I still have no definite handle on the nature of self in its totality. I can say this: my state of consciousness is not actually *that* unusual. If youve experienced a flow state, then youve experienced the same selflessness. The difference is that Ive lost the reflex which would normally reactivate my self-complex when I came out of the flow state. In fact, I cant seem to reactivate it even if I try, which is the source of the difficulty Im having: I can now see only in others the thing Im talking about. Ive come up with the following model of how the self might arise. Its a just-so story, not a claim of truth; Im putting it out here to attract feedback and alternative models. Youre a baby, developing and learning to function in the world. To a large extent, youre learning through direct interaction. If you manipulate the blocks just so, you can stack them up; wave your arm like this and you knock them down; pull the dogs tail and it jumps up and yelps; and so on. But youre also trying to absorb your culture -- a certain way of seeing the world, all the little cognitive tricks that help you solve problems and navigate in society -- and you do this by reconstructing the worldview of your parents, siblings, etc. from their words and behaviour. Thing is, your parents and siblings have all learned, from a young age, to see you as a self-with-characteristics, a consistent object instead of a dynamic force of nature. And your parents, especially, want you to be a self with *particular* characteristics: smart, hard-working, creative, talented. So the worldview you absorb automatically has a distorted view of your self: a reflection of a reflection. And since you mistake it for a real self, you begin to shape your behaviour to cultivate and preserve that self concept. So now instead of just working hard, youre focused on appearing hard-working. Instead of being creative, youre focused on appearing creative. Your smarts are being used to figure out how to appear smart. All of this happens on a deep and largely unconscious level. But if any of these things are false about you, youll generally find it difficult to convince others, and will only delude yourself. And if theyre true, theyll shine through over time without any effort on your part. To operate without a self-concept is therefore a great improvement, for the simple reason that youre not constantly wasting cognitive resources on a non-problem.
Posted on: Fri, 22 Aug 2014 23:04:44 +0000
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