- Carl Jung (from The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious)
Say what Carl?
Carl Jung, a renown early 20th century psychiatrist who studied under Sigmund Freud, is telling us there are two levels of consciousness: One superficial layer that most of us believe is the only layer and a deeper layer that only few of us will ever truly experience in this life time.
The superficial layer is ego dominated. When we operate from this level life seems very 'personal'. We see our selves as separate from each other and from the divine. We are defending and attacking, attaining, maintaining, loosing and occasionally winning. For the most part we are struggling. We see this as the only way there is when it is nothing but a smoke screen.
In the deeper level of consciousness things are different. There is no separateness but an identical nature existing within all. There is union of all things (yoga). There is peace and love and joy without struggle. This is where we truly are. Getting to the 'experience' of this psychic level is a process, one we often call awakening.
The Realization of the Impersonal Nature
My last few entries expressed this realization I have been having. Thanks to Adyashanti, mooji and Eckhart Tolle, whom I have been listening to in hope their wisdom would guide 'me' beyond this seemingly 'personal/maternal crisis' I have been perceiving, I realize that what I think is "My life" is really not my Life. I am seeing (on a purely intellectual level at this point),that there is nothing personal about Life...though it seems to be so personal. What I perceive to be happening to me as a mother and to my son is not happening to me or to me son...it is just happening.
The Stage
All the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players.
-Shakespeare: As You Like It. Act II, Scene VII
We need to think like Shakespeare did and see Life as a stage. Most importantly we need to see our minds as the stage producer, ego as the director and the little' me' or "I" as the star. We have to see the impersonal nature of it.
What difference does that make?
What difference does it make to think like that? Well by removing the "my' from life, story or problem I am no longer the star in this drama that seems so personal. I am just a person watching it. I do not have the 'pressure' of remembering lines I am expected to remember, emoting and feeling in the way the director tells me I should. I am not putting all this energy in to the production to stay in character. "I", I am realizing, am not the character. I am so much more.
Watching from this state of so much more is so much easier than being in the play. It is such a relief! I am in a sense distancing myself without closing my eyes to what is happening around me. I am still aware but not overly attached or lost in the part ego and society expect me to play. My mind stays clearer that way so I can respond rather than react.
That doesn't mean I don't feel the pain, the grief, the fear...but as long as I am watching I am feeling it as a witness rather than a sole player. It's not just 'my' pain, 'my' story...it's universal. It belongs to no one and at the same time it belongs to all. This situation and the emotions I am feeling are just expressions of life ebbing in and out of consciousness. It goes from one act, one scene to the next. It isn't personal! It truly only becomes "Pain, suffering, struggle" when I attach a "My" to it and jump up on stage to start acting it out.
The Threshold
I realize there is a deeper level of consciousness from which to perceive life but I am not yet fully living from there. I find myself on the threshold between true realization (experiencing, feeling, knowing this to be true) and perceiving from the first psychic layer of consciousness which is ego dominated.
Most of us are still on the stage...not knowing, not seeing that we are simply playing a part ego tells us to play...thinking this play is real and all there is. We are lost in the character and the drama. We don't see the audience watching us.
That audience of course is the second layer of consciousness...the collective unconscious, the Atman, the soul, or the Self. There is just One audience...every expression of it claps at the same time, laughs at the same time...hisses and boos at the same time. Though there is a form sitting in each individual seat...each member of the audience is identical...an expression of the One greater audience, the collective, universal, impersonal nature .
Realization of the Audience
Once we know there is indeed an audience...everything changes. We say to ourselves, "If there is an audience watching me...then I must be playing a part. What am I doing here? This must be an act. It must be a drama created by my ego. It is not real...nothing but stage props and other actors. Man? Why am I playing in such a terrible drama? " We begin the detachment from the act and thus from our over identifying with the superficial layer of consciousness.
The beginning of freedom is the realization that you are not the thinker.
The moment you start watching the thinker, a higher level of consciousness becomes activated.
You then begin to realize that there is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought,
that thought is only a tiny aspect of that intelligence.
You also realize that all the things that truly matter,
-beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace-
arise from beyond the mind.
You begin to awaken.
-Eckhart Tolle (The Power of Now)
I am at the point of my waking up where I am realizing I am playing a part and starring in some drama. I see the edges of the stage and see glimpses of audience in the darkened theatre. Every now and again...just for the briefest of seconds...I even wake up in one of those seats and watch what is going on up on stage. The witnessing doesn't last long...but while I am sitting there things are so peaceful. Things are so clear. Life is so impersonal!But before I know it I am back on stage.
I am still spending most of my time on stage and though sometimes I even forget that I am acting, I am for the most part aware that I am acting and that there is an audience out there watching me act. I know now there is me as a character and me as an audience member. Life is so much easier as the audience member. Why? Because it isn't so personal. It is not about me!
Life Isn't Personal!
We can depersonalize life by leaving the dramas we are playing in and sitting down to watch life . Life circumstances are just that circumstances...scenes in a play we do not have to star in. The true living occurs in the seat...as part of a greater consciousness.
All is well.
References
Jung, Carl. The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious. (https://books.google.ca/books?id=hmXfBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA43&lpg=PA43&dq=In+addition+to+our+immediate+consciousness,+which+is+of+a+thoroughly+personal+nature+and+which+we+believe+to+be+the+only+empirical+psyche&source=bl&ots=TUg9ErW21t&sig=7uu5klACIOxbxuL8eW_nfi6KFQ4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiJktHMi8LcAhWH3oMKHaW3CbEQ6AEwBnoECAYQAQ#v=onepage&q=In%20addition%20to%20our%20immediate%20consciousness%2C%20which%20is%20of%20a%20thoroughly%20personal%20nature%20and%20which%20we%20believe%20to%20be%20the%20only%20empirical%20psyche&f=false
Tolle, Eckhart.( 2004) The Power of Now. New World Library.
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