Consciousness and Ego

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Consciousness and Ego – based on these two, the life-drama is played out

If mind were a house, then the ego is its tenant. If mind were a tree, the ego is an inhabitant bird in it—they both are born together, they live together, and they die together. There is a third entity within the mind: the witness. The witness is that awareness which witnesses the mind and the ego. And finally, there is the Consciousness, which powers them all, and it (the consciousness) acts as a medium through which the God (the creator of all phenomenon) watches and executes His will. The consciousness has two aspects: Vyakt and Avyakt (tangible and intangible—i.e. subjective and universal). The mind-body is the medium through which the subjective consciousness realizes its will. The Creator’s (God’s) wish ‘to be’ is realized by the universal consciousness by becoming a subjective consciousness and further through the medium of a mind-body combine. The mind-body combine is a Vyakti (a human)—one who has become tangible. The Creator’s (God’s) wish to ‘continue as continuum’ is realized by the perpetual motion of matter-energy-life (the phenomena) within which an individual plays out the role of generating the continuous activity under the command of a restless ego.

The human connection with universal consciousness becomes possible only after the subjective consciousness first becomes identified with the witness. When it becomes clear to the witness (the person) that the subjective consciousness and the universal consciousness are fundamentally the same, the fear of death disappears (the death itself does not disappear). The witness becomes fearless of death, because the meaning of birth and death become clear to it—it comes to know that the tangible (Vyakt) and the intangible (Avyakt) are two sides of the same coin. The fear of death is linked to the ownership of mind-body combine, owned by the ego. As long as the ego is the owner, the fear would be intact.

We know that we could not have created our own sentience. Unmindfully we might like to assign sentience’s ownership to your ego. Conversely, unmindfully the ego sense might like to claim the ownership of our sentience (as ‘my’ sentience), but we always know that the claim is baseless. However, one cannot blame the ego, because the ego is filling a void of ownership because consciousness chooses to remain invisible and non-claiming.
All ideas of relationships, ownerships, stances, endeavors, efforts arise from a restless mind—a mind wanting to reach somewhere. The restlessness creates activity to get satisfaction—a satisfaction that is incomplete always. From the Creator’s (God’s) point of view, this system which we call life, is made this way on purpose, so that the ‘life drama’ may continue in perpetuity. Full and lasting satisfaction could bring all activity to a stop, therefore, by default; restlessness of mind is an essential element for life-drama to continue.

Spirituality: application in real life sitautions

QUESTION-ANSWER Series between Prem Kumar and Surinder

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Question from Prem Kumar:

Our mind swings between past and future all the time. The oscillations must be brought to rest if we want to experience spirituality in the moment of 'now'. I think all outside activities have to be brought to zero in mind to see the 'now' moment. I cannot bring all outside activities to zero. How to achieve it ?” Prem


My Answer:

As long as you are identified with your mind, past and future will remain part of you. If you become identified with consciousness, you can develop capability to ‘ignore’ past and future (past and future cannot disappear). Total disappearance of past and future occurs only during the state of *समाधी (Samadhi), when you can become completely identified with the present. The present moment is शुनियाता (Shuniyata)—a state of pure Consciousness. Once out of Samadhi, the past and future spring up again. Yes, you can push them to the periphery of your mind by practice (by साधना - Sadhana), but that capability occurs only after you become identified with the consciousness in the first place. (*Consciousness sees no past or future—consciousness is a pure now; it is a raw thought, therefore, it appears as शुनियाता (as a Void). The past and future are projections drawn from a point of now. All the restlessness of the mind (the regrets of the past, and the worries of the future) occurs in the projected area.

(*Samadhi is a Sanskrit word, there is no equivalent word in English. The closest I could go, is something as follows: It is a non-dualistic state of consciousness experienced by a person who has willfully focused his complete attention on an object or an idea in such a way that the consciousness of the experiencing subject becomes one with the experienced object. It is a state in which the mind becomes completely still (voided) though the person remains relaxed, conscious, and happy.)

Surinder

To view the on-going conversation (further question-answers), click on COMMENTS