Do you believe a 'you' exists?

18AD wrote: »

Is the body not in control of itself then? Are you your body? Is your body free?

The body is in control of itself, brain functions carry out movement based on decisions in the brain. There is no 'me' or controller. I have completetly eliminated it, I cant even imagine a self now.
This is called 'enlightenment'. I dont like that word as it sounds spiritual but thats what it is. Its when you see reality for the first time not through the perception of self.
My mind is in deep piece now, no ego, no inner chatter, no self, no me, just my body, just clarity, real emotions (good or bad), real thoughts and acceptance of existence.

18AD wrote: »

Personally, I don't think there exists a 'self' in any real sense of the word.

The self is basically an idea you have about your body, mind, memories etc... You piece it all together and think you have a unified whole, but in reality there is no such whole. It is a fiction of the mind. You are free to reinterpret this idea whenever and however you want, within certain limits. It's difficult enough though, through force of habit, because you retain many ideas about yourself unwittingly.

Excellent ,so you have the concept 100% correct, in theory you can acknowledge this, seeing it for the first time is entirely different though but anyone can do it with a bit of work. You can remove the self from your mind. You need to ask where is that self? Can you physically find it? You need to look at a real object like a laptop, observe its realness and physical matter, then go back and find the self. Its just fiction as you say , its an illusion , it doesnt exist in real life.

18AD wrote: »

That said, it is a necessary fiction. Without a unified sense of self you would not be able to function in the world. Regardless of whether you identify this self as a body, mind, consciousness, body-mind etc...

Absolutely untrue, why does you body need some sort of extra controller? I am free from the self, and I am carrying out my normal business as usual, just with true 100% focus, and piece of mind. No distractions, no self interpreting things incorrectly, basically seeing reality for the first time.

A self is an illusion that is a hindrance to humans. Animals dont have this hindrance, maybe zoo monkeys and pet dogs/cats to an extent, but very little overall compare to humans.
Reality is much simpler and clearer without the self. Life is simple without it. You dont look for answers you simply accept existence for what it is. Blissful is a bit of an exaggeration but nice? Yes.

I dont want to come across like a spammer, but heres my blog if your interested. http://theselfisfalse.blogspot.com/
You have the concept down which is good. I cannot even tell this to family because they'll think Ive gone mad.

I am only writing this in philosophy as people here are open minded to the concept and also have not devoted their lives to other beliefs. This argument is harder to get through to Buddhists/spiritualists (I tried) because they belief the self can only be removed from a lifetime of meditation, they think enlightenment takes a life time of work, mine was removed within about 2 and a bit weeks. I had no interest in any of this prior to that.

Ms.Odgeynist wrote: »

Wylo, I'm all for enlightenment but I think you might be getting ahead of your'self' there bud.
If you 'don't have a self' as you so eloquently put it, what prompted you to come on here and blather on about it.
If you have no ego, then why do you have such a selfish need to come on here and declare it to the world.
Without the ego - you are without motive.
Without a sense of self, I'm afraid you would be quite mad.
Without self/ego, whatever you want to call it, then what is pondering these big questions?
Stick with it there my good man,
who knows, maybe another week or two will do it!!
Keep us posted!

My motive is to share this with people because it is very very difficult to keep it yourself, and whats worse is the fact most people dont understand. People in this forum do though, because they are philosophers. There was nothing selfish about it, I just didnt want to come and say "Look at me look at me, im enlightened", bla bla. A fail on my part because thats exactly what I did in the end. Sorry

18AD wrote: »

Yes, but to function as a person.

Could you expand on that? What functions need a self? It is truly engrained in our brains that a self is required to carry out functions, but I truly believe it is not.

Ms.Odgeynist wrote: »

Wylo, I'm all for enlightenment but I think you might be getting ahead of your'self' there bud.
If you 'don't have a self' as you so eloquently put it, what prompted you to come on here and blather on about it.
If you have no ego, then why do you have such a selfish need to come on here and declare it to the world.
Without the ego - you are without motive.
Without a sense of self, I'm afraid you would be quite mad.
Without self/ego, whatever you want to call it, then what is pondering these big questions?
Stick with it there my good man,
who knows, maybe another week or two will do it!!
Keep us posted!

Also, I know you meant that last few lines sarcastically but I will genuinely keep you posted.

I have no sense of self, and I am not quite mad, the brain does not need the self, the self wouldnt exist if humans didnt create it.

Do you know anyone with a fear of spiders? Do you think something is blocking their view of reality ? Why does their brain trigger a feeling of impending death when they see a harmless spider? Because its a fault , something fed into their brain at a young age that created this.

Re: the self, my theory is that words and the way behave creates the sense of self in humans from a young age.
I believe a 6 month old baby has no sense of self.

Boroimhe wrote: »

If you truly believe what you are saying then who is this "I" you refer to, how is it "Your" brian, body e.t.c? How can you feel emotions and how can you define good or bad?

I understand and somewhat agree with the whole we are all the universe buzz but to say that there is no I is just incorrect, the animals live without it because they have no understanding of it. We are all different and hence are individuals.

It just a brain, the brain experiences thoughts, emotions are likewise, there doesnt need to be a me for this to occur.

We are all individual separate bodies/brains/guts/blood etc, no two brains are the same, but this does not mean for a second that the self needs to exist.
Answer this: Where do you think the self is? Actually try and find it, not just say "its me", where is that self , that thought that gives you that sense of self. The harder you look, the more you realise it doesnt exist.

Then if you really keep at it, a shift in perception occurs in pretty much a split second, this is only the start, this is when the clarity begins. After that true deep piece of mind occurs, and even stronger clarity because you start seeing that illusion in other people. It is so deeply engrained that they will do anything to defend it.
I did the same. One of my questions to another guy was
"Why would we even want to reproduce?", "why would you love or care about anyone else?" I have since realised a self is not needed for any of this to occur. Its just part of life.

Bodhisopha wrote: »

So when you get rid of that illusion do you "let yourself go"? Lose interest in things you like, get fat, dress shabbily?

You have my interest. Sell it to me!

absolutely not, the body still wants to take care of itself, the body still wants to attract other humans, I still wash my clothes and exercise, im still trying to work at setting up a business. And its a great point, cause thats exactly what I thought, a sort of "why would you bother if 'you' didnt matter. But the truth is, people seem to think the self is what makes you human. Im saying its an unnecessary hindrance.
I will admit though that for me personally there was a slight zap in motivation because when you live in the moment other things stop being important.
It didnt actually stop me from doing stuff, I just didnt think about it, I just did it, and was 100% focused when doing it.

The ego , the messy one, the one that makes you care about stupid things that are not important, the one that makes you feel awkward silences, the one that creates pointless inhibitions like not asking someone something that you want to, the one that keeps you trying to argue your point even though you know you've lost, the one that skews your view of how things really are, that ego is the self I talk about, when you drop this things become simpler and more obvious.

Dropping this does NOT mean dropping compassion, emotions, sadness, anger, you are still a human being, and behave like one, you just become more chilled out, because stupid things arent important, you family friends and comfort it important.
So on that note, yes to an extent you must be careful you dont zen out on a mountain or something, you must keep engaging in life. Because otherwise you will just become isolated and presumed crazy. No human or animal wants that.

NOTHING here costs a penny, just in case there's sceptics that may think im trying to sneakily do some advertising or something...

I post on a forum called Uncommon Knowledge , its a psychology forum, I always had a mild interest. Now this was NOTHING to do with no self or anything. It was to do with me trying to learn about confidence and self esteem and all that kind of stuff.
A guy started a thread saying he felt an "in sync" feeling in life, someone replied explaining that it may have been a glimpse of enlightenment. I really hate that word because of its associations but thats what it is. I was extremely interested, and he began to present the very arguments that I did above, he then encouraged me to go to his blog and do the experiments:
http://ghostvirus2011.blogspot.com/

If you go to the top of the blog you'll see exp. 1 exp 2 etc, its worth going through his blog as well, FAQs etc,

I then began reading through a site called Ruthless Truth, a site created by a philosopher who figured out that enlightenment is not about meditating for 25 years , and going on retreats to Tibet, he figured that you can lose the self with aggressive questioning, and it can happen very quickly, he showed others and they now "liberate" people online. You see, if the word "enlightenment" wasnt used this whole thing wouldn't sound as extreme, the word is correct but I hate it because people think of it as some sort of higher conciousness. Its just seeing things the way they are that's all. Its just accepting existence for what it is, as oppose to seeing it through the lens of the self.

Please please please dont lose interest or get too insulted if they are rude to you, or too aggressive, or almost stubborn sounding. Or dont be put off if they are asking you very basic short questions, they are just forcing you to look at reality.
heres the link.http://www.ruthlesstruth.com/arena/viewforum.php?f=3
Some people may have reservations about the site, maybe a bit childish, a bit juvenile? You know what , these guys know what they're doing and its free. So you honestly have nothing to lose (well maybe the self ). So if you feel reluctant just say to yourself, "ah feck it ill give it a go". No ones gonna know, and it may fail as well, only YOU can do it, they just hold your hand while doing it.

Right so I started posting, heres the thread where I became liberated if anyones interested. I started that thread after doing all the experiments outlined above, also after reading a free ebook called Brutal Beginnings.
http://www.ruthlesstruth.com/arena/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1001

Brutal Beginnings is pretty much a copy and paste of liberations (cant think of a better word, im open to suggestions). Its inspiring, cause you get to see the whats going on in the minds of people as they are going through the process, so have a look for it on the site, or even google should get it for you, actually here it is...http://www.mediafire.com/?73x9ap155nh20ey


Well I think thats about it, after 2 weeks of hard looking, trying everything, trying to pretend there was no self, trying to look at physical obects and recognise how real they were, trying to find the self, experiencing huge discomfort because the self was fighting the "battle". Remember you are challenging a lifetime of beliefs. But eventually it just clicked while I was fixing my grandads computer, at aroung 6pm april 16th, I looked at the couch, and was slightly overwhelmed at how real it was , i chuckled a bit, I looked back for that self, and it was genuinely gone. I couldnt even imagine it. Everything was REALLY clear, not physically, everything looked the same, but things seem really clear now, and empty mind, its almost like your field of vision has widened even though you are not actually seeing anymore than anyone else. That cant be described in words tbh. Its just clarity or the truth. (ok I know that stuff sounds offputting but thats all I can say there)

The analogy i like to use is this. You know when your chatting to someone outside and theres something annoying in the distance (sound wise) but your not quite sure what it is, your not even consciously thinking about it, but then all the sudden a car alarm down the road STOPS. You say "Jesus that was annoying", yet you barely noticed it till it stopped. Well the car alarm in this case is the self, the inner chatter, the wrong way you perceive reality. It all simply stops, and its a subtle feeling of "oh right, is that it?" , you are then seeing things the way they really are after that.



Remember , im not asking you to believe anything, im asking you to not believe something.

Alot of atheists are proud and almost smug with their comments of no God. They talk about "no proof , its all nonsense", well its funny because all these same people believe something that there is no proof of, the self.
Its just a belief, like people 1000s of years believed that a solar eclipse was some sort of message from the Gods.

Heres my theory, once humans figure out more about the brain, and once they see real proof that the self is just an unnecessary detrimental thought they will be able to remove it with some procedure (no idea what), I then believe every human will be "enlightened" , and they will look back at us and say "I cannot believe that they lived with that lie", just like we do with people 1000s of years ago with other beliefs.

But your also after helping me and pointing something out to me, im selling this wrongly. I am not going to talk about that particular stuff anymore because its the only thing you seem to hone in on. And as Ive said a few times, enlightenment does not cure your problems.
What Im talking about is true deep emptiness in the mind and living in the moment, it is pleasant.

Little example, a friend recently talked moaningly about turning 30, they are 29 now, but they wont be turning 30 for another 6 months. My way of thinking now is "Wow that is so fckin far away from now why would he even consider that" The old me would have said 6 months is pretty close to 30.

Ok , ill answer your questions no bother, but I just gotta let you know what you are doing right now is completely avoiding the subject, and that is the existence of the self. You are not looking, you are not trying to question the self, you are purposely distracting yourself from it. It is a belief thats so deeply engrained that you will do anything to justify its existence. Because the very thought of no self is one fckin scary thought. Thats why people say you need a few things to become "liberated".

Honesty: have an honest look at yourself and reality , and truly ask does the self really actually exist.

Balls (this is the big one): Can you actually face the fact that its fake? You've even admitted to me that you think the concept is correct yet you are still arguing and trying to justify the self.

Open mindedness: Agreeing with the concept, this one isnt hard to find on forums like philosophy and spiritual.

strobe wrote: »

But an 'unliberated' person may not think "why is he worrying it is so far away" they might think "why is he worrying at all" and the reason they think that could be exactly because of a belief that ageing is a chance to improve the self, which they believe does exist. So in that instance being 'unliberated' could potentially be seen as being better than being 'liberated', right?

Ok ill tell you now that I WAS one of those people, I used give out to people because they moaned about getting old. I used say "Jesus, when your 60 you'll be wanting to be 40", anyway back to the point, your saying that the unliberated person will improve himself based on the fact that he sees ageing as an opportunity rather than a crisis. Fair enough, but a liberated person will not even think like that. They will just want to improve themselves because it is good for life, it is good for your body, you feel better, you learn or know more, whatever the improvement is. Age isnt even relevant . Thats why I thought "6 months is far away", cause I was living in the moment and concentrating on the now, which is not a distraction for improving the life.

strobe wrote: »

That's very presumptuous of you. I'm not trying to justify anything. I don't find the thought of there being no self scary. I find it blasé if anything.

fair enough, if its blasé to you then its gonna be difficult for me to debate.

strobe wrote: »

Again I'm not trying to justify anything. I'm just questioning your claims that someone accepting that there is no self as you understand the word will be of benefit or that someone identifying with a self is detrimental.

Supposed there was nothing on offer, suppose I told you that the only difference between believing a self and not believing a self ,is that with no self you see reality properly. You SEE that there is no self, But suppose I told you that you wont feel any better, everything will be the same. Are you content with that just living with the self even though you know its possible to see reality without it? If so then thats grand, I wouldn't be content with that personally.

strobe wrote: »

From the same philosopher of the last quote you liked that I posted;
"The trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will insist on coming along and trying to put things in it."

He strikes again, another nice quote, cant argue with it, but at least an open minded person is able to see the difference between the nonsense and the good stuff. Its up to you to decide which one im speaking.

18AD wrote: »

Hmm, the conversation has been fruitful since I last checked in. I'll stick with this.

Any sort of ownership requires a concept of self. It's only a concept though. If you don't accept that, then I will gladly take all the things you own off you, because they're not yours.

I think ill keep my stuff thanks:D, this is an example of the belief that a self is required for someone to be human. The stuff in my room belongs to me, this body, this body earned it. Do you think a dog is happy to give away his bone just because he does not believe in a self? Its not far off, its his possesion, hes not going to give it away. There is no higher energy or spirit or soul saying 'this is mine', its just a dog wanting his bone that he owns. What Im trying to say is , that no self does not mean not being a human being.

18AD wrote: »

You also must have a concept of self in relation to your life story. If you tell me about yourself from when you were born up until now you will tell me a story. This story is your self concept. Again, it is only a concept. But without it you would not exist as you do right now.

If I tell you a story of my life I will be telling you everything that happened to this body as it grew up, there doesnt need to be a 'me', yes the word is handy because it identifies this body from your body or someone elses body but again there is no higher energy or controller that experienced it, just the brain. I went for a run the other day, my brain triggered signals to move my legs , there was no self controlling this. it was just happening. Try walking around yourself there and see is there honestly a 'you' deciding how you legs are going to move? Is there honestly a 'you' controlling that movement? Then tell the story of that 'walk around', and question was there really need for a 'you' to be in that story? Is it plausible to say that perhaps it was just your body doing that stuff?

18AD wrote: »

Also, I am highly suspicious of this 'living in the now' thinking.
It is impossible to live completely in the now. You always contextualise your experience with expectations and memories of what is past. Otherwise you could not function at all. Animals also have this, on a somewhat more basic level. When you go outside you expect that things will go a certain way and the floor hasn't turned to lava. These are implicite expectations. You are not fully aware of them, but they are there.

To see pure 'living in the now', have a look at some cases of extreme amnesia. It is a hugely distressing illness, as there is no continuity of experience.

The past and the future are what make a 'now' possible in the first place.

Ok here you got me, when I say living in the now, living in the moment, I dont mean it in a literal 100% 'not think of ANYTHING else', my brain still predicts events, my brain is thinking that I have a meeting next tuesday.
The difference is there is no self dwelling on it, no feedback loop of thoughts, or thinking more about it than what it simply is, which is a meeting next tuesday, and as a result of that I dont worry about it, or even the opposite, I dont say "ooh I cant wait for this meeting, its gonna go great".
This does not mean emotions get "neutered" btw, if anything emotions are more raw and clear with no self. Even anger is somewhat liberating. Not that Im angry person in general anyway, but if I was Id feel it more naturally. Im still the same person I was, its just a shift in perception that happens.

18AD wrote: »

Also, to expand on what I said "But wasn't your body just always in control of that self anyway? You just didn't know it yet."

Yes, your body was always in control. Before you were enlightened and now that you are enlightened. Your body doesn't really care if it's enlightened or not because it's always just in control and doing its thing.

I guess I agree with you a bit here, but im a still a little confused , .
My body doesnt really care, yes thats true, my brain feels free-er though so I would imagine this no self thing has been a relaxant somewhere in the brain, literally, as in less thoughts. So the only way I can say it is, the brain is content with no self. But even that doest make too much sense tbh.
Sorry I probably didnt really address what your saying there.

18AD wrote: »

I'm pretty sure the enlightenment you are talking about and that of Buddhism or Thelema or whatever religion are different. Not that yours is not enlightenment, but just to be aware of the different usages.

Interesting, someone ( who has been 'enlightened' about 4 months made a point to me recently )
Buddhists , Thelema enlightenment is the opposite to the way we did it. Basically pointing out that they spend their whole lives defusing beliefs theoretically and then eventually after years they see no self, that is true enlightenment. Whereas we see no self immediately but still have alot of beliefs to defuse. But it is said that these beliefs defuse very quickly with no self, i.e. months. So I think in one year I may come back with even deeper truer clearer enlightenment. And maybe then this will match up to the type of enlightenment you talk about (like its a competition lol )

18AD wrote: »

I'd like to add an extra point here. I totally agree with you that there is no guiding ego or 'you' when you are engagin in activities of this nature. That is not the appropriate time to be in that state of mind. But as I mentioned in my last post, there is another state of mind, a unifying 'you-ness' that keeps your sense of self unified as an individual. Without it there would be no continuity in your life.

There is a time for the ego and a time for the egoless.

the way ive been thought to address this is the use of the character, i.e. engaging in life with the fake 'you'. The fake ego, that actor. Im not saying that I force myself to live a lie just to do things in life, but your right, there is a time when you should switch on the 'ego'.

johnthemull wrote: »

Yes I do believe a you exists. Do you believe you exists?

no, thats what this whole thread is about:)