False Identity

[Guest guest]

How DID THE SENSE OF A CONTINUING " I, " the ego, arise?

Consider the brain as a memory machine, either storing the memories

physically within itself or acting as apparatus which tunes into a

memory field.

The very first moment consciousness identifies with even one memory

in the brain machine the floodgates swing open and the entire

contents of memories pour through. This is the moment when there is a

sudden awareness of " past. " A moment before there was an absolute

Here and Now, a " birth with no past " and a " death with no future, "

then suddenly those twin aspects of one unity divided. On one side

was a memory of a " being " in the past and on the other was a future

with the possibility of that continuity of being " ceasing to be. "

When past is separated from future we enter a new world of time. We

have sprung the trap upon ourselves. It is the panic recoil from the

terrifying possibility of a " death without future " which splits the

here/now, severs man from the unity of the whole and sends him

hurtling into a false mirrored world of illusions.

o

Man becomes a historical animal preoccupied with the past and the

future, and here we encounter the strangest of paradoxes. From what

we hear from the sages we exist out of time. When asked what heaven

would be like Christ replied, " There shall be time no longer. " We

exist in eternity, but our new false identity can only exist in time.

The historical idea of self, the ego, requires a constant re-living

of memories in order to sustain a continuity of its own. It is only

aware of itself as a repeatedly up-dated autobiography. The ego does

not actually exist — it is an illusion of continuity.

You cannot smell, see, taste, hear or touch either the past or the

future. In order to create a sense that it does exist, however, it is

first necessary to forget the here and now. We all do this with the

full approval of the whole social structure. We have managed to set

up an ego image of ourselves to adore and cherish. This Narcissus is

molded from the memories. These non-material ideas are of course

immune to death for they are abstract and therefore incorruptible.

So the conventional ego, the false passport, is built up from an

edited picture album of our past. That version often seems far more

real than we are in the present moment. That is because here/now we

are in a constant flux and flow, but what we have been is nicely and

securely fixed. The false identity is frozen throughout time, a final

static noun. And just because it is unchanging we become more clearly

identified with that identity card than we do with the real living,

moment-to-moment entity.

In order to support the new false self we have to become more and

more identified with the past, with old knowledge and fixed belief

systems which continue to bolster up our historical selves. And we

forget there was ever anything else.

 

Unknown Man...Yatri

 

posted ........bob