(...continued from part 1)
This word Self-awareness gets tossed around a lot. We humans are considered a self-aware species. Most other creatures are not. But what does that mean - to be self-aware? Can the self be aware of the self? Can this "I" be aware of the "I"?
We live in a dualistic universe. A universe in which for perception to occur there needs to be a subject and an object linked together by the act of perception, the perceiving. The subject perceives the object, the object is perceived by the subject. The act of perceiving is the only thing that gives any reality to this subject-object relationship.
Now the question is can "I" be both the subject and the object of my own perception? In other words, can perception link an entity back to itself. So lets further analyze this. What are the different ways in which we tend to perceive ourselves:
1. we can perceive our bodies visually through a reflection in the mirror
2. we can perceive our bodies sensually through the 5 senses
3. we can perceive our self-image mentally through thought and emotion
4. we can perceive our bodies and minds through relation and reaction with our environments including people, places and objects
If you look closely enough, in all of these processes the subject that is perceiving and the object being perceived are in fact not identical at all.
In case 1, much like in the photograph example from part1 the object is an image in the mirror which actually is nothing but photons of light reacting with the silver lining behind the glass generating a virtual representation of a body.
In case 2, what we perceive as sensual experience - taste, smell, vision, hearing and feeling is nothing but electrical impulses firing between neurons in the brain that confirm a sense of ownership over the experience. If you were to lose your vision or hearing or taste you wouldn't feel any less you. There may be a sense of loss of ability but not of identity. In a sensory deprivation chamber your sense of self continues to operate.
In case 3, as discussed in part1, every thought/emotion is a mental response mechanism. Thoughts/emotions are reactions, they are triggered: by people, environmental events, by other thoughts and emotions. A thought/emotion is not a thing - it is an event. These thought/emotion events are occuring constantly within our minds triggering at split-second intervals. This continuous series of thought/emotion forms a thoughtstream: a seemingly continuous and real entity. Because most of our brains are going a mile-a-minute, thinking/emoting feels like the natural/resting state of the mind but it isn't. Just like you only notice that the air conditioning in the room was on when it suddenly turns off and you're hit by a period of dead silence. Similarly, the natural resting state of the mind is one of silence.
The issue is that thinking/emoting is a sort of chain reaction. If thoughts and emotions were only triggered by external events there would be a lot less stimulus to contend with. But in actuality, thoughts and emotions only trigger more thoughts and emotions leading to a sort of mental effervescing effect also know as stress. Extreme stress can lead to more serious mental and behavioural issues. Which is why meditation as a practice is so highly valued by many eastern cultures as a means of bringing the mind periodically back to its natural resting state. One where awareness is open and not preoccupied with mental content which has its own place and purpose. In fact, zazen which is the zen buddhist form of meditation literally means "just sitting". Its not an esoteric la-dee-da spiritual practice rather its a highly specialized and precise exercise. To 'just sit' means to allow the mind to rest in its natural awareness.
Just like the body when worked too hard breaks down under physical stress so does the brain under mental stress. The brain is after all only a machine and every machine breaks down when improperly maintained. While deep sleep is nature's way of guaranteeing a daily forced rest period for the mind, Meditation and simple awareness allows the mind a chance to recover and recuperate insight, perspective and most importantly creativity.
But to bring it back to point, very few of us have even experienced what it feels like for the mind to be free of thought/emotion for more than a second. Our brains have become so charged with mental momentum that it literally is a runaway train. We have very little control over what we think and when we think. The thinking happens, constantly, obsessively and we have no ability to stop it. Which is why we literally need to run to the furthest corners of the world to some remote tropical beach for a week to soothe our minds, such little control do we have over it.
But what is the energy or impetus that gives our minds this momentum. What is the juice fueling this runaway train on? This brings us back to the question of self-awareness. It is because the "I" perceives this mindstream as being itself. The "I" mistakes the image for its own identity.
Lets look at the story with Bart Simpson and the label gun again. We are currently attempting to investigate what this "I", this sense of being a self, a somebody, really is? Through a process of elimination we are seeing how the body, the mind, thoughts and emotions are all the various kinds of images that we create of ourselves. And so what looks like the Self perceiving itself is really only the Self perceiving an image of itself and not really itself. So why does the Self make the mistake of assuming that it is the image it perceives?
Think of the Self as Bart's label gun. Every act of perception is a new label triggered by the gun. And whatever the label sticks to is the object of the Self's perception. So here is the gun, firing continuously like a semi-automatic rifle at anything and everything it points to. And out go the labels with the letters M,E on them attacing themselves to all the furniture, the walls, the appliances and even the family dog. This is in a nutshell how self-identification works. The sense of Self projects itself outwardly through perception launching and attacing its labels. If it attaches to its mindstream, it identifies with the mindstream - "these thoughts are me, these emotions are me." If it attaches itself to the body - "this body is me." The more adhesive the label the more strongly indentified the Self is with its own images. The less adhesive the labels the more easily the Self is able to drop its preoccupations with its image.
In fact, by following this analogy it is possible to see how 99.9% of who we think we are is a complete figment of our imaginations...
(to be continued...)
