The Seven Phases of Separation
10/12/08 19:21 Filed in: Philosophy
This article is based on our observations of modern Western society and a desire to expand the understanding of how the philosophical nature of Eastern thought can help the pragmatic Western mind understand itself.
"The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honours the servant and has forgotten the gift".
Einstein
Another excellent treatise on this from a logical basis is found in the Complete Illustrated Book of Yoga by Swami Vishnu-devananda in Chapter 10, The Origin and Evolution of Prakriti.
We post this knowing full well that even in those feeling separated according to this below text are actually not separated in any way, except in their own perception, and therefore the perception of others around them. The kind of Vedanta that is the most holistic is called Advaita Vedanta- literally, “Not Two” and the main proponent of this historically was Adi Sankara. Again, meaning ‘one without a second’. This is the philosophical underpinning we espouse on this website.
The following seven steps can be applied to any undertaking where one finds ego. Ego, using willpower from a narrow focused mechanistic manner of thinking pushes us along this path of separation through misunderstanding. Here is a funny example of this:
This is a description of the ‘process’ of ego manifestation. One finds this in all walks of life, including, sadly religions. This is so prevalent now that many Westerners have come to believe that religion is synonymous with control, and reject it on the basis of that reactively. Silent Motion Yoga teachers and practitioners always are seekers of the middle way between such polarizations and it is in this spirit we present you with this.
1) God-understanding (Self-realization, Samadhi, Nirvana, etc.)
One with everything, lacks separateness or identification with body, mind, etc., holistic in nature, compassion, kindness, and love are present. Internal focus sees all external things as mere reflections of internal reality.
Right brained, as in infants, or God-realized people (although Self-realization give one the capacity to think fully on both sides of the brain, while maintaining a root in the right brain). Varying degrees of capability regarding left brain function ranging from genius level intelligence (for example, Swami Sivananda could keep 16 minds busy at one time transcribing his thoughts) to unconscious switching into Samadhi, to the point of needing constant caretaking (for example, Sri Ramakrishna).
2) Misidentification As Separate From God
"God is dead."- Nietzsche
The main misidentification being the feeling/thought/idea that one is separate from God, Nature, other people and things, etc.; focus and energy changes from identifying with internal to the external now being considered real; left brained, still can maintain some varied periods of balanced internal/external understanding.
Ego becomes present, which is structurally contained in the left side of the brain. The need to be different than one is in the face of parents or social stresses tends to exacerbate this problem. Ego then drives all remaining distinctions hereafter, perpetually arrogating it's left-brained, or separatist, agenda. This is usually based on inherited shame from parental figures and a growing body awareness, reinforced by society, friends, and excess of media input and advertising.
3) Attachment
Narrowed EXTERNAL focus onto few objects or one as "mine", like the body or possessions, left brained, begins a denial of one's internal reality of Self, or interconnectedness with others. Shame inherited becomes more deeply and unconsciously rooted. What becomes important now is "my land", "my wife", even "my guru" or "my God".
Clearly, battles among religions, or even within religions(!) are found here. Battling nation-states and patriotism are also found at this level and are carried forward into the idealism stage, when one "identifies" with some religion.
I must note here that even gangs use this attachment or "brotherhood" feeling of belonging to carry out their agendas, later found to be a patho-ideal.
What I am pointing out here is not a value judgement, but rather a statement of observation of the reality of the human mind's journey, that later must be reversed.
4) Idealism
Creation of personal or group "rules" for maintaining attachment/ external focus in a personal or external mythology. This patho-myth tends to lack the recognition of how the external focus is changing the internal landscape of one's thoughts, leading to almost exclusive focus on left-brain, facts, details about facts, etc.
Because these rules never meet with reality and one's focus has previously been narrowed unnecessarily, one can strive harder to meet the constraints of this idealism, ironically motivated by the stress of further separation from one's True Self.
Our Western culture is chock FULL of examples of this. It is our single prevalent influence now. Everything from Apple Computer's computer cult to people pledging allegiance to certain brands of clothing falls into this.
It's the driving force behind advertising and people's difficulty with religion, corporate structures and the general malaise of meaning we find ourselves in today. NO IDEALOGY FITS YOU. So one feels left out by a constant stream of idealisms to choose from and nothing seems to just allow you to be yourself.
Ideals never fully meet the reality of this illusory and phenomenal life that has many gray areas and is constantly in flux and changing.
Even where some things do not change, it can be argued that our current culture very rarely recognizes such lasting things. Especially in view of the constant bombardment with factual information. One's reality can be skewed to think that all information is of equal value, thereby lessening the value of any unchanging experiences one might have, even where that experience is satisfying and relevant.
Even where one is apparently seeing the world in a specific way and this is socially acceptable, there tends to be a continuous and outsized reinforcement mentally and socially of one's identification in a narrow area (being Catholic or other religion, gay, feminist, left-ist, Mac user, PC user, etc.). These influences, by their heavy-handed (and to my view unneeded) reinforcement they tend to produce control behaviors.
The real problem here is one of mixing up weakly expressed versions of personal internal ideals or ways of behaving with "similar" (but not the identically same) external strategies employed by others, some of which may be strongly (i.e. healthily) expressed.
5) Control
Idealism breaks one's ground floor of compassion and seeing one's self as the other, one gains an ability to de-humanize others now. From there, it's possible subject them to your personal expression of the Control Disease formed by idealisms (perfectionism, fanaticism, etc.) as a way of maintaining stability for what you have identified as yourself, which is essentially as a messenger of the Idealism you imagine.
The deeper one aligns with idealism, the more one must re-inforce the narrow view presented by the chosen idealism; excluding, ridiculing and eventually punishing those whose ideas are outside this view.
A very common symptom of cult activity (and just listen to your evening news to see how prevalent this is in our Western news media) is to imagine the horrible fate of the "fallen" former believers and talk amongst the "still faithful" about how terrible it must be to behave in such a way. This is a re-expression of control that implies going beyond the mere personal relationship one might have had with the formerly upright member. Now the "fallen" former member assumes a sort of 'cosmic inhuman' quality, where not even God could love this fallen personage.
I expressly don't want to confuse here positive control with negative control. Negative control is seen here as one where the rajasic nature of the mind projects one's ideals onto others, or even everyone. This can include languages or behaviors.
6) Addiction
Addiction comes as a last resort to failed or imperfect Control Behaviors, a lack of integrating and accepting choices or resistance from those being controlled (including one's self). One then goes back and re-affirms and re-establishes another or several other attachments to the tenets of the chosen Idealism. A total lack of understanding of the motivations of those who would not feel or subscribe to the same narrow viewpoint is had and repetitions of such behaviors begins.
Even where the person sees that this or that former idealism (such as drug, sex, or alcohol addictions) didn't serve them, they tend to assign the problem to the idealism chosen rather than the choice of idealism and then the control behaviors that follow it in a general sense.
7) Destruction
The essential result of this addiction, which is fed by addictions in various guises, be it drugs, war, profit or anything else. Often, this destruction can come in the form of destruction of one's relationships or one's own self physically, materially; or they can be "externalized" into the environment in the form of companions personally or in political terms. It can also happen in terms of one’s own destruction and death. One can dig one’s self into a hole that one cannot escape, like this man:
Expansion and Contraction
Throughout modern life, we will move in cycles between all these states. The cycle of separation can never sustain itself infinitely or it leads to a destructive impulse to the world around (like in the case of a Hitler or a Pol Pot) or one's self. Still, given the nature of our underlying spiritual lives, we can often learn enough to reverse this process again and head back up the ladder. The systematic process of undoing these phases of separation is called Yoga, and it has eight states or maturities.
With Yoga, these phases can begin to happen in the reverse order from what I have described and in a more effective manner; gradually undoing the negative direction this article has described as time goes on. Maturity sets in. When enough time has progressed to begin to see the madness and insanity of what these phases are doing we have realizations that lead to greater understanding of ourselves personally.
In a larger impersonal and political sense of the world, it appears that we operate in general in these cycles of expansion and contraction, influencing each other, learning as we go along, and developing ourselves toward a greater understanding even as we apparently destroy ourselves and others.
It is the hope of Yoga and my teachers before me, that we can, one person at a time, undo these cycles of separation so long understood by the ancient Yogis and spiritual aspirants across the globe.
Om Shanti,
DurgaDas
"The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honours the servant and has forgotten the gift".
Einstein
Another excellent treatise on this from a logical basis is found in the Complete Illustrated Book of Yoga by Swami Vishnu-devananda in Chapter 10, The Origin and Evolution of Prakriti.
We post this knowing full well that even in those feeling separated according to this below text are actually not separated in any way, except in their own perception, and therefore the perception of others around them. The kind of Vedanta that is the most holistic is called Advaita Vedanta- literally, “Not Two” and the main proponent of this historically was Adi Sankara. Again, meaning ‘one without a second’. This is the philosophical underpinning we espouse on this website.
The following seven steps can be applied to any undertaking where one finds ego. Ego, using willpower from a narrow focused mechanistic manner of thinking pushes us along this path of separation through misunderstanding. Here is a funny example of this:
This is a description of the ‘process’ of ego manifestation. One finds this in all walks of life, including, sadly religions. This is so prevalent now that many Westerners have come to believe that religion is synonymous with control, and reject it on the basis of that reactively. Silent Motion Yoga teachers and practitioners always are seekers of the middle way between such polarizations and it is in this spirit we present you with this.
1) God-understanding (Self-realization, Samadhi, Nirvana, etc.)
One with everything, lacks separateness or identification with body, mind, etc., holistic in nature, compassion, kindness, and love are present. Internal focus sees all external things as mere reflections of internal reality.
Right brained, as in infants, or God-realized people (although Self-realization give one the capacity to think fully on both sides of the brain, while maintaining a root in the right brain). Varying degrees of capability regarding left brain function ranging from genius level intelligence (for example, Swami Sivananda could keep 16 minds busy at one time transcribing his thoughts) to unconscious switching into Samadhi, to the point of needing constant caretaking (for example, Sri Ramakrishna).
2) Misidentification As Separate From God
"God is dead."- Nietzsche
The main misidentification being the feeling/thought/idea that one is separate from God, Nature, other people and things, etc.; focus and energy changes from identifying with internal to the external now being considered real; left brained, still can maintain some varied periods of balanced internal/external understanding.
Ego becomes present, which is structurally contained in the left side of the brain. The need to be different than one is in the face of parents or social stresses tends to exacerbate this problem. Ego then drives all remaining distinctions hereafter, perpetually arrogating it's left-brained, or separatist, agenda. This is usually based on inherited shame from parental figures and a growing body awareness, reinforced by society, friends, and excess of media input and advertising.
3) Attachment
Narrowed EXTERNAL focus onto few objects or one as "mine", like the body or possessions, left brained, begins a denial of one's internal reality of Self, or interconnectedness with others. Shame inherited becomes more deeply and unconsciously rooted. What becomes important now is "my land", "my wife", even "my guru" or "my God".
Clearly, battles among religions, or even within religions(!) are found here. Battling nation-states and patriotism are also found at this level and are carried forward into the idealism stage, when one "identifies" with some religion.
I must note here that even gangs use this attachment or "brotherhood" feeling of belonging to carry out their agendas, later found to be a patho-ideal.
What I am pointing out here is not a value judgement, but rather a statement of observation of the reality of the human mind's journey, that later must be reversed.
4) Idealism
Creation of personal or group "rules" for maintaining attachment/ external focus in a personal or external mythology. This patho-myth tends to lack the recognition of how the external focus is changing the internal landscape of one's thoughts, leading to almost exclusive focus on left-brain, facts, details about facts, etc.
Because these rules never meet with reality and one's focus has previously been narrowed unnecessarily, one can strive harder to meet the constraints of this idealism, ironically motivated by the stress of further separation from one's True Self.
Our Western culture is chock FULL of examples of this. It is our single prevalent influence now. Everything from Apple Computer's computer cult to people pledging allegiance to certain brands of clothing falls into this.
It's the driving force behind advertising and people's difficulty with religion, corporate structures and the general malaise of meaning we find ourselves in today. NO IDEALOGY FITS YOU. So one feels left out by a constant stream of idealisms to choose from and nothing seems to just allow you to be yourself.
Ideals never fully meet the reality of this illusory and phenomenal life that has many gray areas and is constantly in flux and changing.
Even where some things do not change, it can be argued that our current culture very rarely recognizes such lasting things. Especially in view of the constant bombardment with factual information. One's reality can be skewed to think that all information is of equal value, thereby lessening the value of any unchanging experiences one might have, even where that experience is satisfying and relevant.
Even where one is apparently seeing the world in a specific way and this is socially acceptable, there tends to be a continuous and outsized reinforcement mentally and socially of one's identification in a narrow area (being Catholic or other religion, gay, feminist, left-ist, Mac user, PC user, etc.). These influences, by their heavy-handed (and to my view unneeded) reinforcement they tend to produce control behaviors.
The real problem here is one of mixing up weakly expressed versions of personal internal ideals or ways of behaving with "similar" (but not the identically same) external strategies employed by others, some of which may be strongly (i.e. healthily) expressed.
5) Control
Idealism breaks one's ground floor of compassion and seeing one's self as the other, one gains an ability to de-humanize others now. From there, it's possible subject them to your personal expression of the Control Disease formed by idealisms (perfectionism, fanaticism, etc.) as a way of maintaining stability for what you have identified as yourself, which is essentially as a messenger of the Idealism you imagine.
The deeper one aligns with idealism, the more one must re-inforce the narrow view presented by the chosen idealism; excluding, ridiculing and eventually punishing those whose ideas are outside this view.
A very common symptom of cult activity (and just listen to your evening news to see how prevalent this is in our Western news media) is to imagine the horrible fate of the "fallen" former believers and talk amongst the "still faithful" about how terrible it must be to behave in such a way. This is a re-expression of control that implies going beyond the mere personal relationship one might have had with the formerly upright member. Now the "fallen" former member assumes a sort of 'cosmic inhuman' quality, where not even God could love this fallen personage.
I expressly don't want to confuse here positive control with negative control. Negative control is seen here as one where the rajasic nature of the mind projects one's ideals onto others, or even everyone. This can include languages or behaviors.
6) Addiction
Addiction comes as a last resort to failed or imperfect Control Behaviors, a lack of integrating and accepting choices or resistance from those being controlled (including one's self). One then goes back and re-affirms and re-establishes another or several other attachments to the tenets of the chosen Idealism. A total lack of understanding of the motivations of those who would not feel or subscribe to the same narrow viewpoint is had and repetitions of such behaviors begins.
Even where the person sees that this or that former idealism (such as drug, sex, or alcohol addictions) didn't serve them, they tend to assign the problem to the idealism chosen rather than the choice of idealism and then the control behaviors that follow it in a general sense.
7) Destruction
The essential result of this addiction, which is fed by addictions in various guises, be it drugs, war, profit or anything else. Often, this destruction can come in the form of destruction of one's relationships or one's own self physically, materially; or they can be "externalized" into the environment in the form of companions personally or in political terms. It can also happen in terms of one’s own destruction and death. One can dig one’s self into a hole that one cannot escape, like this man:
Expansion and Contraction
Throughout modern life, we will move in cycles between all these states. The cycle of separation can never sustain itself infinitely or it leads to a destructive impulse to the world around (like in the case of a Hitler or a Pol Pot) or one's self. Still, given the nature of our underlying spiritual lives, we can often learn enough to reverse this process again and head back up the ladder. The systematic process of undoing these phases of separation is called Yoga, and it has eight states or maturities.
With Yoga, these phases can begin to happen in the reverse order from what I have described and in a more effective manner; gradually undoing the negative direction this article has described as time goes on. Maturity sets in. When enough time has progressed to begin to see the madness and insanity of what these phases are doing we have realizations that lead to greater understanding of ourselves personally.
In a larger impersonal and political sense of the world, it appears that we operate in general in these cycles of expansion and contraction, influencing each other, learning as we go along, and developing ourselves toward a greater understanding even as we apparently destroy ourselves and others.
It is the hope of Yoga and my teachers before me, that we can, one person at a time, undo these cycles of separation so long understood by the ancient Yogis and spiritual aspirants across the globe.
Om Shanti,
DurgaDas