Yesterday I referred to the aspects of ego - what we see as ourselves - and how "face" is used to cover up unsocial thoughts and insecurities. Going back again to my stupid days of drug experimentation, the loss of face - of a facade - that made communication so embarrassingly difficult was often followed by several other phases (I will count 3 here, the way I see it); first, as one is pulled towards the peak, the embarrassments of self-transparency fade into unimportance. Here, one goes into the transcendental phase, where an infinite reality of complete connection and timelessness is experienced. This is the mystical high that drew so many hippies and experimenters to Eastern religions, as they often emphasize direct union with the Beyond (rather than worship from afar). Here, the former ego is seen as a nothing, a thin membrane over a vast ocean of realization that is not only accessible to everyone, but IS everyone - that is, one feels that it IS the real you. From there, as one falls back from the peak, the "humanity head" as one friend called it, reigns; that is, one becomes encased once again in an individual self, but feels great sympathy and love for everyone else. From there, one becomes grateful for just being alive - and often begins to plan the next trip.
In terms of Christianity, it is the peak phase that makes us worthy of redemption. We are not the invidious, selfish individuals of our ego, but something far greater. This small self is the sinful self, one that we have descended into from our fall from Eden. To realize Godhead is to see our connection with everything and everyone, and our own immortality and god-like qualities. As this experience is difficult to achieve without drugs, and dangerous to reach with drugs, most never encounter it. Rather, the "humanity head" phase is recommended - although this is very hard to maintain without constant reference to the mystical experience, and thus difficult for most of us to live with. We fall back into the small ego and all its pettiness - and again make use of the social face. We rely, then, on faith to save us.
One can find all of this in books on mysticism or on prime drug experiences. However, through the research on genius, we find a fly in the ointment. We find, as the mystics have always known, that until we are fully assumed into Godhead, we have real, deep personalities that reach deeper than the common ego. That is, that even at the mystical height there is a real and separate "us" present. Most people find this comforting, but it is not always so. In Castaneda's books on sorcery, his enigmatic teacher Don Juan tells him that some are simply born to evil, just as some animals are born to be predators. One cannot know who one is until the greater depth of the self is experienced. In the discussion on genius through the ages, it is usually recognized that "genius" comes either from a separate spirit, or is experienced as one is brought (mentally) into a spiritual, or higher, world - one similar to that found in mystical experience. And just like Don Juan's sorcerers, the genius or man influenced by genius can bring either harm or good - that is, he can be the good genius or the evil genius. Literature is replete with this complex; but we have to ask: how can one who is so elevated become evil? Shouldn't a greater knowledge of the whole make on more saint-like? In Christianity, one would say that one has been tricked by the devil. For Don Juan, the universe is an amoral place, where things and beings simply are as they were made, that decision based on something beyond our knowledge.
Eastern mystics have long had their own explanation - they say that not only do we all have individual temperaments that may pull us towards good or evil, but that there are different levels, or heavens, beyond ordinary reality that one may obtain. At some levels, one is conferred with great powers, or siddhus (if I remember the word correctly). The great sages tell us to ignore these powers, for they can pull us in and entrap us - even unto doing evil. For them, there is only one great goal - complete immersion in God, or the No-thing (nirvana). They do recognize that even the saints on earth, of those who communicate directly with us mere mortals, have unique personalities. But these have not let themselves become fixated in the temptations of power in the lesser heavens. Thus, it seems, free will is restored amid greater and greater temptations. The effective genius is one who has access to one of these higher levels - not necessarily THE level - where he may become enmeshed in its power and what it lends to his own image on earth - the image of the "genius." In this, we may consider the thin film of ego that we normally observe as something real; for while it is only small and relatively powerless, it still expresses the possibilities of temptation that a deeper self might find in higher consciousness. FK
In terms of Christianity, it is the peak phase that makes us worthy of redemption. We are not the invidious, selfish individuals of our ego, but something far greater. This small self is the sinful self, one that we have descended into from our fall from Eden. To realize Godhead is to see our connection with everything and everyone, and our own immortality and god-like qualities. As this experience is difficult to achieve without drugs, and dangerous to reach with drugs, most never encounter it. Rather, the "humanity head" phase is recommended - although this is very hard to maintain without constant reference to the mystical experience, and thus difficult for most of us to live with. We fall back into the small ego and all its pettiness - and again make use of the social face. We rely, then, on faith to save us.
One can find all of this in books on mysticism or on prime drug experiences. However, through the research on genius, we find a fly in the ointment. We find, as the mystics have always known, that until we are fully assumed into Godhead, we have real, deep personalities that reach deeper than the common ego. That is, that even at the mystical height there is a real and separate "us" present. Most people find this comforting, but it is not always so. In Castaneda's books on sorcery, his enigmatic teacher Don Juan tells him that some are simply born to evil, just as some animals are born to be predators. One cannot know who one is until the greater depth of the self is experienced. In the discussion on genius through the ages, it is usually recognized that "genius" comes either from a separate spirit, or is experienced as one is brought (mentally) into a spiritual, or higher, world - one similar to that found in mystical experience. And just like Don Juan's sorcerers, the genius or man influenced by genius can bring either harm or good - that is, he can be the good genius or the evil genius. Literature is replete with this complex; but we have to ask: how can one who is so elevated become evil? Shouldn't a greater knowledge of the whole make on more saint-like? In Christianity, one would say that one has been tricked by the devil. For Don Juan, the universe is an amoral place, where things and beings simply are as they were made, that decision based on something beyond our knowledge.
Eastern mystics have long had their own explanation - they say that not only do we all have individual temperaments that may pull us towards good or evil, but that there are different levels, or heavens, beyond ordinary reality that one may obtain. At some levels, one is conferred with great powers, or siddhus (if I remember the word correctly). The great sages tell us to ignore these powers, for they can pull us in and entrap us - even unto doing evil. For them, there is only one great goal - complete immersion in God, or the No-thing (nirvana). They do recognize that even the saints on earth, of those who communicate directly with us mere mortals, have unique personalities. But these have not let themselves become fixated in the temptations of power in the lesser heavens. Thus, it seems, free will is restored amid greater and greater temptations. The effective genius is one who has access to one of these higher levels - not necessarily THE level - where he may become enmeshed in its power and what it lends to his own image on earth - the image of the "genius." In this, we may consider the thin film of ego that we normally observe as something real; for while it is only small and relatively powerless, it still expresses the possibilities of temptation that a deeper self might find in higher consciousness. FK
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