(nikon d5200 22.0 mm f/4.0 1/50sec)
I, like many of us, am constantly at war with my ego.
If find beneficial to once and a while stop and think about the different ways I let negative self-conscious thought permeate my mind. Subsequently, I put up mental or even physical defenses in order to cope. There is a war going on outside for our attention and a constant bombardment of stimuli hurled at us every day.
Recently I had a friend tell me I was too self-conscious. Did I believe that? No. However, perhaps he saw something in me that was unconscious, a physical tick, a feigned response. Now I begin thinking my quickness to deny this outright is a sign in and of itself that my ego is already taking to much control. The fact that I did continue to think about an offhand statement in is way illustrates trick that my ego plays. The ego tries to protect us by fending off negative thoughts but at the same time only acting shield. This prevents us from doing the deep work that can really help us "clean house" mentally.
But can you ever really clear the mind?
Temporarily maybe.
If found meditation very beneficial at different stages of my life and though I don't do it enough I feel relief in trying to have nothing at my attention at least 5 minutes a day. Most times I struggle through these 5 mins but feel slightly more at ease and more capable of extracting useful thoughts for sometime after. Some people call this mindfulness others just call it introspective thinking. Dan Harris calls this state,"10% Happier," the title of his book I haven't yet read.
A recent study found, "serotonergic psychedelics (psilocybin & LSD among others) are capable of robustly increasing neuritogenesis." (in trials)
In other words, promoting structural and neural plasticity in the brain strengthening and creating different neural connections. In the 1950s scientist already had a sense of this and performed guided therapies and psychoanalysis with the use of these drugs, finding it helped patients with a re-wiring of the brain so to speak. Many of these patient trails in the 1950s and early 1960s had subjects walk away feeling as though it was one of the most significant experiences of their lives.
Imagine a chemical rewiring your brain and turning off this "ego" without having skills of being a good meditator.
In my experience they help you do the work of turning off the ego, usually spurring my mind to subconsciously reach a new epiphany about minute parts of life I had not yet thought to uncover.
A few epiphanies I've gained as a psychonaut
The first time I stepped outside myself with help of some fungi I was sick with Mono and hoping to simply elevate myself from the terrible feeling of an intense prolonged cold/fever. (This was a very bad idea I later discovered due to the fever I had.)I was not ready for the intensity that followed. This pushed my body temperature too its limit and I almost passed out thinking I might die. While that was going on I was scared and I thought about how badly I wanted to see my friends and family one last time, so I called some of them but they were busy at school or work because it was still noon. Fortunately, I woke up and got my body temperature back down by taking a cold shower. Afterword I experienced a sense of awe about just being alive. A phenomenon some call "childs eyes" I became much more grateful for the things I'd been taking advantage of and took stock of the good things in my life. When I think back to it now, I remember feeling a great sense to make the more out of my time thereafter and for the most part, I followed through on an adventurous time in my life.
Another experience had me reconsidering how tightly a grip pleasure-seeking behavior has on people. While watching the bizarre movie called Rubber about a car tire who kills people I was also "researching" a chemical that I that was not what I thought it was.. As I watched a tire vibrate and shake all over the screen while it somehow made people explode I became incredibly overstimulated, feeling as if I was also about to explode along with them each time. I came to the realization that the many people including myself are aimless searching for the next "hit" of stimulation in their life whether it be entertainment, food, sex, drugs, ect, and most of us are probably too fixated on the next objective. We can't wait for the next "thing" that will bring us a dopamine rush and we become incredibly distracted from enjoying the times in between. Rubber is a trippy film and I don't ever want to see it again so as to ruin the memory of terror I felt everytime tire cause an explosion. At the time I thought it makes some good points about the nature of entertainment. We have a desire to make sense of things in the world even when they have no rhyme or reason. Images can overtly create a sense of instant gratification or horror in our mind and this makes movies a perfect medium for the reward centers of the brain.
Once while at a music festival I encounter a confrontational guy deep into some type of trip. He was standing near a communal bonfire asking if someone would kick a ball with him. "Kick a ball?" he kept repeating as people walked past him almost like a homeless person asking money. I repeated the phrased "kick a ball" to a friend in the same tone, not trying to mock him though I thought it was funny to do an imitate him at the time. The guy was standing right behind me, and started angrily berating me in weird soft-spoken tone. "What are you afraid to kick a ball?" all I remember is he got in the face and I caved to joining his game. I did not enjoy kicking that ball with him. I was wearing sandals in grass wet with dew causing me to fall over and over again making a fool out myself everytime I was passed the ball. I got to thinking about just how important our delivery of language is and how it subtly sends tons of signals to someone. While what you say to someone may be seemingly a normal response to you, it could be interpreted as a threat by someone else. Everday misunderstandings are extremely common, and I have seen people fired from their jobs for the way they have spoken the word, "OK."
And last, this epiphany is from a great book about this called Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging
by Sebastian Junger which I can relate to from many life experiences. Junger basically says we are extremely communal by nature and having very separate singular lifestyles isolates people and is a major cause for depression in society. I can attest to that healthy tribal bond, having experienced a sort "tribe" with a cohesive group of friends traveling together for months at a time together and sharing resources. Thing back on life tribe like experiences always led to the happiest experiences in my life. Social relationships are built on familiarity and compatibility and even feedback loops. Inside jokes and humor are the most powerful anchors between people when building report and from what I do know about Jungers work that's just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the evolutionary psychology of group bonding.And finally I bring you the most powerful psychedelic rock song I've ever heard about the nature of mortality and gratitude.
Do You Realize by The Flaming Lips
Do you realize that everyone you know
Someday will die?
And instead of saying all of your goodbyes, let them know
You realize that life goes fast
It's hard to make the good things last
You realize the sun doesn't go down
It's just an illusion caused by the world spinning round
"We digitize all the things we like and share them." - Richard Heart
I hope you have good day!