streams.of.egoism

*Image adapted from Google Images*

Egoism is something which hold hostage of the life through locking it up in a so-called ‘abstract barred enclosure’. These enclosures are brought together with expectations, which are backed by trepidation or insecurity. These expectations come together to create a concept whereby a ‘label’ assigns a role for these expectation to play in our environment.

Fascinatingly enough, placing ‘other’ in these ‘abstract’ enclosures allow ego to attain sense of distinctiveness. We commonly recognize and generalize incorrect doings with words such as wrong, while the egoism under certain circumstances in us cautiously labels it as ‘right’. It is through this very process of conceptualization that ego attains an ‘identification card’. If it were not for these labels, ego would have no idea as to whether it were approaching or leaving. In view of the fact that our very identity is banking on the constant preservation of these ‘enclosures’, there is a vast amount of time and energy dealt in investing these conceptual thoughts.

Many a time we unknowingly know how to correlate problems by observing and comparing it to the environment in our daily lives. A fan is one of the many examples, taken. When a fan is turned off or spinning at a slow rate, it is clear that there are three individual blades. The faster the fan spins, the more ‘rigid’ the blades appear to be. The three blades are going so fast that, eventually, they seem to have a disk-like appearance. This resemblance can be implied to our thoughts. When the mind is calm and at ease we can ‘see’ thought for what it is. Conversely, things appear to be more and more rigid when we use more and more energy in thinking. The reason is that; energy which is being endowed in thought is thought. Hence, after a certain period of time, the stream of thought becomes ‘flooded’ and it seems as though mind is a steady stream of thought when it is actually not what it is. In short, we call it mental barrier. Once the stream of thoughts ‘solidifies’, we inevitably mistake the map for the territory and...we begin to relate with thought asthough it were reality.

To say that we have misguided thought for reality is to say that what we think about events takes precedence over fundamental experience. Life as it is takes the back seat to our interpretations on life. Unfortunately, these interpretations are perforated with imperfections and flaws. The concepts we use to delineate the diverse aspects of impermanence are little more than an attempt to ascribe undeviating traits to impermanent events.



Ps : There is a slight degree of curiosity as to how life is nothing more than a continuous stream of evolution, but the notions which we attributed to it look as if it is to go along and unchanged for a significant period of time.