Why Improve The Self When There Is No Self?

[The White Belt]

Heyyy!

I took a class on compassion recently at my local Buddhism centre. Great. But what I couldn't understand is why add things to the ego, if even positive, when we want to let the ego go? 

Why do personal development? Is a healthy ego easier to let go of really?

This is confusing to me.

 

Thanks guys.

[Neo]

Heeeeeyyyyyyyyyyyy

 

Because you as a human is one way in which reality manifests itself here and now. Don't be in such a hurry to destroy the ego.

Edited October 4, 2016 by Neo
Forgot to put Heeeeyyyy

[The White Belt]

@Neo Heeeeeeeeeeeeeey. Thanks man. I've just watched the shocking truth about enlightenment video. So many paradoxes running through my mind. You're right. I need to be patient. I guess I'd rather live with a wholesome, healthy ego until it's time to let go.

Edited October 4, 2016 by BeginnerActualizer

[Frogfucius]

18 minutes ago, BeginnerActualizer said:

@Neo So many paradoxes running through my mind. 

Yup, those same paradoxes would hang me up for a while, too. You'll break through it, eventually. I just believe that our reality itself is a paradox. Our consciousness arises from a mix of unconscious material. Matter rose from nothing…or maybe it was always there, which is a paradox itself. How can something exist if nothing put it there? Embrace the paradoxes, man! I think they're a thing of beauty now.

Edited October 4, 2016 by Frogfucius

[Self-Mastery]

7 minutes ago, Frogfucius said:

Yup, those same paradoxes would hang me up for a while, too. You'll break through it, eventually. I just believe that our reality itself is a paradox. Our consciousness arises from a mix of unconscious material. Matter rose from nothing…or maybe it was always there, which is a paradox itself. How can something exist if nothing put it there? Embrace the paradoxes, man! I think they're a thing of beauty now.

Everything seems to be fucking paradoxical . I hope Leo releases a video about these countless paradoxes.  

It's beautiful when you realize you do not know anything and everything seems to be a paradox; it's also scary  

Edited October 4, 2016 by Seyed

[Neo]

Quote

I hope Leo releases a video about these countless paradoxes. 

He has already. Get with the program man!!!

 

[Self-Mastery]

7 minutes ago, Neo said:

He has already. Get with the program man!!!

 

Oh Shit. How did I miss those!

[Azrael]

10 hours ago, BeginnerActualizer said:

But what I couldn't understand is why add things to the ego, if even positive, when we want to let the ego go?

Basically to have fun with your role in life. I'd suggest not only getting better, kinder ... this kind of stuff - but look at how you can maximally become authentic in your life. If you get this, oh man. This will fulfill you like nuts. And with enough awareness it's even greater because you can see that you are really deep down perfectly playing your role in human life. And that's fun.

[The White Belt]

@Azrael Thanks. So I wouldn't be creating more attachments?

[Neo]

Quote

Thanks. So I wouldn't be creating more attachments?

To me, there doesn't seem to be a paradox here. Maybe I'm not enlightened enough. But you want to be the best you can be in life and enlightened? Or just a real waste of space that everyone dislikes, completely unable to hold down a job, and enlightened. OK, so some may say "it doesn't matter." Jesus said, if you're going to build a house, don't build it on sand. Build it on the rock. You don't need me to explain what happens if you build your beautiful oneness with reality on sand?

[cetus]

13 hours ago, Seyed said:

It's beautiful when you realize you do not know anything and everything seems to be a paradox; it's also scary

@Seyed Yea, it's like that. The "scary" part is the awakening from the dream of self. The self that experiences a paradox every time existence refuses to fit the constructs of it's logical self.

[cetus]

@BeginnerActualizer Self is an illusion, albeit a very persistent one. (Einstein said that about time). The point being, if self is a persistent illusion, why not make it a really great one.

[Dodo]

2 minutes ago, cetus56 said:

@BeginnerActualizer Self is an illusion, albeit a very persistent one. (Einstein said that about time). The point being, if self is a persistent illusion, why not make it a really great one.

If the illusion is great will we want to escape from it?

[cetus]

24 minutes ago, Dodoster said:

If the illusion is great will we want to escape from it?

I wouldn't say escape, but more as just accepting what it is as illusion. In the real world of everyday existence, we all have a "street self" that must interact with others and their well imbedded illusion of self. Job, family, friends, people we meet, all a role play that we watch happen from a place of silence beyond the illusion.

Edited October 5, 2016 by cetus56

[Prabhaker]

16 hours ago, BeginnerActualizer said:

But what I couldn't understand is why add things to the ego, if even positive, when we want to let the ego go? 

This is something basic to be understood – the ego must come to a peak, it must be strong, it must have attained an integrity – only then can you dissolve it. A weak ego cannot be dissolved. And this becomes a problem. 

In the East all the religions preach egolessness. So in the East everybody is against the ego from the very beginning. Because of this anti attitude, ego never becomes strong, never comes to a point of integration from where it can be thrown. It is never ripe. So in the East it is very difficult to dissolve the ego, almost impossible. 

But in the West it is very easy to dissolve the ego. So whenever a Western seeker reaches an understanding that ego is the problem he can easily dissolve it, more easily than any Eastern seeker. This is the paradox – in the West ego is taught, in the East egolessness is taught. But in the West it is easy to dissolve the ego, in the East it is very difficult. 

This is going to be a hard task for you, first to attain and then to lose – because you can lose only something which you possess. If you don't possess it, how can you lose it?

[cetus]

17 hours ago, BeginnerActualizer said:

But what I couldn't understand is why add things to the ego, if even positive, when we want to let the ego go? 

@BeginnerActualizer Buddhist have egoless compassion for everyone. A compassion that desires nothing in return.

[The White Belt]

@cetus56 @Prabhaker @Neo This opens up an interesting question. Do enlightened people use the illusive ego that they built up even though they are liberated from it? Do they use it to interact from a place of no-mind?

[Prabhaker]

9 hours ago, BeginnerActualizer said:

Do they use it to interact from a place of no-mind?

THE STATE OF ENLIGHTENMENT is not the state of individuality. There is no person in it. One who is enlightened is enlightened only because he is not; there is nobody to function. Activity continues, but there is nobody to do it.

Functioning continues, but there is nobody to function it. Then it continues on its own... just as stars go on moving and the seasons move, and the sun rises, and the moon comes, and the tide, and the seas, and the rivers.

An enlightened person is one with the whole; the whole functions through him.

His activity is perfect because he is not there to distort it. He is just like a hollow bamboo - whatsoever song the whole chooses to sing through him, it is sung.

There is nobody to hinder, there is nobody to obstruct.