So who are "you" anyway?
By "you" I am referring to your identity, or the thoughts, beliefs, ideas and positions that are the basis of your sense of yourself. These are the things that the brain uses to create the experience of being unique, an individual separate from everything and everyone. It is what allows me to say, "I am Mark, and you are you." Zen Buddhists refer to this as the "small self," and understanding it begins with the question, "Who is the 'I' that you refer to?"
The early stages of exploring this question can be perplexing and difficult. I recall being extremely frustrated when senior Zen students would abruptly stop me in the middle of rambling about the problems in my life and ask, "Who is this 'I' that you keep referring to? Show him to me." During one conversation, one person went as far as to say, "If that is who you are, no wonder you are constantly stuck." I didn't appreciate those words, but they were enough to get me to stop complaining and consider that perhaps I did not know as much about myself as I thought.
So what is the small self?
Neuroscientists often refer to invariant representations, or the model that the brain uses to create our perceptions. As Jeff Hawkins, the author of "On Intelligence," stated, "The brain uses vast amounts of energy to create a model of the world. Everything you know and have learned is stored in this model. The brain uses this memory-based model to make continuous predictions of future events."
The implications of the memory-based model are significant. Research suggests that as much as 80 percent to 90 percent of what you perceive is stored memory rather than what your eyes and ears actually see and hear. This is the small self, and ultimately it constrains your ability to respond freely or authentically to what is happening around you. Examples of this include not being able to speak out, empathize or respond appropriately to certain situations; not seeing or taking advantage of opportunities; and refusing to grow or express certain emotions.
For most people, realizing that most of what you think, do and feel is nothing but the activation of stored memory is unsettling, for it smacks the popular notion of who we think we are right in the face. This truth not only exposes that we are not as free as we like to believe, but that we are not fully present to the people and things in our life as well. So if this is the case, and neuroscience is right, then what can be done?
The simple answer is nothing.
The brain uses memory to ensure that you survive from moment to moment -- this is a good thing. On the flip side, however, this fact underscores the Buddha's teaching identifying the small self as the source of needless suffering, or the "stuck-ness" that we all experience in certain areas of our lives.
While the Buddha's teachings might evoke feelings of hopelessness initially, he also prescribed a solution or pathway to greater freedom and control over our thoughts and actions. The foundation for this is Zazen, or Zen meditation.
Zazen's core aim is to facilitate realization into the nature of reality. When this happens, our map of the world and ourselves is seen for what it is: empty, or void of any fixed meaning. Experiencing emptiness for the first time can be like jumping off a cliff in the middle of night: totally terrifying because suddenly you have absolutely nothing to hold on to. Yet for most people it is the first time in many years that they experience life "outside the box," free from the constraints of the small self. Once this experience has taken place, many people dedicate themselves to minimizing the grip of their identity for the purposes of cultivating a much larger expression of themselves.
Ongoing Zazen coupled with other aspects of personal development will reduce the suffering, or stuck-ness, that the Buddha spoke of. The result is a person who can operate with a higher degree of grace, fluidity and authenticity in situations that are foreign, uncomfortable and marked by stress and pressure.
The great Zen master Dogen Zenji said, "To know the Self is to forget the Self. To forget the Self is to be enlightened by the ten thousand things." In today's fast-paced modern society, one's carefully constructed identity and the preservation of it is often valued above and beyond everything else. Without knowing it, this emphasis only serves to prevent us from having a much deeper experience of who we are.
Imagine for a second what it would be like if you were free from constraints of the small self, identity, just for a few seconds. What would you do? What would you say? Who would you be?
This Emotional Life is a two-year campaign to foster awareness, connections and solutions around emotional wellness. Join our community at www.pbs.org/thisemotionallife.
Mark Eckhardt is part of the teaching staff at the Santa Monica Zen Center. In 2008 he founded LYFE Systems, a consulting company that works with professionals in the area of leadership. His work integrates aspects of Zen training with Western methods and science for increasing human performance and effectiveness.
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As a teacher of meditation, I see how people evolve and expand their sense of self through regular meditation practice. They quickly begin to experience that they are bigger than the confines of name, job, education, race... It's easy to identify with the cosmic Self when you directly experience it in meditation. It's also lots of fun!
I'm just sayin'
I have changed this map many times, as if discovering new corners of a seemingly familiar land. But outside me there are real things and people to experience, and to love or judge or to both love and judge. Love and judgment alter my map, as does experience, learning a foreign language, experiencing good art or literature or theater, meeting someone smarter or more insightful or kinder or more generous than I am.
I prefer transformative experience more than nothingness, although I do like to just stare at some trees outside my window for hours, perceiving, thinking very little.
For instance I once attended a Catholic Mass on Trinity Sunday. I remarked to my hosts that I could explain the Trinity better than the priest did. So I explained and they thought the explanation brilliant. Then I said, "But this explanation can't be valid at all. If it's so clear that would mean it can't be true. The Trinity cannot be explained, only contemplated, appreciated, loved. Any explanation would be false."
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Imparting Zen to a rice bag with a clothes hanger or vice versa is excellent exercise. and does neither any harm if not overdone.
In some peculiar way, 'no answer' seems to be correct.
Instead of 'saying go away' we just watch the concept in question. Non judgementaly observe it and it may weaken and dissappear. Just an idea.
Now something I have experianced is simply put the issue aside and go for a run, or work on a Bonsai or something(NOT TV or a book) . Then sometimes the answer ' just appears' while I am engaged in the other activity.
if we exist as both a here and a there simultaneously, then there must also exist an everywhere of which i am a part. i think this is where martin buber was coming from.
My problem with Buddhism is the same as I have with any system of ideas that denies human finitude. Yes, if we are mortals, then we come to an end of things. That may be a cause for suffering, if one has been taught to expect infinity as a human prerogative. We are not free to do and have whatever we can imagine. Tragedy is real.
It is our limits, however, that make our decisions important. They give us tools for deciding what is best. The Buddha's tools are good ones but if they come at the cost of denial of the real world, that is too high a price for me to pay.
I do not believe ours is the best possible world. Notice how many of the comments at this point are about feeling good. I have nothing against feeling good, but religion's job is doing good. Avoiding that demand is simply a cop-out.
i thought i made the connection between buddhism and hegelian philosophy pretty modestly, though. when i did mention them both together i set them in opposition to one another. and i agree that both are forms of idealism if one permits a loose definition of idealism.
it is actually hegel's idea that we have no limits, though. we are a part of absolute spirit, which is infinite, and so we are a part of infinity. if there exists something that is infinite, then it includes all of us and everything otherwise it isn't truly infinite.
i agree that it is religion's job to do good. buddhism is quite possibly the best at serving its adherents best in this way
i don't believe ours is the best possible world either. leibniz was a great mathematician, not a great philosopher.
Me too and I think a lot of other "secular" Americans as well. But then Buddha tells us NOT to accept anything on "Faith" or "Authority". Prove things to ourselves. Judge for ourselves. Use what part we can and keep on.
Thats a lot of honest freedom.
To me the job of Buddhism is to cure my distorted pained mental picture of myself and the world. ( I don't like to use the word Religion on myself )
If this helps me to do " Good " then Good.
What does that mean?
We're processes, dreaming we're things.
As I've written elsewhere: enlightenment is less like climbing a mountain, and more like melting.
What melts? All the artificial definitions we've incorrectly presumed to be reality, for our entire lives. When we drop all the artificial, conceptual divisions ... hey, living unbound, right here, right now.
http://livingunbound.net
In my case , when I realize what I'm seeing, I think ' Ahh yes' then it slips away ' NO wait' then 'Oh no' it's gone.
Does this make any sense ? Does anyone experiance anything like this more that just for an few seconds?
In fact he doesn't have to "become or turn into" anything. When he dropps all the baggage that has become "him", he will just be the good dog that he was allways at his core.
The self-concept, whether limiting or liberating, has a huge impact on our lives.
=In career choices, for example, many people unnecessarily restrict their options by being unable, or unwilling, to consider professions they are capable of pursuing but that are outside of their "comfort zone."
=How many times have you heard someone express a dream, for example, to become a writer, a musician, an actor, a painter, etc.; but, they don't even try because, as they say: "I can't see myself doing that."
=That's why just about every successful person has had someone in their lives who encouraged them to pursue their "impossible dream"--a teacher, a mentor or a colleague--who pushed them to
expand their self-concept and "see" themselves doing what they want to do.
=I've always suspected that this is the real advantage of the rich--money can do wonders for someone's "self-concept." So: Don't think you can get into Yale because of that "C" average? Don't worry, we'll get SAT tutors and, anyway, you're a "legacy"! Want to be an actor but
get "stage fright"? Hey, we're big contributors to that experimental theatre in the Village! Don't
feel qualified to be Chancellor of the NYC public schools because you have zero experience in education and sent your children to private schools? No sweat, we'll be seeing the mayor at the Met fund-raiser tonight!
Why can't they all just talk in a language I can understand?