Freedom from the Self

Dr Sudhansu Kumar Dash

What ‘Self’ is a very important thing inviting discussion before searching a freedom from the ‘Self’. Our so called self is nothing but the memory ,conclusions, experience of various forms of the namable or the unnamable intentions, a consciousness to be or not to be ,the accumulated memory of the unconscious ,or the conscious may be racial, group or individual ,the whole of which is projected outwardly or projected spiritually as a virtue. The stirring after all these is the ‘self ‘We also know the extraordinary moments when the ‘self’ is not there, in which there is no sense of effort. It is therefore important to know how experience strengthens the ‘self’. If one wants to know it earnestly, one can understand the process of experience.

By experience we mean the impressions in mind in course of our action in time and we translate those impressions and act and react according to them. We become calculative, cunning and so on. No doubt ,there is a constant interplay between what we see objectively and our reactions to it, or interplay between the conscious memory and unconscious memory.

We react to whatever we see,feel,know ,believe and experience .A reaction and a response to whatever seen or felt is therefore experience. The naming of a reaction is experience and if we do not name the reaction ,then it is not an experience. After the experience there is a projection of various desires ,the desire to be protected ,to be secured, to have a silence of mind ,to seek the truth and so on. Any experience always strengthens the’ self ‘,the ‘me’. The more one is entrenched in the experience, the more does the ‘me’ gets strengthened. As a result we get a certain strength of character, knowledge, belief  which we display to other people because we know that they are not as claver as we are. What will happen if one is serious to dissolve this centre completely and not justify it?

The vital question is: Is it possible to do so, for the mind not to project, not to desire, not to experience? Actually all experience of the ‘self’ are negative, a destruction but we call them positive actions. When one earnestly  goes to the root to  understand the process one will see that it is negative .Then what can bring the dissolution of this ‘self’? All so-called religious groups have offered a solution that is an identification ,may be identification of the self with the so-called largest entity and the ‘self’ will disappear. But still any identification is the process of the ‘self’, the ;me’ and strengthens the ‘self’ further. Even one says that one can dissolve the ‘self’, but in that there is also an experiencing of the ‘self’. Our whole effort is to be free from all experiences When experience is not there ‘self’ is not there.

Is there any entity apart from the self and looking at the self to dissolve it? We think there is .The so called religious people say that there is such an element and getting in touch with it ,the self is dissolved. The materialists say that it is impossible to dissolve the self .It can only be conditioned. Is there such a thing that the mind can conceive of which can dissolve the ‘self ‘whom we call God or anything else? There may be God or may not be. That is not the point but the fact is that when the mind seeks a timeless state which will go into action in order to destroy thr ‘self’, is that not another form of experience which is again strengthening the ‘self’? Certainly we do not destroy the ‘self ‘but give another name to it, a different quality to it and the ‘self is still there because we have experienced it. Thus our action from beginning to the end is the same action. Only we think it to be evolving growing, becoming more and more beautiful, but if one observes it inwardly, one could see it to be the same action going on the same ‘self’ functioning at different levels with different labels ,with different names. The whole process is a cunning one where the ‘self’ comes itself with different identifications through virtue, through experience through beliefs knowledge and all  in a circle, in a cage if its own making.

When we are aware of the whole process ,the whole cunningness of the mind ,fully cognizant of it ,not through compulsion, not through any reward, not through any fear, not through any ideology then one can see that the mind is utterly still and has no power of creating. When the mind is non-creating, there is creation which is not a recognizable process.

Reality and Truth are not to be recognized but for truth and reality to come, all beliefs, knowledge, experiencing all pursuit of virtue must go. Even a virtuous person who is conscious of perusing virtue can never find reality. One may be a decent person ,but not a man of truth. So no belief, no experience no belief is the freedom from the ‘self’.