Bring4th

Quote:..."So in Zen, a duality between a higher self and a lower self is not made. Because if you believe in the higher self, this is a simple trick of the lower self. If you believe that there is no really lower self, there is only the higher self but that somehow or other the higher self has to shine through, the very fact that you think it has to shine through still gives validity to the existence of a lower self. If you think you have a lower self, or an ego to get rid of, then you fight against it, nothing strengthens the delusion that it exists more than that. So this tremendous schizophrenia in humans beings, of thinking that they are rider and horse, soul in command of body, or will in command of passions – wrestling with them; all that kind of split thinking simply aggravates the problem, and we get more and more split. And so we have all sorts of people engaged in an interior conflict which they will never never resolve. Because the true self, either you know it or you don’t. If you do know it, then you know it’s the only one, and the other so called lower self just ceases to be a problem. It becomes something like a mirage, and you don’t go around hitting at mirages with a stick, or trying to put reigns on them. You just know that they are mirages and walk straight through them." ~Alan Watts...

Some interesting thoughts.

An interesting point to add to this line of thinking is that in Qabalah, you have the level of Tiphareth, Geburah and Chesed as related to different grades of consciousness of the adept, with the holy guardian angel or higher self as corresponding to Tiphareth. Above that level of the Rauch we see the Abyss and the non Sephiroth Daath crossing over into the Neshamah of Binah, at which point all that is reflected below the abyss is let go of, including the higher self. This is interesting because the level of the tree at Binah and Chockmah relates to the head and the indigo ray or ajna chakra. Qabalistically speaking one becomes the higher self at this point and in doing so does not bring about the dualistic conditions for a separate lower or higher self. Basically we need to develop and work with our higher selves until the point we can become the higher self and in doing so, being the true self dissolves the illusionary emanations below the abyss.