing the same thing, but having different perspectives of what that thing is. For you, a phone is a device to call people. But what is that phone to a shaman? A monolith? A spirit? A machine elf?

And considering you've experienced infinity before, I'm sure how you can see that your perception of a phone being a phone, is no more real then the shaman's perception of what that thing is.

IME the ego never goes away, even after an infinite love awakening (LOC 1000). And for many spiritual teachers who claim they are enlightened, the ego never goes away for them too. Your perception of what that ego IS, changes. This may be too tricky to realize just through this post, but when you had that no self realization, its not like the ego disappeared, its that your perception of what an ego is changed. It changed from something that's absolutely true, to something that is a dream. Its still there, but as a dream. You didn't lose an ego (ironically because adviata vedantans pride themselves on no ego) the ego just got recontextualised as being not absolutely real/true. Just like how 'others' aren't true, yet there are still there, you're still talking to people.

I find the adviata vedantan you vs no you duality too crude. Its either there or not. When the reality is something in the middle. Its not true but its there as a dream.

It is possible to fully loose an ego. But that's nothing like no self realization. That's complete and utter amnesia. When you sleep every night, that's what its like to completely loose an ego (if not lucid). When you reincarnate into those sleep dream characters, you've completely forgotten who someone here is. The no self realization is different to that, you still know who someone here is, its just been re-contextualized into a dream instead of absolute truth. You've seen emptiness and now cannot be fooled into thinking truth is ego instead of emptiness.

Every awakening is an integration or recontextualization of the ego. It never goes away until you reincarnate (body-mind dies). Knowing what happens when you get hit by a bus is hard to understand without psychedelics or advanced sleep dream work. But that's what you want to aim for if you want to see what true "no self" is

 

 

[nistake]

The ego is an incredibly intricate and highly complex sytem. Most of the spiritual teachings tend to oversimplify it saying "get rid of your ego and you'll be just fine" or even saying that the ego is the enemy and has to be killed. I mean, we're talking about your current perception of reality. That's the very reason you're not criminally insane and you can function properly in this world. In the complete absence of ego and memories, you'd be lying in your room and drooling over the carpet. Maybe I'm exaggerating, but you get the point.

In the light of this, I think it's quite understandable why the ego is so 'sticky' even if you've had some glimpses into your true nature.

[Someone here]

58 minutes ago, James123 said:

Because of thoughts

Yes I mean what Is the source of the "I" thought?  Why does it arise in the first place if it's not pointing to anything real?  For most people they simply believe "I am the body obviously what else can I be"? 

Edited December 5, 2020 by Someone here

[Someone here]

1 hour ago, Javfly33 said:

 

It seems like the ego is neccesary for surviving (If you want to survive in a body, a selfish "I" thought is neccesary to know and interact with the world). But the ego can become self-aware (like it is connected with a ubs-cable to Consciousness Lol) and be less neurotic and have more concious behaviours aligned with the Truth of reality. (But of course, the ironic thing is, that if the ego would be really aligned with this Truth,he would just dissapear Lol).

Ultimately of course there is no duality between ego and conciousness because it´s all Consciousness. But Consciousness is imagining this differences so Consciousness still lives the dream of being a human being I guess  

 

Interesting perspective. I think there is some truth to it. 

[Someone here]

1 hour ago, electroBeam said:

the ego never goes away for them too. Your perception of what that ego IS, changes. This may be too tricky to realize just through this post, but when you had that no self realization, its not like the ego disappeared, its that your perception of what an ego is changed. It changed from something that's absolutely true, to something that is a dream. Its still there, but as a dream. You didn't lose an ego (ironically because adviata vedantans pride themselves on no ego) the ego just got recontextualised as being not absolutely real/true. Just like how 'others' aren't true, yet there are still there, you're still talking to people.

Who is the "you" that get a different view of the "ego"? Awe this is a tricky. You assume there is a you that have a ego.. The ego IS what is being referred to as "you". 

[Vittorio]

18 minutes ago, Someone here said:

Yes I mean what Is the source of the "I" thought?  Why does it arise in the first place if it's not pointing to anything real?  For most people they simply believe "I am the body obviously what else can I be"? 

To allow the simulation to exist.

The scope of life is living Creation through many perspectives.

To create a perspective, you have to create a sense of separation and you have to create well defined boundaries.

And you have to create someone who percieves those boundaries who is not aware of having those boundaries and thus being infinite, timeless and bondless.

And that one entity who percieves those boundaries is the ego mind you.

If you perceived not having those boundaries and to be God (at a really high level), you would dissolve.

Edited December 5, 2020 by Vittorio

[electroBeam]

4 minutes ago, Someone here said:

Who is the "you" that get a different view of the "ego"? Awe this is a tricky. You assume there is a you that have a ego.. The ego IS what is being referred to as "you". 

Heres something that might be cool to contemplate.

Lets just say "you" keep going meta, who is the you, who is aware of that answer, now who is aware of that answer, etc etc.

A) once "you've" found that ultimate answer, is there anything that answer won't include(the answer is this and not that) and if it doesn't include something, then how is that answer not a duality?

And if that answer includes everything, how many times will "you" need to go meta to include everything. If everything is infinity...

B) what even is going meta? Instead of asking who am I, you could ask, what is "who am I"? Go meta on the process of going meta  you might find it eats its own tail when "you" do this

[James123]

17 minutes ago, Someone here said:

Yes I mean what Is the source of the "I" thought?  Why does it arise in the first place if it's not pointing to anything real?  For most people they simply believe "I am the body obviously what else can I be"? 

 “I”, “arising”, “why”, “real”, “body”, “real” these are all thoughts, there is no such a thing as real, I, people or body. There is just you and you are nothing. And in nothing there is no thoughts, there is just you. Thats why you are dreaming now such as i, purpose, arise or life.   All thoughts are something that you have learned. But you can never learn your real self, you can just be it. And there is no question there because there is no thoughts there different than you, you are the thoughts because you are nothing. If word of life, body and Chair is identical, what will it make any difference between them? And if there is no differences between I and chair, how can person experience a thought something different than him/her? 

[Nahm]

1 hour ago, Someone here said:

My question is.. If there is no you.. Why does it ' seem like ' there is a you..?

 

1 hour ago, Someone here said:

I have a few  question for those who have a good understanding of the ego.. Personality and memory. Awareness and how all these work together and their relationship to personal identity. 

 you are familiar with spirituality and nondual teachings you likely' know' that the sense of individuality or separation is false or illusory. That there isn't an actual separate self inside the organism. Who you think you are is not who you actually are. Who you think are - the ego is literally just a thought. An arising sensation that says "im me here inside this body ".   When this thought disappear.. What is left is pure awareness of various perceptions and sensations without any personal relationship to them. Without "my perception and my sensation" identification. 

My question is.. If there is no you.. Why does it ' seem like ' there is a you..?

You can grasp in direct experience that "you" is false identification with thought.. It is not real. Yet it is the most real thing for you. After all what is more real and important to you in your life then yourself? Right? 

So what exactly is grounding this sense of self? Why does the "I" thought keep arising throughout your whole life even after seeing through the misidentification?  And what is the personality ?  What makes this body-mind here to have a different personality than that body-mind over there even tho there is no "person" to begin with?  What role do memories play in grounding your sense of self?  What is the difference between a memory and a thought? 

Now a whole pack of questions can open up about memory .is the past even real ? No matter where you look you can't find anything but the present and How can we trust our memory if any at all? Etc but I will just stop here. 

For example your entire life story and who you think you are and how you view yourself and your life is just a thought story.. Mostly memories... But those thoughts are not occurring 24/7.. So once they stop occurring even for a second you are left not knowing who you are and how you got there (interesting huh?). And so what prevents you from losing yourself and going Insane is these stories and memories keep arising to ground your sense of self and reality. 

Thoughts? 

 

[VeganAwake]

1 hour ago, Someone here said:

Yes I mean what Is the source of the "I" thought? 

All the past experiences and accumulated knowledge for that particular body/mind organism. (otherwise known as conditioning) 

Why does it arise in the first place if it's not pointing to anything real? 

Because regardless there has been constant habitual identification with these thoughts as 'MY' thoughts. It's like a self-perpetuating illusion. When the thoughts are entertained and given energy it's like stoking a fire and wondering why it keeps getting hotter and won't cool down. 

For most people they simply believe "I am the body obviously what else can I be"? 

Exactly and this assumption never gets closely examined. ❤

 

[73809]

7 hours ago, Someone here said:

My question is.. If there is no you.. Why does it ' seem like ' there is a you..?

 

Of course it seems like there’s a you, how else would it be? 

[Javfly33]

40 minutes ago, Tim Ho said:

"you" is real in this realty.  It is a result of billions of years of a process of Survival  and Reproduction (evolution).  That process turns a tiny small fractal of consciousness, "you".    So it starts out small, but get more complex over time.  To a point now,  "you" can realize your higher self!   

Survival and Reproduction is the key to everything for your experience, your ego.  For "you" to exist, your parent had to success with Survival and Reproduction.  For your parent to exist your grand parents had be success with Survival and Reproduction... so all going all the way back to primates, a different form of "you".   If you keep going back further, "you" were a mammal during dinosaurs time, keep going back, "you" were be a fish.  That fish species were also successful through many generations over millions of years to be come very good at Survival and Reproduction. 

My point is, since Survival and Reproduce, those instructions are hardwired into your DNA.  Everything "you" do daily such as eat, love, fuck, work are all about survive and Reproduce.  All your fears or loves are also for Survival and Reproduction (Note when the environment changes a bit, life adapts to it  environment and changed their form over time.   Different environment have different forms of "you".  Understanding Evolution, how DNA works will help a lot)

 

That whole thing about Survival and Reproduction is "you" or the ego.  

The weird thing is, once "you" realize that you are God, Survival and Reproduction is no longer needed.   You won the game.  You are not just God.  You are the 2% that realize itself.  We don't want to deny "you" because it is still a part of the whole thing.

 

Hehe...

That´s a good story you got going on there.

You want know the truth? The truth is you weren´t born from "your parents" and there is no such a thing as evolution.

There´s no DNA ever, LOL! 

You even had grasped how radical this stuff is. It will end ALL of your stories.

[LfcCharlie4]

Here's one of my favorite passages that explains this paradox so well- 

'Then you are natural pure awareness itself yet retain your sense of being a person. You are able to enjoy having a unique human identity and a fully featured dynamic personality. You will be able to enjoy life like never before. 

Your experience then is that there is no one else like you in this amazing world of ours, yet you are one with all of it. You could say you get to have your cake and eat it, too.' Once you know it, you will never want to live any other way.

You are now more human than ever before, not less. To be truly human is beautiful.' 

This is true Non-Dual freedom. 

Investigate & find that the separate self doesn't exist, investigate and find out who & what you truly are. Investigate and allow the natural happiness & peace that is all of us to blossom. 

For the Sage duality is no longer a problem, personalities are no longer a problem, thoughts & feelings are no longer a problem. THIS IS IT. 

It's all the Self, including your personality & humanity, allow it to blossom, become authentic, stop playing the role of the Separate Self, find out what is true and let it flower. 

Then go celebrate, express & live this understanding in all realms of your experience. The flowering of the teaching never ends, the seeking does. 

You will still have a personality post awakening, you will still have thoughts, you will still have feelings. None of this will be a problem for you anymore. 

But, most importantly you will have seen through the illusion of the separate self & will know your true being as natural pure awareness. 

You will still play as the character, but you will no longer identify as the character, for that is the grand mistake 99.9% of us make.

[LfcCharlie4]

@Javfly33 So true, lmao.

Once you know your true being, playing the character just becomes a fun game & the way you live the understanding. Your happiness is no longer dependent on anything external, meaning you can actually enjoy 'things & activities & relationships' even more. You no longer need to play an image, so you can authentically be yourself without any restriction. 

Life literally becomes a celebration, it's so fun! 

I always found it most paradoxical that when you know you are not a human, you can enjoy the 'human experience' 1000x more, one of many great paradoxes in this teaching, lol. And, when it is time for you to leave this body, you have no fear of death, as you know nothing real can ever die.

Genuinely, 'We' are all so lucky to have stumbled across Non-Duality. I mean look at the world, most are searching for scrapes of happiness outside of themselves, when the treasure chest can only be found within realizing their own being!

[Javfly33]

@LfcCharlie4 Speaking Truth! 

[Breakingthewall]

the ego is a kind of phantom made up of thoughts that form a multicolored avatar but without substance, a kind of hologram. encompasses the entire structure of who you are as a human, even the briefest and smallest of your thoughts. that is why it is very difficult to get rid of it. It is the crutch on which you lean in this world, without it you would be lost, you would merge with the whole and stop being the part. when the ego disappears, in death, it will be as if it never existed. the hologram will dissolve ... pof! and bye. I think that what is possible is to reduce the ego to the minimum necessary, as the text of suyinamurti says, transform the ego to an ego that "knows" deeply that it is an illusion, capable of being in silence, and letting the greatest flow pass of possible emptiness, and enjoy this world of colors, I guess that's why exist. 

Edited December 5, 2020 by Breakingthewall

[LfcCharlie4]

1. @Javfly33 Haha, yessss