- defence -

The false self

October 29, 2010

Fear and defence

The ego-self is directed outwards in defence, to uphold and protect itself. Ironically defence only confirms the vulnerability of the ego-self: any moment the me-fiction can be taken down. Fear calls for defence… which amplifies the fear.

The sense of being cultivates the habit of seeing itself as a real existing form moving through time and space. By ascribing perception to an I there seems to be a separate form that perceives other forms. This imagined self is the person, a psychological shape associating with ideas from the past, culture, upbringing, schooling and assumptions.

A person often is a tense sense of being, holding on to a time-line. Perception is consciousness, which before time perceives itself as everything that appears, including time, space and universe.

The seeing that the person is a fiction reveals the underlying Ground. From then on the person doesn't need to fight for an existence, because it is absolutely clear that consciousness already Is. It spontaneously manifests as everything without interference of the person.

Fear drops away

Sometimes the Ground reveals Itself firstly, after which it is seen that the person is a fiction. It can happen suddenly or gradually over a certain period. In both cases fear of death drops away and the mind comes to rest.

Fear belongs to the domain of the ego-person. Fear of death is recognized as the I that doesn't want to admit it is a construction kept alive by belief. Identification with the body or a thought form is seen through… consciousness is prior to birth and death.

Then the tricky part starts. Consciousness looks in itself and realizes there truly isn't a somebody being conscious. It 'sinks in' that there is just consciousness experiencing itself as universe, as life-forms, as perceptions, emotions and thoughts.

Emptiness is full of potency

The person has great difficulties with the realization that there is just consciousness. It sees this as a nihilistic, desolate and cold emptiness. It resists with all its cleverness and fights to keep attention glued to the false self. Until it is experienced that Emptiness is full of potency and a miracle of unimaginable perfection, self-regulating and personless.

This realization has a profound impact, and at the same time nothing changes. The paradox is noticed: the person still is a phenomenon in the world of forms. However, the tension of the self that has to defend its existence is transformed into clear presence and humor.

After a period of desperation, anger and resistance the stressed mind relaxes. There is knowing of the naturalness of the selfless Being. The question 'how to relate without a person' dissolves in the recognition that relating happens naturally, from the one Love.

Patterns and habits from the past may be active… they get no weight, because identification isn't happening anymore. Everything serves a unique expression. Enjoyment is allowed, just as human suffering is included… addressed from the truth of Being.

healingsite   1993 - 2024