The Lesson of the Raven: A Tale of Self-Love

Gazing into the gray-white sheet that had spread itself over the sky, spilling down over the familiar vista like a visual representation of the fog that filled the hole in his chest, he could not help but wince at each spark of the friction caused by the infinite mutability of his identity and the unbearable indestructibility of self-hood twisting the skin of his soul in opposite directions.

Where could he find hope if not in ideals? Where could he retreat to despair if not in nihilism? Where could he derive his motivation without the promises of hope or the destruction of despair? Can progress be borne of anything but conflict? Can it even be measured without the increments of resolution?

As with most things at this point, he had lost his certainty on this. But no alternatives were forthcoming, so he simply watched the conflict taking place within himself; each new ideal crushed by a nihilistic doubt, each glimmer of hope snuffed out by the cold wind of despair.

My ego is playing games, he told himself, that's all this is.

The boundaries are too strong. I simply fear losing this illusory construction of myself; the beliefs that have so jealously guarded it.

The boundaries are too weak. I simply fear the reality of my individuated being; the responsibility that comes with it.

Fear of death, fear of life.

Can I embrace life without coming to fear death? Can I still make my life worth living after having accepted the inevitability of my own death? Should I stack my accomplishments, brick by brick, until I've built a mausoleum for myself, hoping that passers by will stop to wonder about who I was and what I did? Or, instead, should I retreat, divest myself of attachments, and place each new insight as a rung on a ladder to heaven, in the hope that it will carry me up and beyond this life when it comes to its end?

The Buddha lost his fear of death, but he also abandoned his wife and family.

The great rulers of all empires have left their legacies, but only in the hope that their lives would continue- either in the remembrances held in the minds of others, or in some wished-for transcendent realm where a new and eternal life would await their souls.

Both in equal measures acting on some kind of faith.

So what of it? Faith. Is it not just hope without the buttress of reason?

Skepticism doesn't seem much more profitable: What good are reasons if they are reasons for nothing?

Are we splinters of the Divine, waiting to return to our undifferentiated origins, atoms spilled from a singularity into infinite dispersion slowly merging into complexes of form and consciousness to eventually reclaim our unity? Destruction for the sake of separation, awareness, experience?

Or are we just chaotic byproducts of the collision of universes swimming in an infinite pool of higher dimensions, guided only by some unexplained striving to preserve our genetic lineage? Slaves to inscrutable confluences of causes that have no reasons, only effects? Creation for the sake of survival, evolution, experience?

A raven cawed, and a bridge constructed itself across his psyche, just as the glow of the sun became visible beneath the fog, gently diffusing a warm light into his world.

Experience could be the only certainty, the only thing for the sake of which he could truly act. His experience as much as the experience of others, since he knew that whether we had descended from unity or arisen out of chaos, the one thing he could be certain that we share is experience. His values and his reasons could only be reflections of ascribing value to and having reasons for certain kinds of experience.

Ideals had cheapened his experience so long as he allowed them to be expectations, but they could not do so when used merely as guides. Nihilism devalued his experience so long as it was total, but not as a carefully implemented tool to discern what he really thought important from what, in its willed absence, did not force itself back into his consciousness. Hope descended from the Platonic Heaven of ideals into his own heart. Despair loosened grip, as it transmuted from a leaden insulator from pain into a golden conductor of those things that could alleviate it. The conflict between them remained, not as a desperate struggle, but as a useful mechanism of contrast; after all, things must progress, and progress must be measured.

His faith lay only in purpose; his skepticism only of permanence. His mausoleum became a temple of love, for that was all he could leave behind him with any lasting effect. His ladder to heaven became a lightning-rod to channel the energies through himself and out to the world, while he had the chance.

His identity had gained no fixity- perhaps even lost what little it once had- but he welcomed the container of his self, as he knew now more than ever that he was alive, and that he would not always be so.

- Roman "Pach" Pawar

Meditations on the Band Philosophy

Of The 'I'

‘Why ‘Of The I’?’

While searching for a band name, we asked ourselves if there was a theme that connected all of our songs. Soon we realized that everything we talk about revolves, in some way or another, around the issue of the self; ‘I’ is the most central concept in our existence. There are two senses of ‘I’: in everyday usage, ‘I’ represents an illusory self – the ‘ego’. This sense of identity is the basis for all interpretations of reality. Everything we experience is filtered through this ‘I’ and we have no idea what the world looks like without it. The second sense of ‘I’ is the true self, awareness, presence, whatever you want to call it (naming it is anyway futile task, as the Buddha saw, who refused to call it anything and instead just denied it). This basic awareness connects us all and is responsible for all existence, including that of the ego. Obviously I don’t know all of this, and I assume that you don’t either, but we have all had experiences that were between being and ego, and these experiences provide enough motivation to dig deeper.

Construction of the Ego

As we are born, our first experiences are (presumably) those of undifferentiated awareness. Since our minds aren’t properly structured yet, there is no real interpretation but only perception. As soon as we learn that a particular sequence of sounds is our name, we begin to equate a word with who we are. A little later, we do the same with the word ‘I’. Slowly, other thoughts appear and become part of the original I-thought. The next step is identification with possessions. ‘When ‘my’ toy breaks or is taken away, intense suffering arises. Not because of any intrinsic value that the toy has – we will soon lose interest in it, and it will be replaced by other toys – but because of the thought of ‘mine’. The toy has become part of our developing sense of self, or ‘I’ (Tolle, A New Earth, 29). As we grow up, we slip into gender-roles (and are forced into them) and begin to shape our identities in accordance with social class, physical appearance, race, views, interests, music and fashion tastes, etc. As more things are added to this ego-structure, we become increasingly convinced that these things are what we truly are.

The ego plays many roles: the rebellious punk, the successful business executive, the tough gangster, the teenage-emo, the housewife, the family guy, or the victim (people develop illnesses to remain in the role of the victim). These roles represent a misguided search for identity and are an expression of the need to be noticed. In many cases we define ourselves by the football club we support, the religious community we belong to, or the company we work for. Corporations are macrocosms of ego, branded with a certain identity, competing with others for more. As for us: ironically, the only way ‘Of The I’ can be a successful band is if we manage to convince our audience to become part of our collective identity.

Drive and Reactivity

The ego has an inherent drive to sustain itself. Success in strengthening it brings pleasure, while failure causes pain. Of course, success depends strongly on others; our self-worth is often determined by what people think of us. If we are praised, the ego is strengthened and we are happy, but if we are criticized, the ego takes a hit and it hurts (though it will quickly find a way to compensate). Obviously, this is all very personal. Since we have used our opinions, possessions, and beliefs to define who we are, when they are criticized, we are criticized. The ego is always ready: we become defensive, and without second thought, we react – either verbally or quietly in our heads. Mark Epstein offers a good characterization of our day-to-day minds:

‘We are constantly murmuring, muttering, scheming, or wondering to ourselves under our breath: comforting ourselves, in a perverse fashion, with our own silent voices. Much of our interior life is characterized by this kind of primary process, almost infantile, way of thinking: I like this. I don’t like that. She hurt me. How can I get that? More of this, no more of that.’ These emotionally tinged thoughts are our attempts to keep the pleasure principle operative. Much of our inner dialogue, rather than the ‘rational’ secondary process that is usually associated with the thinking mind, is this constant reaction to experience by a selfish, childish protagonist. None of us has moved very far from the seven-year-old who vigilantly watches to see who got more.’ (Epstein, Thoughts Without A Thinker, 110).

Thinking without Awareness

The voice in our head is rarely silent. It is a constant source of distraction that prevents us from being still and present in the now.

"Thinking without awareness is the main dilemma of human existence"
(Tolle, 32).

When I began my studies in philosophy, I was convinced that my professors, with all their acquired knowledge, would have to be some of the wisest and most fulfilled creatures I would ever meet. But soon I began to see that only very few of them had been successful in translating their intellect into real understanding. While the rest of them were all very clever and extremely skilled at breaking down reality into thoughts and concepts, they did not seem to have gained anything deeper from it. In fact, this very tendency seemed to prevent them from looking beyond and discovering real meaning. As Eckhart Tolle writes, thought can imprison us:

"The quicker you are in attaching verbal or mental labels to things, people, or situations, the more shallow and lifeless your reality becomes, and the more deadened you become to reality, the miracle of life that continuously unfolds within and around you. In this way, cleverness may be gained, but wisdom is lost, and so are joy, creativity, and aliveness. They are concealed in the still gap between the perception and the interpretation."
(Tolle, 26-27).

Deconstructing the Ego

How do we find this gap? How do we stop the incessant stream of thoughts to live, if only for a short while, in the present moment? How do we break the identification with our illusory self and discover this underlying awareness? As far as I can tell, it’s ridiculously difficult. I also believe that we can probably only provoke this state of mind to a certain extent; I don’t think it is a goal we can achieve by simply working hard enough for it. But there is a place to start. The ego’s grip on us is loosened when we become aware of its workings – be it in meditation or during every day activities. By standing back from our busy mind, by creating a certain distance, by questioning the ego and recognizing the tricks it plays, by acting as a witness watching a spectacle (rather than an immediately involved agent), we can gradually make the ‘shift from emotional reactivity to non-judgmental awareness’ (Epstein, 113).

As difficult as this is, it provides an incredible relief. My experience of this is very limited but the few times I have felt it, it seemed more important than anything else. When my grandfather died, for example, although I felt sadness, these personal feelings were trumped by an urge to help out my family. This provided me with a huge relief and a deep sense of freedom: finally I could spend a few days without my usual worries and dedicate my attention to something meaningful.

Traps

Even experiences of this kind are often mixed with ego, however. The illusory self sets up traps that are hard to avoid. I spent a few summers in Buddhist retreats that always made me feel very peaceful and happy. Although I’m sure a big part of these feelings came from letting go, I now know that another part came from an ego delighted by its identification with a new, peaceful and spiritual person. I was proud to have released my self. Epstein offers a good description of this phenomenon: ‘As meditation unfolds, the coarser aspects of the self, as personified by emotional upheaval or by the chattering mind, tend to become quieter, but more subtle attachments or identifications become visible in their stead. In this sense, meditation becomes rather like a labyrinth, with each new opening and each new perception about the self revealing yet another opportunity for attachment and release. What the meditator must keep confronting is her own capacity for conceit or pride, her own instinctive thirst for certainty, her own ability to co-opt the meditative process for narcissistic ends. Meditation is a means of indefatigably exposing this narcissism, of highlighting every permutation of the self-experience so that no aspect remains available for narcissistic recruitment.’

-Sebastian Danielsson