Bit Of A Journey

[TimeWatch]

The last time I posted here I was running a campaign to try and protect ancient sites, to be honest I had no idea about most of the conversations here and was pretty distrustful of a lot of stuff that was said.

I then dropped off the map, a few things happened to me, My campaign ended with a planning decision, my wife left me and I chose suicide then inadvertently collapsed my ego. That's what I call it - in the process of deciding to kill self, I asked the question "What is self?" and with that I remembered that the self I was, was actually a bunch of learnt behaviours - I'd picked up the habit of copying others in order to present to the world the "Self" I thought they wanted to see, not my true self at all - Who or what my true self was I had no idea, it was long forgotten as for quite some time I'd assumed the self I displayed to the world was me. But it wasn't.

So that's how my bid for suicide turned into a search for self, I was wondering if anyone else has experienced this collapse of ego. It's also what I call the beginning for being "Born Again". Not in the religious sense but rather in the sense of having discarded all concepts of self with theopportunity to begin again.

 

[GNC]

Do you mean like "hitting rock bottom", as they say, then realising the only way was up from there? Consider yourself lucky that you were able to experience an epiphany that helped you improve. Are you a more spiritual person, or do you regard the world as more precious now, and your place in it, that sort of thing? I can understand why a dreadful experience can shake up the old ego, yes.

 

[PeteS]

I can relate to TW's experience in some ways. Like many on here I've had a handful of traumas in my life. The best experience turned round into one of the worst of my life and the whole actually changed my entire view of my standing in the world. Not more spiritual , but certainly different, and not only me but others have benefited from it.

 

[Ringo]

@TimeWatch If you haven't already checked it out then you should have a look at Russel Brands social media stuff and his podcasts "Under the Skin". And this podcast with Joe Rogan is amazing.

He is fascinated and some would say obsessed with this very idea. That the self is a false construct and that we deny our true selves - all the while being manipulated by the media and commerce.

Forget his comedy stuff and films - he is a great orator when it comes to the workings of the mind. His new tour/book is called "Re:birth" and is about being true about who you really are and accepting that.

His book (about Receovery from addiction) is also about breaking down the self and accepting the reality of your situation. Here's a quick vid outlining his 12 steps. (Not really applicable to you but a still good).

 

[escargot]

The last time I posted here I was running a campaign to try and protect ancient sites, to be honest I had no idea about most of the conversations here and was pretty distrustful of a lot of stuff that was said.

I then dropped off the map, a few things happened to me, My campaign ended with a planning decision, my wife left me and I chose suicide then inadvertently collapsed my ego. That's what I call it - in the process of deciding to kill self, I asked the question "What is self?" and with that I remembered that the self I was, was actually a bunch of learnt behaviours - I'd picked up the habit of copying others in order to present to the world the "Self" I thought they wanted to see, not my true self at all - Who or what my true self was I had no idea, it was long forgotten as for quite some time I'd assumed the self I displayed to the world was me. But it wasn't.

So that's how my bid for suicide turned into a search for self, I was wondering if anyone else has experienced this collapse of ego. It's also what I call the beginning for being "Born Again". Not in the religious sense but rather in the sense of having discarded all concepts of self with theopportunity to begin again.

We're glad you're still here, and that you're back here especially! Stick with us.

You speak sense. What you say rings a bell with me, too.

The worst experience of my life changed me in ways I'd never have expected.

To put it simply, as you know, you find out what really matters. Owning nice things or looking attractive or having money in the bank are irrelevant. People show their souls by their actions. What they own or how they look don't matter.

Having never been materialistic or, I hope, vain, I now find myself sceptical to the point of cynicism, especially about the value of what money can buy.

This is what to do: surrender the ego. Be what you are, not what others want you to be.
Humility comes into it too; you've nothing to prove. Failure doesn't matter compared to the massive success of surviving (however grudgingly) that awful trauma.

This isn't something I've come up with, although I learned it the hard way. Can't see myself changing any time soon.

 

[mrs_mose]

Long time lurker here - I know exactly what you mean TW about being born again. I had cancer about 4 years ago, and it really made me look at my life and the decisions I was making. I would say that I am now a better person, its just a shame you have to hit that "rock bottom" in order to appreciate everything and to be able to say "f it, I will be my true self", and if people don't like it then you don't need them in your life.

 

[Amoradala]

It’s well referenced in Psychology, that many people experience a “story arc” similar to many of the great hero myths, legends and religions.

Joseph Campbell in his book “Hero with a thousand faces” would have described your experience as being in “the belly of the whale” (think the story of Jonah or even Pinocchio).

Psychologist Jordan Peterson (also on Youtube) talks often about how ‘life's meaning’, is overcoming the struggles that we will all encounter and the lessons we take forward to becoming stronger and rounded individuals.

 

[TimeWatch]

Thanks for the responses, it's good to know I'm amongst friends.

The first response asked if I was more spiritual and the next part of my journey explains that:

A few days after I had become born again, I went to bed at the normal time and bang! I found myself in the most relaxed state, viewing at amazing scene, with a running commentary in my mind, this was what I can only describe as a full-on vision - it went on for hours so it's pretty hard to summarise but I found myself partaking in a spiritual training course - explaining about aspects of how reality is constructed.

This was all pretty new to me, up till then I'd had no interest in spiritual matters and had shy'd away from educating myself about it.

Now the question is? Was this a real vision or was it an elaborate dream? A rather startling figment of my imagination or something more telling?

I mean they told me things, stuff I'd struggle to imagine as real, but then again I'm into my science fiction.

It really made an imprint on me I can tell you. It totally changed my outlook, that was where the real journey began.

An explanation that I had for this vision was to do with truth. The idea is that there is a mystical energy, some call it love, which flows through a path of truth. Truth, is all to do with self. True self, is the only expression of truth that we are capable of, it is at the heart of our own divinity. That act that I did, that stripped away my ego removed all of the obstacles to the flow of truth in me and in that flow of divine light I was able to establish that connection to the otherside. There's another thought that also I was lead there - that divine intervention - manipulation if you like, had caused that exact set of circumstances to allow me to see the vision.

So I kind of had a double whammy - the realisation that the was a self to explore and also that there was a lot more to existence than I had previously allowed myself to explore.

That was over ten years ago, my exploration into self took me far, I found that the search for true self either takes you to enlightenment or madness. Depends on your take on things.

 

[TimeWatch]

@TimeWatch If you haven't already checked it out then you should have a look at Russel Brands social media stuff and his podcasts "Under the Skin". And this podcast with Joe Rogan is amazing.

He is fascinated and some would say obsessed with this very idea. That the self is a false construct and that we deny our true selves - all the while being manipulated by the media and commerce.

Forget his comedy stuff and films - he is a great orator when it comes to the workings of the mind. His new tour/book is called "Re:birth" and is about being true about who you really are and accepting that.

His book (about Receovery from addiction) is also about breaking down the self and accepting the reality of your situation. Here's a quick vid outlining his 12 steps. (Not really applicable to you but a still good).

Yes really like him

 

[TimeWatch]

Do you mean like "hitting rock bottom", as they say, then realising the only way was up from there? Consider yourself lucky that you were able to experience an epiphany that helped you improve. Are you a more spiritual person, or do you regard the world as more precious now, and your place in it, that sort of thing? I can understand why a dreadful experience can shake up the old ego, yes.

I've actually hit several deeper rock bottoms since, experience tells me that the first is the best but also that you don't have to hit rock bottom to collapse you ego, it just that so few seem to work that out. It's a big secret in society but society needs it's secrets I suppose.

 

[TimeWatch]

I can relate to TW's experience in some ways. Like many on here I've had a handful of traumas in my life. The best experience turned round into one of the worst of my life and the whole actually changed my entire view of my standing in the world. Not more spiritual , but certainly different, and not only me but others have benefited from it.

Yep I reckon cancer would do it for you, what I found was once I was accepting of death, that's when it became easier for the ego to fall away, it's like that particular moment is when the true self is first revealed.

 

[TimeWatch]

It’s well referenced in Psychology, that many people experience a “story arc” similar to many of the great hero myths, legends and religions.

Joseph Campbell in his book “Hero with a thousand faces” would have described your experience as being in “the belly of the whale” (think the story of Jonah or even Pinocchio).

Psychologist Jordan Peterson (also on Youtube) talks often about how ‘life's meaning’, is overcoming the struggles that we will all encounter and the lessons we take forward to becoming stronger and rounded individuals.

That probably decribes my journey to a tee - I created my own myth through the exploration of self. It's was often straight out of a heroic adventure.

 

[Schrodinger's Zebra]

The last time I posted here I was running a campaign to try and protect ancient sites, to be honest I had no idea about most of the conversations here and was pretty distrustful of a lot of stuff that was said.

I then dropped off the map, a few things happened to me, My campaign ended with a planning decision, my wife left me and I chose suicide then inadvertently collapsed my ego. That's what I call it - in the process of deciding to kill self, I asked the question "What is self?" and with that I remembered that the self I was, was actually a bunch of learnt behaviours - I'd picked up the habit of copying others in order to present to the world the "Self" I thought they wanted to see, not my true self at all - Who or what my true self was I had no idea, it was long forgotten as for quite some time I'd assumed the self I displayed to the world was me. But it wasn't.

So that's how my bid for suicide turned into a search for self, I was wondering if anyone else has experienced this collapse of ego. It's also what I call the beginning for being "Born Again". Not in the religious sense but rather in the sense of having discarded all concepts of self with theopportunity to begin again.

Fascinating, and it's good that you're here (in both senses of the word).

I can relate to what you said about copying others to present to the world what they wanted to see - I've done that throughout my life, most likely as a consequence of being extremely shy and somewhat socially awkward and thus not having the confidence to be myself.

This was made worse in recent years by a job that required me to work with a bunch of people who were highly critical of anyone who didn't think and act the way they did (talk about sheep), and by the end I was extremely downtrodden in that place to the point that when I left, I had pretty much zero confidence in myself or my abilities. Thankfully I'm in a much better job now where people actually value my skills and don't treat me like I'm stupid, and I am finding, now that the confidence issues are slowly going away (it's taken a very long time) that I'm beginning to be the real me, still shy and still just as socially awkward (and with the addition of anxiety and ocd), but strangely not having to hide it anymore. I don't even have to hide my slight ocd. They just accept me as I am.

We're glad you're still here, and that you're back here especially! Stick with us.

You speak sense. What you say rings a bell with me, too.

The worst experience of my life changed me in ways I'd never have expected.

To put it simply, as you know, you find out what really matters. Owning nice things or looking attractive or having money in the bank are irrelevant. People show their souls by their actions. What they own or how they look don't matter.

Having never been materialistic or, I hope, vain, I now find myself sceptical to the point of cynicism, especially about the value of what money can buy.

This is what to do: surrender the ego. Be what you are, not what others want you to be.
Humility comes into it too; you've nothing to prove. Failure doesn't matter compared to the massive success of surviving (however grudgingly) that awful trauma.

This isn't something I've come up with, although I learned it the hard way. Can't see myself changing any time soon.

When we were in our 20s, Mr Zebra and I would worry somewhat about our social image, i.e. whether we had a good enough house and car, as that's what all the people around us, our workmates etc., were bothered about - and in order to fit in we felt that we had to make that good impression too. We'd worked our way up the housing ladder and had finally found a place where we were happy, along with the job we'd been in for many years.

But then, to quote a certain James May, "Everything in the future shattered like the mishandled Christmas bauble that the future turns out to be." And we found ourselves without jobs and having to sell our beloved home, move some distance from where we'd been, get new jobs and start again, pretty much from scratch.

And I guess then is when we began to realise that all that stuff really didn't matter - all that mattered was being together, and we realised that as long as we had that, we'd be ok. So we no longer worry about how old our car is, or whether we have the latest mobile phone or any of that unimportant stuff. And of course as many of you know, we currently have a lot more to worry about than that.

So I don't know that we've surrendered our egos as such, but I would say that we have stripped away some of the layers enclosing them.

 

[Coal]

But then, to quote a certain James May, "Everything in the future shattered like the mishandled Christmas bauble that the future turns out to be." And we found ourselves without jobs and having to sell our beloved home, move some distance from where we'd been, get new jobs and start again, pretty much from scratch.

And I guess then is when we began to realise that all that stuff really didn't matter - all that mattered was being together, and we realised that as long as we had that, we'd be ok. So we no longer worry about how old our car is, or whether we have the latest mobile phone or any of that unimportant stuff. And of course as many of you know, we currently have a lot more to worry about than that.

I think that's a common thing. We start our lives doing what we think matters and what we think society expects, we wash our car on Sundays and keep up with the Jones'. At some point, some of us realise that this only matters to those who think it matters...and that's not nearly as many people as you think it might be...and hardly any of those folk's opinion really matters.

It's a healthy thing to realise, because it start you down the path of putting your life into the order you want it to be. I've changed tack a few times in my life and at each point there been the Sunday car-washers telling me it wasn't a good idea or it would be better if I didn't. Sure. Thing is, it keeps working out OK.

 

[AnonyJ]

For some people it's a single shattering trauma, for others it's a series of smaller events but they always seem to lead to the same humble truth:

We need very little, the 'wants' can mostly be ignored and our real selves are vulnerable, humble and giving. Giving yourself permission to live simply and gratefully is very liberating. Accept whatever experiences come your way - visions, personal encounters, painful and damaging events.

I've recently become much more disabled than before, and yes there is a part of me that's grumbling and swearing and feeling sorry for myself. But bad stuff happens to all kinds of people and there is a part of me saying "Why NOT me?"

Being open to a different kind of living does mean finding friends and kindred spirits in all sorts of unlikely places.

I've been cultivating a personal philosophy of gratitude for several years. It starts with simply being grateful for being alive on any given day.

https://www.becomingminimalist.com/thanks-for-gratitude/

 

[TimeWatch]

Yep there's definitely layers to the ego, a lot of them we need in order to survive. As I see it ego includes a whole bunch of learnt behaviours that amount to a toolkit for survival - if we had to take the time to think about how we react to events then most often we would be too slow. Ego is simply part of our enhanced survival tool kit - allowing us to plan and automate responses. The danger is where you lose sight of that process - when you forget that you are just playing out inputs that you have seen elsewhere, that way you do indeed become a sheep - playing out your responses without really knowing why.

What I found is that this process of learning from your environment is ongoing and easy to lose track of, so it's very healthy to add a check to your responses - "Do I really want to do this?" and also to regularly challenge yourself in terms of those behaviours you have learnt and if they really suit you.

 

[Amoradala]

Absolutely.
I learned that, the many automatic unconscious behaviors and thought patterns become our comfort zone.
When we step outside of or challenge these patterns we feel uncomfortable and naturally feel safer sticking to what we always do - “it’s just the way we are” - “it’s in our nature”

But when we know we have to change we accept the discomfort and repattern until the new behaviors become the new comfort zone.
To go back to previous behaviors and actions would now be uncomfortable.

To learn the power of self awareness, recognition of comfort zones and the power of repetition and routine to reprogram is incredibly powerful.

 

[Coal]

Yep there's definitely layers to the ego, a lot of them we need in order to survive. As I see it ego includes a whole bunch of learnt behaviours that amount to a toolkit for survival - if we had to take the time to think about how we react to events then most often we would be too slow. Ego is simply part of our enhanced survival tool kit - allowing us to plan and automate responses. The danger is where you lose sight of that process - when you forget that you are just playing out inputs that you have seen elsewhere, that way you do indeed become a sheep - playing out your responses without really knowing why.

What I found is that this process of learning from your environment is ongoing and easy to lose track of, so it's very healthy to add a check to your responses - "Do I really want to do this?" and also to regularly challenge yourself in terms of those behaviours you have learnt and if they really suit you.

I think that's right - many of our response are based on previous responses to superficially similar situations or peer-learned behaviour from times previous - which is a fine cognitive shortcut, but it never hurts to query one's first response or to work out what you really want to do.

Or, to put it another way, one needs to occasionally (or more often) overwrite/ignore the current program and execute new instructions.

Apart from anything else, even though people haven't changed for millennia, the world has.

 

[PeteS]

Fascinating, and it's good that you're here (in both senses of the word).

I can relate to what you said about copying others to present to the world what they wanted to see - I've done that throughout my life, most likely as a consequence of being extremely shy and somewhat socially awkward and thus not having the confidence to be myself.

This was made worse in recent years by a job that required me to work with a bunch of people who were highly critical of anyone who didn't think and act the way they did (talk about sheep), and by the end I was extremely downtrodden in that place to the point that when I left, I had pretty much zero confidence in myself or my abilities. Thankfully I'm in a much better job now where people actually value my skills and don't treat me like I'm stupid, and I am finding, now that the confidence issues are slowly going away (it's taken a very long time) that I'm beginning to be the real me, still shy and still just as socially awkward (and with the addition of anxiety and ocd), but strangely not having to hide it anymore. I don't even have to hide my slight ocd. They just accept me as I am.




When we were in our 20s, Mr Zebra and I would worry somewhat about our social image, i.e. whether we had a good enough house and car, as that's what all the people around us, our workmates etc., were bothered about - and in order to fit in we felt that we had to make that good impression too. We'd worked our way up the housing ladder and had finally found a place where we were happy, along with the job we'd been in for many years.

But then, to quote a certain James May, "Everything in the future shattered like the mishandled Christmas bauble that the future turns out to be." And we found ourselves without jobs and having to sell our beloved home, move some distance from where we'd been, get new jobs and start again, pretty much from scratch.

And I guess then is when we began to realise that all that stuff really didn't matter - all that mattered was being together, and we realised that as long as we had that, we'd be ok. So we no longer worry about how old our car is, or whether we have the latest mobile phone or any of that unimportant stuff. And of course as many of you know, we currently have a lot more to worry about than that.

't know that we've surrendered our egos as such, but I would say that we have stripped away some of the layers enclosing them.

Quite a journey there Zebs - one I've done a few times. I've quoted it before but worth pondering on - "It'll be Ok in the end. If it's not Ok it's not the end"

 

[TimeWatch]

I think that's right - many of our response are based on previous responses to superficially similar situations or peer-learned behaviour from times previous - which is a fine cognitive shortcut, but it never hurts to query one's first response or to work out what you really want to do.

Or, to put it another way, one needs to occasionally (or more often) overwrite/ignore the current program and execute new instructions.

Apart from anything else, even though people haven't changed for millennia, the world has.

I feel like it's one of societies greatest secrets, we should be taught how our mind works, trouble is society is based on manipulating us in the sleeping state.

 

[Carl Grove]

I feel like it's one of societies greatest secrets, we should be taught how our mind works, trouble is society is based on manipulating us in the sleeping state.

Many of your comments relate very directly to the basic teachings of Sufism -- the sleeping state of humanity, the problem of the false self, the effect of impacts from the world... You might check out the Idries Shah Foundation site. The Sufis have just one publicly recognised teacher per generation, and Shah was the most recent. All of his books are available for reading online free of charge. I think you will find that his approach, tailored to contemporary society, is extremely relevant and helpful.

 

[escargot]

Here's another saying - redefine happiness.

It's a song line, quite an important one in the context of the lyric. I have it as a tattoo!

You can do this if everything goes wrong; redefine happiness to a lower level and accept that.

 

[Coal]

I feel like it's one of societies greatest secrets, we should be taught how our mind works, trouble is society is based on manipulating us in the sleeping state.

It can feel like that. But it is as well to remember that the very mechanisms that seem to force us to subvert ourselves in order to cooperate with others, serve to bind society together and reduce conflict.

The trick is to understand when this is a good thing and also when it's not. Being too agreeable can be as destructive to the self as not being agreeable enough.

 

[PeteS]

Being too agreeable can be as destructive to the self as not being agreeable enough.

Couldn't agree more.

I have known a couple of too agreeable individuals. Very "nice" people and popular but wholly ineffective in any work environment and solving life problems. One has become so submissive to others he's almost robotic. I no longer spend any time with him for fear of upsetting his "wiring". It is actually quite sad to see.

 

[Amoradala]

I think being too agreeable is not being sure of self enough to set firm boundaries.
We all need boundaries - for ourselves and boundaries set out by others for us to recognise and respect.
When boundaries are ‘flexible’ a person become easier to influence, coerce and manipulate. Sometimes unintentionally sometimes predatorily.

 

[XBergMann]

Here's another saying - redefine happiness.

It's a song line, quite an important one in the context of the lyric. I have it as a tattoo!

You can do this if everything goes wrong; redefine happiness to a lower level and accept that.

Indeed when I was single it was all about my happiness.

Now I have 2 young daughters it is about their happiness, if they are happy then I am. I have changed my definition of happiness from an internal concept to an external one as far as I am concerned.

 

[Carl Grove]

Couldn't agree more.

I have known a couple of too agreeable individuals. Very "nice" people and popular but wholly ineffective in any work environment and solving life problems. One has become so submissive to others he's almost robotic. I no longer spend any time with him for fear of upsetting his "wiring". It is actually quite sad to see.

Being co-operative is encouraged in children, but the dangers of being too compliant are ignored. I recall that two of Manson's young ladies were known as especially nice and obedient when children. Unfortunately, without any kind of moral guidance, they became obedient to him, with rather unpleasant results. Cults and sects are always on the lookout for just these people.

 

[AnonyJ]

Behaving in a way that is evidently right, feels 'right', and has the right result is something that often conflicts with the consumerist, materialist world around us. Trying to live gratefully and humbly can often provoke a real backlash from some who just don't get it (yet).

This is a trite quote that also holds personal power for me:

 

[rasputin]

I'm quite surprised that nobody has mentioned Eckhart Tolle and his book "The Power of Now", which is basically all about this subject.

I'll just quote one paragraph (or two) from his book of his first experience of dissolution of the ego which changed his life permanently and seemed very similar to the description by the original poster, it's almost uncanny;

I have little use for the past and rarely think about it; however, I would briefly like to tell you how I came to be a spiritual teacher and how this book came into existence

Until my thirtieth year, I lived in a state of almost continuous anxiety interspersed with periods of suicidal depression. It feels now as if I am talking about some past lifetime or somebody else's life

One night not long after my twenty-ninth birthday, I woke up in the early hours with a feeling of absolute dread. I had woken up with such a feeling many times before, but this time it was more intense than it had ever been. The silence of the night, the vague outlines of the furniture in the dark room, the distant noise of a passing train - everything felt so alien, so hostile, and so utterly meaningless that it created in me a deep loathing of the world. The most loathsome thing of all, however, was my own existence. What was the point in continuing to live with this burden of misery? Why carry on with this continuous struggle? I could feel that a deep longing for annihilation, for nonexistence, was now becoming much stronger than the instinctive desire to continue to live "I cannot live with myself any longer." This was the thought that kept repeating itself in my mind. Then suddenly I became aware of what a peculiar thought it was. `Am I one or two? If I cannot live with myself, there must be two of me: the `I' and the `self' that `I' cannot live with." "Maybe," I thought, "only one of them is real."

I was so stunned by this strange realization that my mind stopped. I was fully conscious, but there were no more thoughts. Then I felt drawn into what seemed like a vortex of energy. It was a slow movement at first and then accelerated. I was gripped by an intense fear, and my body started to shake. I heard the words "resist nothing," as if spoken inside my chest. I could feel myself being sucked into a void. It felt as if the void was inside myself rather than outside. Suddenly, there was no more fear, and I let myself fall into that void.

I have no recollection of what happened after that I was awakened by the chirping of a bird outside the window. I had never heard such a sound before. My eyes were still closed, and I saw the image of a precious diamond. Yes, if a diamond could make a sound, this is what it would be like. I opened my eyes. The first light of dawn was filtering through the curtains. Without any thought, I felt, I knew, that there is infinitely more to light than we realize. That soft luminosity filtering through the curtains was love itself. Tears came into my eyes. I got up and walked around the room. I recognized the room, and yet I knew that I had never truly seen it before. Everything was fresh and pristine, as if it had just come into existence. I picked up things, a pencil, an empty bottle, marveling at the beauty and aliveness of it all. That day I walked around the city in utter amazement at the miracle of life on earth, as if I had just been born into this world

For the next five months, I lived in a state of uninterrupted deep peace and bliss. After that, it diminished somewhat in intensity, or perhaps it just seemed to because it became my natural state. I could still function in the world, although I realized that nothing I ever did could possibly add anything to what I already had.

I knew, of course, that something profoundly significant had happened to me, but I didn't understand it at all. It wasn't until several years later, after I had read spiritual texts and spent time with spiritual teachers, that I realized that what everybody was looking for had already happened to me. I understood that the intense pressure of suffering that night must have forced my consciousness to withdraw from its identification with the unhappy and deeply fearful self, which is ultimately a fiction of the mind. This withdrawal must have been so complete that this false, suffering self immediately collapsed, just as if a plug had been pulled out of an inflatable toy. What was left then was my true nature as the ever-present I am: consciousness in its pure state prior to identification with form. Later I also learned to go into that inner timeless and deathless realm that I had originally perceived as a void and remain fully conscious. I dwelt in states of such indescribable bliss and sacredness that even the original experience I just described pales in comparison. A time came when, for a while, I was left with nothing on the physical plane. I had no relationships, no job, no home, no socially defined identity. I spent almost two years sitting on park benches in a state of the most intense joy

But even the most beautiful experiences come and go. More fundamental, perhaps, than any experience is the undercurrent of peace that has never left me since then. Sometimes it is very strong, almost palpable, and others can feel it too. At other times, it is somewhere in the background, like a distant melody.

Later, people would occasionally come up to me and say: "I want what you have. Can you give it to me, or show me how to get it?" And I would say: "You have it already. You just can't feel it because your mind is malting too much noise." That answer later grew into the book that you are holding in your hands. Before I knew it, I had an external identity again. I had become a spiritual teacher

Look him up, he has loads of videos on Youtube.

There is also a member of this forum called Sundog, who wrote the most beautiful post many years ago which I always remember and reverberates with this topic. See here;

http://forum.forteantimes.com/index.php?threads/my-15-minutes-of-enlightenment.19576/#post-478563

 

[Naughty_Felid]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ego_death

Can be experienced by very good quality LSD or similar things or a mixture of psychoactive substances, cultural and spiritual guidance. The thing is you have to be very careful exploring this as there are few guides out there.

Beware or risk a visit to chapel perilous.