Ego, The Self and Meditation

[dwai]

How does Ego affect our Meditation?

Is it the Self or is it something distinct and disparate?

[Cameron]

My enlightenment to do list:

 

1. Stop doing

 

-Nirmala

[Taomeow]

How does Ego affect our Meditation?

Is it the Self or is it something distinct and disparate?

 

I have a Hun, a Po, a Zhi, a Yi, and a Heart Shen. Together these comprize my Greater Shen. Underlying my Greater Shen I have qi, and underneath that, jing, and under that, blood, fluids, organs, flesh and bones and sinews, skin and hair and nails and teeth. Above my Greater Shen I have my Causal Body, and hovering over it and penetrating it all too, my Acausal Body, or the body of tao. That's a very cursory, but fairly complete sketch of my anatomy, physiology and psychology viewed from the classical taoist perspective. Nowere in this picture do I have an "ego."

 

So to your question -- how it affects my meditation -- I have to answer, it doesn't, for lack thereof. What affects my meditation is the level of communication between all parts of me. E.g., if my left brain hemisphere is merely silenced, it's not meditation, it's "relaxation." In meditation, it is awake and alert and talks freely to all the energies and entities, both formed and formless, that reside, across the corpus callosum, in my right hemisphere; also, simultaneously, they both talk to my midbrain whose ancestral home is my Heart Shen, and the midbrain talks to the lower brain, which stores much of my Po; and my Po tunes up my breathing and postural alignment in meditation, and these affect my Kidney Yin and my jing, and so on. In other words, meditation, in my world, is integration and its goal is to become completely whole. So obviously, in my world, nothing is singled out under the label of "ego" in order to be shut down, thrown out, ignored, punished, or be ashamed of.

 

What about you? What's meditation for in your practice?

Edited August 12, 2007 by Taomeow

[Todd]

I have a Hun, a Po, a Zhi, a Yi, and a Heart Shen. Together these comprize my Greater Shen. Underlying my Greater Shen I have qi, and underneath that, jing, and under that, blood, fluids, organs, flesh and bones and sinews, skin and hair and nails and teeth. Above my Greater Shen I have my Causal Body, and hovering over it and penetrating it all too, my Acausal Body, or the body of tao. That's a very cursory, but fairly complete sketch of my anatomy, physiology and psychology viewed from the classical taoist perspective. Nowere in this picture do I have an "ego."

 

So to your question -- how it affects my meditation -- I have to answer, it doesn't, for lack thereof. What affects my meditation is the level of communication between all parts of me. E.g., if my left brain hemisphere is merely silenced, it's not meditation, it's "relaxation." In meditation, it is awake and alert and talks freely to all the energies and entities, both formed and formless, that reside, across the corpus callosum, in my right hemisphere; also, simultaneously, they both talk to my midbrain whose ancestral home is my Heart Shen, and the midbrain talks to the lower brain, which stores much of my Po; and my Po tunes up my breathing and postural alignment in meditation, and these affect my Kidney Yin and my jing, and so on. In other words, meditation, in my world, is integration and its goal is to become completely whole. So obviously, in my world, nothing is singled out under the label of "ego" in order to be shut down, thrown out, ignored, punished, or be ashamed of.

 

What about you? What's meditation for in your practice?

 

Obviously the word "ego" would be an anachronism if applied to classical Daoist thought. However, the thing to which "ego" refers, when it is used well, is something about which Laozi, at least, had a fair amount to say. This "ego" is a verb, a motion that obscures the Dao. The word "ego" is often used to refer to this movement, since one of the primary ways that we obscure the Dao is by obsession with the idea of a personal self, which can gain or lose things. There is nothing wrong with such an idea. It is as much a part of everything as anything else, and much entertainment comes from it. However, people like Laozi saw something else to pay attention to, something which, in contrast to the idea of a particular self, actually lasts. He saw his particular self fade into insignificance, and what was there then? The uncarved block, the undyed cloth... the dark beyond dark. Whatever floats your boat, just so long as you don't think its any thing, or that it can be gained, or has been gained. A huge part of the Taoteching, and perhaps all of it, if I could understand it correctly, is basically a description of this state, which boils down to don't do the whole ego thing. Don't move from what actually is, if anything actually is. And if nothing actually is, don't move from that. Don't move from nothing, and don't move from something. Don't move.

 

Maybe going from description to prescription was his way of acknowledging the futility of description, though he talks a bit about the goodies that we enjoy when we are ready to acknowledge them.

 

The ego is just as much a mystery as the Dao. It is not seperate from the Dao, so it is small wonder. Use whatever word you like for it, even incompleteness, or unintegration. However, you might consider that it is not so much incompleteness or unintegration, as the sense of incompleteness and unintegration that often obscures the Dao. You might have a point though, that it is not so much ego, but the sense of an ego to be gotten rid of, that often obscures the Dao.

[dwai]

In other words, meditation, in my world, is integration and its goal is to become completely whole. So obviously, in my world, nothing is singled out under the label of "ego" in order to be shut down, thrown out, ignored, punished, or be ashamed of.

 

What about you? What's meditation for in your practice?

 

Hi Taomeow,

 

Thanks for your response. It was very illuminating...

 

I have a few questions based on your description. Note, however that I might not make any sense at all, since I'm just a novice. And my apologies if that is the case.

 

So what drives your meditation?

Your left brain or your right brain?

Is it your left-brain Interpreter module?

Or is it your Heart?

Or is it your Lower Dan Tien/Te?

 

Based on what I have understood of the process, Ego is our "Self-image" and it keeps "waking up" every once in a while to re-assert itself. It is not just an intellectual limitation that we place upon ourselves, but also a societal one. This Ego is the barrier that differentiates us from the unlimited one.

 

I know it is very easy to talk about it intellectually but not sense it experientially. But for those rare instances when it drops...

 

My meditation is in trying to learn what my teacher teaches me, physically as well as energetically. Get as close to the description as I can, hopefully to go beyond the description eventually.

 

But the problem is with this darned Ego which throws a monkey-wrench in my plans. Maybe I'm imagining it, but my self-description seems to be my limitation.

 

Maybe going from description to prescription was his way of acknowledging the futility of description, though he talks a bit about the goodies that we enjoy when we are ready to acknowledge them.

 

The ego is just as much a mystery as the Dao. It is not seperate from the Dao, so it is small wonder. Use whatever word you like for it, even incompleteness, or unintegration. However, you might consider that it is not so much incompleteness or unintegration, as the sense of incompleteness and unintegration that often obscures the Dao. You might have a point though, that it is not so much ego, but the sense of an ego to be gotten rid of, that often obscures the Dao.

 

Thanks Todd. That was an extremely intriguing elucidation. My teacher tells us about syntax and it's limitations. I guess to experience the Dao, we need to first go beyond syntax (which is what Lao Tzu refers to in the first aphorism of the Tao te Ching)...

 

But my problem has been with the separation of the intellect from the experience. I believe (from my reading, etc) that this is a primary problem with many of the "Rational" kinds. We tend to "interpret" everything and find an explanation (even when there might not be any definition or words to explain such phenomenon).

[Eric23]

Would it be fair to say that meditation is quieting down that part of one's self that gets in the way of just being (as so wonderfully described by Taomeow)? I notice that there is this part of me (self, ego whatever you want to call it) that wants to be in control, have its say and provide a blow by blow commentary on the process. The mechanical process of meditation is to slow everything down to absolute stillness so that we can have a chance just be.

[Spectrum]

Letting go of what we have "learned" is difficult but necessary for advancement. Learn to let go. Its most important. Be where you are today. Put one foot in front of the other. Breathe one more breath. Relax just a little more.

[Yoda]

Taomeow and Todd sure know their Taoism!! It's great to have y'all around!!

 

Taomeow,

 

I dislike the word "ego"... Is there a roughly equivalent term in Taoism that might have more accurate connotations?

 

Yoda

[Cameron]

[Spectrum]

But my problem has been with the separation of the intellect from the experience. I believe (from my reading, etc) that this is a primary problem with many of the "Rational" kinds. We tend to "interpret" everything and find an explanation (even when there might not be any definition or words to explain such phenomenon).

 

Just throw it all away and start over. Its easy when it's not all in your head to hang on to.

Edited August 12, 2007 by Spectrum

[fatherpaul]

in meditation, it is the meditator who is most important, not method,

who is meditating?

[Todd]

But my problem has been with the separation of the intellect from the experience. I believe (from my reading, etc) that this is a primary problem with many of the "Rational" kinds. We tend to "interpret" everything and find an explanation (even when there might not be any definition or words to explain such phenomenon).

 

If you feel that it is a problem, I would suggest you explore your tendency to side-step experience by searching for interpretations. Get to know it. What is it like? How does it arise? What does it feel like to search for interpretations, or to settle on a particular interpretation as sound? What comes of these sorts of movements?

 

I would also suggest that you not settle for any answers that feel like you could grasp onto them. Answers that can be grasped are like judgements about people. They aren't helpful if you want to get to know someone. Getting to know someone is much more about feeling. And what happens when that feeling gets stuck somewhere? So explore how it feels to seek interpretation, to grab onto answers, and get to know your problem. Get to know it like the most interesting person you've ever met and the sun on your face all wrapped up into one.

Edited August 13, 2007 by Todd

[Todd]

Taomeow and Todd sure know their Taoism!! It's great to have y'all around!!

 

 

Thanks Yoda, though I don't know much about Taoism.

 

Its great to have you around too!

[Yoda]

[Todd]

[Cameron]

Excellent!

 

LB