EGOLAND

 

Once upon a time, in an ordinary galaxy, on a watery planet called Earth, a strange creature evolved. For hundreds of millions of years, countless species of animals had come and gone without one QUESTION having been thought of, or spoken. Then, during a time of rapid climate change when many species were unable to survive, this creature, physically inferior to many predators, developed a language which enabled it to think in a radically different way. It was able to think about things as if it were talking to itself. It invented questions, and a logical way of analyzing it’s life, and its needs. This was a great advantage for it’s survival, and led to it’s domination of all the animals, and eventually, it’s planet.

 

It’s animal brain had long been creating concepts and images that represented all the important things in it’s life, and associated them with vocal sounds, expressions, and gestures, including such ideas as “come”, “go”, “eat”, “fight”, etc. Animal thinking was rapid and had been efficient enough to serve it well for millions of years. But then, as it’s new language evolved, vowels, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, and finally pronouns, were invented. He and she could now communicate much better with each other and “think about” things. They thought and talked about past events, and planned for the future. They thought about themselves, or rather, the image/concept of who they thought they were. And they made names for themselves.

 

Their minds identified with their imaginary descriptions of themselves, which were associated with the pronoun of the first person; “I”, in Latin, “Ego”.And, they wondered what had become of those individuals they cared about, who had died, and began to think about their own death, and how to find ways to avoid or transcend it. Anxiety had come to Earth.

 

Many generations later, after writing had been developed, myths about the origin of mankind were recorded in the literature of the first city states to arise in the lands between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. It passed from Ur through Babylon, and finally a modified version of the myths became the Hebrew book called “Genesis”. Like most mythology, it told of supernatural powers and magical events, and contained within it an analogy to important truths. Remarkably, it suggested how the first human thinking began; with the eating of the “fruit of the Tree of Knowledge”(language); after which, thinking about themselves for the first time, they took over the responsibility for their lives and no longer lived as innocent creatures, motivated by impersonal animal thinking. Ego had arrived on Earth.

 

As these first “Homo Cogitens” (thinking man) invented agriculture, animal husbandry, commerce, and civilization, they were creating a whole new world- Egoland, which exists only in the minds of people, although it severely effects all life on this planet. Almost all people are kept imprisoned in Egoland by the language that once freed them from the perils of animal life. Human thinking and communicating through language, creates concepts of separateness, vulnerability, scarcity, and insecurity which results in competition, strife, violence, suffering, and destruction of our environment, our planet. These people are US- egotistically named “Homo Sapiens”. Our human species does not yet deserve to be called “Wise Human”, especially as the side-effects of our ego-mentality are creating the possibly worst challenge to our survival we have faced since the great ice sheets advanced southward.

 

Many of us would not choose to leave Egoland if we were given the chance; One can leave only by surrendering the Ego, our personal identities, and our individual existence is dear to us, even though it means a life of isolation, insecurity, limitations, and lack of love. Egoland is not all bad, of course. Many people are caring and altruistic. Great music, art, and literature have been injected into it through individuals who are more open to creativity, even though their egos like to take credit for it. There is excitement, joy of discovery, and fun in life, and forms of attachment we call love. There are precious moments when we stop thinking and experience beauty, beholding things as they are, without the ego’s filters. But there are many problems, and the specter of death hangs over us all. We have become so addicted to our wonderful tool that we cannot stop thinking long enough to discover what we, and our world, are really like.

 

It is a fact that we are individual beings, in a world of many parts, and animal life evolved as individual creatures with individual lives. It is natural to deal with it in that way. This is our reality now. However, there is another way to perceive the world; as a whole, a unity. Our brains can and do perceive holistically. But we have lost our balance between the two ways of being in the world, and are losing the forest as we focus too closely on the trees.

 

There have been many people who have experienced life in a wider, more complete way. A life full of beauty, love, and peace. Although they came from a wide variety of cultures, and through the whole spectrum of human history, their essential message to us has always been consistent; that we should accept each other, and all things, in unconditional love. The great majority of these individuals lived quietly, influencing others by the examples of their lives, and are unknown to us. A few of these individuals have been remembered, mostly through religions that developed, based on inflated images of those individuals, and legends that elaborated on their messages and added dogmas which often were contrary to the original message. I am talking about those people who have been called “enlightened” or “liberated”; they were liberated from the illusion of being an ego self; They could experience the world as it is, free of the mental filters that distort and hide much of the beauty and love of living in this mysterious and wonderful world. They were often described as being in the world , but not of it. They were individuals, and acted and communicated as if they were individual personalties, but knew their self-image was only that, a description, a reference to their individual Self. There are many of these individuals in the world today, more than we know of. Many have not had dramatic transformational experiences, but seem to have evolved into more “spiritual” people over time, and some seem to have come into this life already open to a wider perception and experience of reality than the many who seem to be lost in the narrow world of the personal ego.

 

Understanding the concept of the ego-self is very difficult. Seeing how we are attached to, identified with it, is even more difficult. Becoming familiar with the descriptions many have presented to us can prepare us for eventually becoming aware.

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From Richard Alpert- AKA Ram Dass:

 

“Your ego is a set of thoughts that define your universe. Its like a familiar room built of thoughts; you see the universe through its windows. You are secure in it, but to the extent that you are afraid to venture outside, it has become a prison. Your ego has you conned. You believe you need its specific thoughts to survive. The ego controls you through your fear of loss of identity. To give up these thoughts, it seems, would annihilate you and so you cling to them.”

 

 

From Eckhart Tolle; “The Power of now”:

 

The mind is a superb instrument if used rightly. Used wrongly, however, it becomes very destructive. To put it more accurately, it is not so much that you use your mind wrongly- you usually don’t use it at all. It uses you. This is the disease. You believe that you are your mind. This is the delusion. The instrument has taken you over.”

 

A little ego quiz:

 

To perhaps learn something about yourself, see which choices come easily to your consciousness.

Which of these pairs of statements seems more appropriate, more natural for you;

 

1. I have a body; or I am a body

2. I have a brain; or I am a brain

3. I have a mind, or I am a mind

4. I have a soul, or I am a soul

5. I have an ego, or I am an ego.

 

If you, like most people, find it easier to say “I have these things”, then ask yourself “who it is, that has these things?”