If you missed our August 18th Reality Sandwich on KPOO 89.5 FM with my co-host Martin Matthews, it is now available for you to stream in your browser.

We interviewed Adam Coutts, veteran meditation instructor, who can be found here. To listen to Liberation Through Meditation, click here.

His classes begin in September, so be sure to go check out his site while space is still available.

Who am I? Who are you? Who are we? Do I “know” you?

The ultimate spiritual practice is dis-identifying with that which we think is us—objects in our awareness. It may be our possessions. It may be our finances. It may be our looks. It may be our intelligence. It may be our social reputation. It may be our behaviors, our sexual orientation, our beliefs, or ideas. And yet we are none of that.

As the Buddhists would say—we are the pure witness. As Mark Michael Lewis would say—“We are not [XYZ], we are that which is experiencing [all of it]”. As Ken Wilber would say—“[You are] the witness, the original face you had before you were born—before the big bang…is not a thing or an object. It is a feeling…an atmosphere”.

I would agree with all of that—indeed, the ultimate spiritual practice is dis-identifying with that which you think is you—anything other than pure awareness—pure witness, and add: before we can dis-identify, we must first recognize when we are identified—when we have a case of mistaken identity. Yet even before we can recognize this, we must have developed self-reflexive awareness.

Simple, but not easy, as in the moment [any moment] when we are in our experience, we are often IN our experience—That is to say our experience has us, we do not have it. AND, to the degree we have built the muscle of self awareness and self-reflection by being able to take our very self and make it an object in our awareness is the degree to which we have choice.

Even further, to the degree that we have “meta-cognition”—that is the ability to think about our thinking—is the degree to which we have choice around our thinking. And as most of you know, how we think about something creates our emotional experience around it. The more we exercise and build the muscle of witnessing, the more we move from misery to emotional choice and finally to emotional freedom.

How do we know if we are identified? If you imagine anything being taken away from you and you experience a high degree of fear or anxiety—or if it has been taken away from you and you are in grief or misery—you are identified. You have a case of mistaken identity [or a “confusion of identify location” as I like to phrase it]–and you are identified with something other than who you truly are—pure witness; radical spirit; God.

Yet we judge ourselves [and often go into shame] when we do not attain what we think we should with the objects in our awareness. We are judging our degree of success with them as us—as our very Self.

All this is sad enough, yet we don’t stop there do we? We go even further and we judge others [and indulge in self-righteousness] with the same case of mistaken identity. We judge them for their dress, their speech, their intelligence, their attractiveness [or lack thereof], their possessions, status, sexual orientation, political affiliations or positions, etc. etc., etc.

While it sometimes makes sense to judge behaviors [and even at times to insist they stop or are dealt with from a justice standpoint] we do not judge just the behaviors—we judge the being at their core for a behavior. Something external to who they are truly. This is all too easy to do and too often indulged in to feel superior or reinforce our fears or…

The bottom line is that collapsing behaviors [or any other object in our awareness] with identity is a gross confusion of logical levels. To do it to ourselves creates misery in one form or another. To do it to others allows us to feel superior or reinforce our self-indulgent fears—or both.

To free yourself from this trap is the ultimate spiritual practice.
To do so means taking on five simple steps:

1. Develop self-reflexive awareness
2. Notice how you are thinking about yourself or others [meta-cognition] and whether it serves your ultimate happiness
and thrival
3. Recognize when you are identified [fear, anxiety, misery, loss, or grief in specific contexts]
4. Notice that it is not really you—there is the noticer—behind what you are aware of is that which is aware. This is you.
5. Take this on as a daily spiritual practice

And as an additional exercise, step into the belief that we are all in evolution and are therefore always deepening and changing and therefore we never really “know” anyone. As a result we must take on the practice of continually updating our internal representations [our interpretations] of others. Continually looking to increase and update our accuracy in who we think they are. But that is another thought to flesh out at another time.

May you be happy and free.

–

For more on dis-identification, read The Key in the Darkness, which can be found at The Priest and the Punk.

For those of you who missed the radio program–Reality Sandwich on San Francisco’s KPOO 89.5FM–today, you can download it here: Key in the Darkness [33MB MP4].

We had a lot of fun, and as usual, Mark Michael Lewis was an incredible guest.

UPDATE: the file has been fixed and should now stream in your browser.

Ego is the source of most of the ills in our society. It is the thing to dissolve as you become more spiritual. It is something to be noticed, sought out, fought, and destroyed. Ego is bad.

Or is it?

Ego is largely misunderstood in our cult-ure. As Eastern Spiritual traditions are imported into the west with greater and greater rapidity, it is misunderstood even further. Rather than looking at it and understanding it for what it is, it is further collapsed, fused, and maligned into one mass of experience generally labeled “it-is-bad”.

Those who judge it as “bad” are missing the point of transcending attachment through craving and desire, which they pre-suppose is generated by ego, as they are creating aversion, the darker sibling of craving and attachment. They are engaging in the same dynamic. Ignorance and fear are largely at play here.

All of this is due to a lack of understanding and poverty of distinctions with respect to the nature of this phenomenon we are labeling “ego”. And all of this is also due to a lack of wisdom about the nature of evolution and this game that we, as conscious beings, find ourselves in, which I am terming Personal Evolution.

To find more clarity, we need to turn to integrative thinking.
Ego is not a static “thing”. It is not fixed. Like all manifestations of consciousness it is dynamic. It is fluid. And, contrary to popular belief and common misconception, it is ever evolving—as consciousness can do nothing else. Let us look at one model of the evolution of ego so that we can better and more fully understand its nature, its complexities, and from what position it is most misunderstood and from what level of development it is most oft misperceived.

As a preface to the model that is about to be presented here, think as these “levels” less as “steps” and more like waves or spirals. In other words, they are not discreet (in the mathematical sense) levels. They are more flexible and fluid than that. And, unfortunately, due to the current linguistic limitations, we are working with “levels”.

Pre-rational

This is the most fundamental of all levels of the ego. At this level, one often engages in moral pronouncements of or about the Self. There is also a larger percentage of self-to-other comparisons “I did X and I am therefore a good person. In fact I am better than you”, or on the opposite end of the egotistical phenomenon: “I failed at Y so I am therefore a bad person, and in fact, compared to you (who succeeded at Y) I am worthless.” Whatever the case, with pre-rational ego present, there is judgment in the pejorative sense, that amounts to something being “good” or “bad” bringing with it a disproportionate (from a rational and certainly from a trans-rational perceptual standpoint) amount of emotional “charge”. At this level of development, there is self-congratulation in the extreme—hubris and arrogance. There is also self-flagellation—self-hate, self-doubt, and in the simplest terms—“beating one’s Self up”.

Rational

Rational is the “middle ground” or “half way” point in this model. At this level in the development—or evolution—of the ego, one begins to be focused on competence and results. For instance, “I am more competent than you at X, therefore I can produce better results than you”, or “I am less competent at Y than you and therefore you can produce better results than I.” Moral pronouncements begin to drop away in the higher realms of rational ego. One may feel positive or elated about one’s accomplishments; one may also feel deflated or negative about one’s failures, but there is no “I am therefore a “good” or “bad” person as a resultant meaning or extrapolation about the Self. One other benefit provided by this level of development is that one begins to engage in self-to-self comparisons through time, rather than static, two dimensional self-to-other comparisons, which are inherently a slippery slope. Why are they a slippery slope? No matter what the context, no matter what your level of skill or development, there can (and arguably IS) someone more developed or skilled, or less developed and less skilled. Ergo, these comparisons are foolhardy and easily deconstructed. Given that this level is the Rational level, one can easily see the inappropriateness of these comparisons with ease. The ability to self reflect and self examine becomes easier and achievement becomes important

Trans-rational

This level is where the juice is. Where the verve is, in the artistic sense. This is where the artistry of the Self (and in fact often art, poetry, and the highest expressions of the Self begin to emerge. This is also where the ego begins to “dissolve”. I put “dissolve” in quotes in this context because it only appears to be the dissolution of ego. It is the expansion of ego. It is the expansive Self. At the highest levels of trans-rational states and development, one becomes god by becoming one with all. One with everything and nothing. This is already and always happening, but it is only at a trans-rational level of development and awareness that one becomes cognizant of this reality.

At this level of development, one becomes fully-self reflexive in that one is able to fully self examine. One’s own mental processes (meta-cognition) becomes paramount as the evolution of Self come into full awareness.

One begins to develop the qualities of the Buddha and the Christ mind—love, compassion, wisdom, radical and accurate awareness of self, of the world around you, and of Other, although the desire to “change” or “blame” other is not present. The desire to assist others in evolving is. The desire to serve others and be a resource for others is.

While some posit that further distinguishing and putting more and more linguistic “separation” into our experience creates separation and rails against the very I.D.E.A. of attaining non-dual levels of reality, again, while the Buddha mind points at the moon they are focused on his finger, which is doing the pointing, but not the reality and the experience of what he is pointing to. They are, in our popular vernacular, missing the forest for the trees. Why? Because non-duality contains duality. Everythingness and Nothingness contains all. How could it be otherwise?

Part of understanding developmental models is understanding that a being can only truly appreciate a level they have already developed through, beyond, and transcended. A child can not understand the wisdom of their parents until they are old enough to see the truth and positive intention in the direction given by the parents. Someone driven by and mired in their pre-rational emotions can not understand (and will often state it is impossible) having emotional mastery at the trans-rational level. Someone who still feels violence or the law of the jungle is the best way to handle disputes cannot see the value in a codified rule of law, where disputes are handled by an objective party. And the list goes on. At the same time, once someone transcends a certain level of development, they can see and understand both the benefits and limitations of each level. They can begin to think in integrative terms: differentiate, distinguish, transcend, and include.

Now, imagine how someone who has a pre-rational understanding of ego or is stuck at the pre-rational level of ego development experiences a rational ego. They will think this person is arrogant when they are not. Why? Because given the givens, and the same scenario of achievement, the pre=rational ego minded individual would be arrogant. They cannot see how someone else could not, not understanding more developed levels. And often, they will judge the rational person as bad to safeguard their own fragile sense of self. And so on. I could give many more examples (and I imagine I will in the future) and for the sake of brevity, I will not.

Every day we are faced with the choice to live and make choices one of two ways—consciously or unconsciously. The choice is entirely yours, mine, ours, humanity’s. What will you choose?

[What is capitalism? It is not about corporations or about stocks and bonds. While these are certainly outgrowths of it, the essence of it is this: the ability to freely associate for mutual benefit. It is about freedom, self-direction, and personal responsibility. It is not about Enron’s and the Tyco’s. Fraud does not figure into the model. That is why we have civil courts. Fraud fits nicely into them eventually, while (hopefully) integrity sits in the jury box…]

For centuries (millennia really) there have been two endlessly warring factions in society; the Spiritualists and the Materialists. On one side, we have the Spiritualists (whether they claimed God was their higher power, or the State), who have in their various forms and systems, proclaimed material wealth to be “evil” and basically detrimental to the soul.

Opposing them (or trying to ignore them), we have materialists (who may be entrepreneurs, small business owners, independent contractors, or corporate executives) attempting to assert their right to prosperity and a rise in the standard of living for all. Never before had their armor clanged more loudly than in the 1980’s and early 1990’s in the West. Quite frequently, this has shown up as the community vs. the individual; the We against the I. There is no need for this. The We must include the I, otherwise it is a We with significant pathology and illness. A We that cannot last and will be self-defeating unless it embraces and encourages the I.

The problem with this conflict is globally and stunningly evident. People ascribing themselves to most (if not all) spiritual belief systems have to generally ignore the natural human desire to excel in the material world; to evolve to the next highest material level; to achieve. This created, and is continuing to create, an internal conflict within these individuals, robbing them of internal harmony and peace. This is an obvious problem with repercussions ranging violent internal and personal (as well as external and eventually military) conflict.

Individuals exercising rights afforded them in a free-market economy, and their inherent desires, find themselves having to ignore the culturally taught evil-branding of what they are achieving. Or worse, operating at a level which is spiritually dead. The latter is a behavior that has produced such results as the dis-integration of Man and Nature, costing the world its environmental harmony and creating concerns over the stability of the eco-system for future generations. This should be of grave concern for both sides.

*The Integrative Consciousness*

Who is right? Both. And, neither. An integration is necessary to avoid further polarization, societal tensions, and environmental destruction. [more on this in a forthcoming piece on the topic of power and responsibility].

Where this breaks down (and can be integrated in a more whole-sum way) is by taking in the historical contexts that most of the spiritual texts were written in. Most of the spiritual texts we read today were written by people in slavery/bondage/or the inescapable class [or caste] systems. If not written by them, then for them to liberate their minds and spirits when little else could. There is nothing wrong with this. It served a beautiful and clear purpose and was in fact perhaps necessary at the time. 2000 years ago and more it was not possible to generate wealth the way it is today. You could not as easily generate wealth nor with integrity in most areas. You generated wealth by robbing the people or the land, not by innovation or offering services. You made money by levy, taxation, graft, by using slave labor, and by being born onto the right family. While some of these dynamics have not been completely evolved beyond, what is clear is that something new has emerged in the last 200 to 300 years: free enterprise.

While I am certainly not going to echo the “greed is good” speech of Michael Douglas’ character in Wall Street, I will say that the basic human desire to achieve, to better one’s self, and to live comfortably is certainly good. The desire to be compensated with value for value given is not greed: it is justice and balance, which are both “good”. I say they are good because the results they produce are “good”. In my world, anything that uplifts, increases the value of or in, assist or helps is “good”. Anything that infringes on the rights of others, damages property, life, inhibits freedoms, is “bad”. It is a delicate balance to walk, as anytime you limit the freedoms of others, is could be to defend the rights of still others, but there I go digressing again…

It is now possible for anyone of competence and vision to create wealth with integrity–at least in this Country. This…is good. You can live entirely within your own sense of spirituality AND generate wealth and prosperity for yourself and those around you.

The fact is, people possessing enlightened self-interest (which is where you realize that not only do you need to act in your own best interest, but immediately following that, the best interests of those around you–including your community at large) can embrace capitalism and be even more spiritually rich that they possibly could be otherwise. We can acquire wealth by simultaneously being a channel for spirit, or living Christ-like, or possessing the Buddha mind (whichever metaphor you prefer), thereby avoiding the internal and external conflicts I spoke to before.

How does one do this? There are four aspects that are necessary for this to occur.

First, live your life by choice. What this means it to live your life consciously and to choose. Question everything. Why do I want this car? Why do I want to buy this house? Is this necessary? Does it bring me joy? Why? Why do I want that suit of clothes, that man/woman? That job? Why do I eat the foods I do? Do they bring me what they are supposed to? What do I value and why? Am I living consciously, or out of habit and cult-ural training? Often in this first phase, the clearing of negatively charged emotions that block your intuition and color or skew your perceptions is often necessary.

Second, discover your mission or purpose. Why are you here? What can you contribute? What can you offer of value that is unique and uniquely you? Perhaps you have been called by spirit. Perhaps your inherent gift are clear and obvious and you feel no “spirit” is necessary but you have a vision of a better way/life/world/community. You want that vision to come to life–and it can.

Third, access your creativity. Your intuition. Your inspiration. Let your larger Self come out and play—freely and intentionally.

And last, access or acquire an entrepreneurial spirit. That is to say, using the previous 3 stages, and adding to it the possibilities of a free market, how can what you have to offer be of value to others? And hence, find those who would value it and market your services to them with integrity.

It is time for the dawn of a new era. A new epoch. It is time for those with access to spirit to realize the freedom they have, the necessity of their contributions, and to act with integrity and in accordance with that. I pray that new day has already dawned. Let’s awaken to it together.

“We’re one, but we are not the same.”—Bono, U2

Once I was in a train station waiting for a train with a friend. He pointed to a steel and cement column and said, “at the sub-atomic level, this column is mostly air. So are you. So am I…”. And he went on to state we were the same as the column—no difference—and no different from one another. He went on to imply that there was, therefore, no meaning to anything. I stretched my arm out, made a fist, and pushed my fist at the column until it stopped with a thud. I looked at him and I said, “that may be so, AND at the same time, the world we move through is not the sub-atomic world”.

Often we are addressed with reminders, assertions, and at times even pleas, that we are “all one”. We are all human. We are all the same at some level. We all bleed red. At the sub-atomic level, we are all made up of the same stuff. In fact, at the sub-atomic level, at least at our current level of knowledge [see String Theory for an interesting hypothesis about how we may be very different from one another indeed], not only are we all “the same” as beings, we are the same as a rock, dirt, plant life, our dog, the wall, etc.

Eastern Spiritual traditions remind us that at the ultimate level, it is all vibrations, all wavelets. “Validated” by science, at the “ultimate” level, we are all the same—“just” sub-atomic particles.

And yet, anyone with eyes, ears, a tactile sense, and a mind can tell we are all very, very different. I challenge anyone who says that the ultimate level is the only important level (“we are all one”) to Zen his or her way through me the next time we meet.

The problem with this is that most people cannot seem to contain both I.D.E.A.s intellectually, experientially, or spiritually, so then end up ignoring one or the other, or collapsing the informational and the practical. Does our having the same sub-atomic structures mean we are all the same?

Are you “the same” as a murderer? A rapist? A child molester? A terrorist? A priest? A politician? A man? A woman? A tribal leader? A shaman? A grocery clerk? A Fortune 500 CEO? Are you and I “the same” as Mozart, Bill Gates, Socrates, Thomas Jefferson, or Ayn Rand? Of course not.

And, yes.

We have differing sets of skills, intelligence, symmetry, size, shape, and color. And yet…to paraphrase Ken Wilber, “while we are all perfect manifestations of the divine—of Spirit—yet how we demonstrate that is bound by our current level of development; we are limited to our current depth”. Spiritual reductionism [we are all one and we are all perfect and we are all love] is usually accompanied by moral relativism. No act is inherently better than any other act. No world-view is more true than any other—and they are arbitrary.

I disagree.

Setting aside the performative contradiction (if no world-views are any more true than the other, then neither is that world-view—and thus it is false), compassion is better than anger because it possesses greater depth. Love is better than hate for the same reason. Grace is better than vengeance for the same reason—it requires an awareness of greater depth to exercise those choices, therefore, it is better.

Liberty is better than tyranny. Free Enterprise is better that centrally planned economies. In both cases they produce better results. Measurably better. Different beings possess different levels of awareness; different depths that that can reflect back by the development of their own depth. In this, we are very different indeed.

Is there utility in thinking we are all one—all the same? Perhaps. It can assist us in bridging potentially explosive differences in a world where differences in ideology can kill and maim. At the same time, in a world where ideologies can kill and maim, we had better keep the differences in mind as well.

In all things, be discerning, but not judgmental. Keep your mind open—but keep it working. Never allow someone to demand you turn off your common sense for their imagined utopia.