T23 - Illusions - C 6 and 7

I've re-read the book many times and had many interesting thoughts while reading. Regarding memories and the themes in the story (if I recall correctly, ideas about memories came up in chapters 6 and 7) I think that one idea of what or who we think we are is that our individuality, personality and identity is composed of memories. You can verify this for yourself with some in‑depth thinking. Memories are notoriously inaccurate, incomplete and even non‑existent for experiences we know we've had. Our memories are illusions. Who we are is illusion(s). If this is all we are then we don't really exist. If we are also spirit or soul as many people like to believe, we know of these other elements of our beings only through our memories of what we've been told or, if we're a practiced spiritual person, through our intuitive sensations. At the very moment we experience the intuitive sensation we can know something (to be true) however a fraction of a second later it becomes a memory. If we continue living in the intuitive sensation, called 'being in the moment,' we can have direct experience of reality. This experience is without ego of course because it takes time, even if only thousandths of a second, for ego, which is reflective, observational and judgmental, to operate. When we are in this intuitive sensation we as individuals, personalities, identities (egos), don't exist because we are without ego, absorptive, non‑reflective. So, any way we look at it we don't really exist at all. What we consider to be 'us,' our individuality, our personality, our identity, is illusions. The old philosophical adage 'I think therefore I am' is completely wrong. So, if we don't really exist why do we take ourselves so seriously? As though we are important. Why do we consider our thoughts and feelings important or meaningful? Because we love our illusions. They make us feel real, at least in the sense that we identify with our cultures and what we've been told is true all our lives. We also understand unconsciously or intuitively that beyond them is nothing, no‑thing, and this puzzles us or makes us (egos) fearful. This creates anxiety, the causes of which we find very difficult to confront. This existential angst, floating anxiety, fear of death, whether physical or spiritual, however, gets our attention and we focus on it seriously as though we can influence the outcome(s). We're trying to relieve ourselves of that (no‑thingness or ego-less awareness) which itself is relief from our concerns, fears, etc. We are then immersed in Maya, our world of the continuous cyclings of concerns and illusions. By repeated involvement over time, habit, we are addicted and blinded to any possibility of resolution or escape from this cycling. As you are reading this you are having the sensation of cycling. This is your life.

This is what I call 'The Illusion Of Personality.'

Everything has many layers. How do we get to the bottom line (foundation, base, ground)? According to Gableplunk meditation is the path to follow for release. I think that's true at least in our lifetimes.

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What if there's another possibility for memory, that of memory being located outside of us, outside of our bodies, our nervous systems? This is a theory of occultists of various disciplines which claim that we 'receive' our memories from this outside place in a similar manner as does a radio or television, by radio waves, and in the case of our memories, by psychic waves. I don't know how accurately I've described the method of this kind of receipt of our memories but the idea of our memories being located somewhere other than inside of us, in our brains or nervous systems, seems like it might be worth an examination.

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How do we make personal changes in light of the 'Illusion Of Personality?'

Observing ourselves we notice through self awareness that our identities must be capable of monitoring our feelings and behaviors and directing us to (hopefully) better behaviors and feelings which create better memories which create (hopefully) better feelings and behaviors.

So, through our identities, which are illusions, we create more mnemonic illusions but (hopefully) better ones, more mature ones based on monitored and directed experiences. Thus, as we observe ourselves through self awareness, we seem to change.

Illusions can be self-generating, reproductive, replicative, self-perpetuating. Are our illusions real? As real as, say, birds or germs? How do they get into us? Are identities necessary for illusions to procreate? Are we inseparable?

Ultimately illusions are the products of nervous systems. Without nerves we could not feel anything. Feelings are the body's reactions to memories. Without nerves we could not have memories or perceive them if we receive them from outside us. So, illusions are bound to our physical bodies, our biologies, as are our minds, our psychologies. Our minds are memories. Our memories are illusions, so, yes, we are inseparable.

If 'I think therefore I am' is incorrect then what might be correct is 'I SENSE therefore I am.' In this case, what is it that senses? Our nervous system. Are we merely our nervous system? The answer is, yes.

This thinking goes round and round. Maya, the cycle of illusions. When your mind is cycling you're experiencing an illusion. Meditation is release, at least temporarily: our best change.

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I try to make this analysis concrete but it's impossible because of the nature of language which is metaphoric and vague. Mathematics would be a better tool for this. Physicists and Mathematicians do analyze illusions, however, they present their findings/thoughts in a language that only one out of a hundred thousand of us can read.

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Illusions, delusions, schmillusions. It's not illusions that screw up your life. It's expectations. Keep your expectations in perspective and life flows smoothly. Knock them a little out of kilter and life can turn hellish.