Thread: Compulsive thinking, and how to getrid of this? Ego death

Hello, everyone. I'm sure most of you has come across the so-called 'ego death' ot 'ego loss' phenomenon. During the experience you realise, or at least believe you are, one and united with the rest of the universe, and actually thinking in terms I/you doesn't make sense. It is a liberating feeling.

Some people have claimed to have achieved this state, either temporarily or permanently. Here is an account of Eckhart Tollle from his Power of Now:

"I couldn’t live with myself any longer. And in this a question arose without an answer: who is the ‘I’ that cannot live with the self? What is the self? I felt drawn into a void. I didn’t know at the time that what really happened was the mind-made self, with its heaviness, its problems, that lives between the unsatisfying past and the fearful future, collapsed. It dissolved."

Tolle recalls going out for a walk in London the next morning, and finding that “everything was miraculous, deeply peaceful. Even the traffic."

I had the experiece as well. Sadly enough, only after drugs - salvia - few times, and even marijuana brought me into a state kind of ego loss.

How about you?

Now, I write about ego loss because I believe that the ego is the thing that causes this incessant gibbering in your mind. That's not my idea, Tolle wrote about that, and I agree. I'm sure most of you know what I'm talking about, as being interested in lucid dreaming, you surely have also tried meditation, relaxation techniques and so on. Ad during these mental excercises you have surely realised that there is a constant voice in your head that basically will never shut up. 'I'm meditatig- stop thinking''ok, I stop' few secods 'nice, few seconds without thinking, good''shut up, you moron''oh no once again I'm blaming myself for not being able to switch off thinker mode' and so on. It does not neccesarily use words, you may only think the thought instead of saying it in your head, but it's the same thing.

So, why do we think so much? I watched a film on youtube, where a guy stated that it is impossible to stop thinking through thinking, etc. Just try to convince yourself out of thinking, during meditation, for example, convince yourself it is stupid to think - impossible - all you can do is just stop thinking. You've got to go beyond. And he said on the film: What is the cause of thought? Desire. Just watch yourself and realise that all you think about is connected to a desire, directly or indirectly. So to stop thinking one has to give up desire.

I completely agree with all of that. But this knowledge doesn't help. I've read Tolle's Power of Now. And what? Didn't help, although I understand perfectly what he's talking about, I can't assimilate it into my life.

It's not that I want to get any enlightenment or so on, I just got enough of myself, just like Tolle did. I suffered from depression, not long ago, now I'm slowly snapping out of it, but it is possible that maybe it is not depression , but something chronic, only now realised after I've done some stupid things.

I try to meditate. Doesn't help. I just want to get rid of that constant mental noise. And sit on a bench in front of my house and listen to bird singing. Any advice?

The dude of youtube is very right. Don't bother trying to stop thinking, because it's part of life. It's like trying to stop the body's heart from beating.

Thinking arises because of many inherent reasons, and they are all purported for your survival. Fear, anger, grief, desire, pride - just to name a few, are the primitive drives that fuel the typical human mind, not just desire. Because of the way the mind is structured - you will always seek something better, hence never find happiness. This is how you will survive, but for most of those people who have chosen the path to discover real, perfect happiness will give up the illusion of the journey for survival. I am not saying you will physically die when happiness is found, but life just becomes recontextualized so that survival seems like a meaningless dream.

Peace is revealed by not becoming attached to thinking, not by denying or trying to stop it. Trying to stop thinking probably makes it worse - because you are focused on thinking not to think. Getting enamored of thinking is like blocking the awareness of that peace that is always available. When you see that this disturbed peace is synonymous with other beings, you begin to feel greater and greater compassion.

Drugs, in a blunt sense, simply suppress the endless drag of thoughts so the higher states of awareness prevail. They have nothing to do with what's in the actual drug. Contrary to popular belief, drugs reflect valid states of experience that can be arrived at without them.

So meditate often. Don't expect anything major to happen in a few days. It is all in the long-term, and how much changes depends on your willingness to change and not make excuses. The way I meditate is by seeing thoughts - but not getting caught in them. I.e. Becoming non-attached to them, by not dwelling or re-enforcing their seeming reality. In this sense you become more of a witness - a witness that merely observes but doesn't get involved in the drama, that doesn't take every perception as reality. When it's hard to let something go, you meditate on it and question it until it falls away; the problem having been resolved or recognized.

I think, because I am.

EDIT:: It is actually ‘I think, therefore i am’. This was said by some famous Greek guy. Will post soon.

You could also try to focus your thought. Things like breathing excerises are good. You focus on breathing, and it will empty your mind of all other thoguhts, and you can meditate. The other meditation techniques that work, is you allow thoughts to come and go, and if you don't focus on any, you wont get distracted by them.

http://www.youtube.com/user/EckhartT.../0/hbj4nLOPN8o - this is great, and is somehow connected to freeing yourself from the ego.

I watched some more of his videos, and during one of them something kind of clicked in in me, an understanding of something. Basically speaking, I'm finally grasping this concept of being a conscious observer, a witness of all that's happening. Well, I've got a metaphore or image, whatever you call it, of my own about this 'observer state', and maybe it will be helpful to you as well.

Imagine that you are still. Outside of time. World passes by. You are outside of this world, and it is only like a movie being played. You are this awareness that is still, unchanging. Think about time, this will help. You are outside of it. Virtually. You are always in the now, in the present moment. There is no past, no future. Past and future just happen. But you are always here and now, and just watch the world (including yourself and your flow of thoughts and emotions) pass by, and enjoy it like a good movie. Hope this helps.

Originally Posted by hgld1234

I think, because I am.

EDIT:: It is actually ‘I think, therefore i am’. This was said by some famous Greek guy. Will post soon.

Its Cicero and hes roman . "Cogito ergo sum".

I cant ever remember having this problem. I dont think ive ever gone through ego death either. So I certainly cant empathize with what your going through, but I would say keep using the hallucinogens and also use meditation. Use both as a tool. Salvia would be good just make sure its of proper potency, I would suggest something like mesacline or DMT though.

You can drown out excessive thinking by drinking in more of your surroundings. In Castaneda's book, Don Juan advised him to take in as much peripheral vision as he could while walking to induce "inner silence". This can include visual, audio, and physical sensations. Basically what you want to do do stabilize a dream.

I feel you Nick89, i am the same way

excessive thinking....fear of being successful, looking cool, etc. ?. There are days when I lay down and try to just listen to everything in the house, like the fridge..the fan, the birds outside..but it's always interrupted by some useless thought, followed by another and another....and not only that but i'm aware of it...so it's louder than when you are walking around and your doing it unconsciously.

When I used to smoke weed a lot, the thoughts were ten-fold.....the more I smoked and started actually paying attention to my surroundings and relaxed, I "woke up"..and the excessive thinking went away. I could stare at the sky as the sun was setting and it was like i was reborn and i was seeing it for the first time. Like a dream or something. The only way of getting to this state is through the fear I think....but once you do it the ego is not there anymore, you basically vibe with everything and everyone.

I was only at this state for a little while, the fear quickly returned. Even worse when i stopped smoking.

It's like the cusp said the only way to drown out the thinking is to take in your surroundings...focusing on breathing and being aware is the right way.

I also forgot to mention deep breathing. It is probably the most beneficial thing you can come across.

Racing thoughts and compulsive thinking is a result of anxiety, acute manic episodes, and or paranoia, fear. etc., etc. It was ten-fold when i smoked weed. I'm now able to relieve the cannabis-induced anxiety but i actually have to consciously breathe deeply, it takes a lot of effort. It works though.

But to the OP's question:

I try to meditate. Doesn't help. I just want to get rid of that constant mental noise. And sit on a bench in front of my house and listen to bird singing. Any advice?

Practice deep breathing...it's the answer to all of life's problems. You just have to relax. Deep breathing relaxes you and focuses your mind. It's scientifically documented.

Deep breathing reduces stress-if you are stressed, you breath in short, shallow bursts-To relax you do the opposite - breathing deeply

Deep breathing releases endorphins-the bodies own painkillers, into the system. This can help relieve headaches, sleeplessness, backaches and other stress related aches and pains.

Deep breathing helps to clear and focus the mind

Deep breathing strengthens weak abdominal and intestinal muscles

Deep breathing also lowers blood pressure among a host of other benefits.

I have a thread on this in beyond dreaming. Ignore the people that says deep breathing is dangerous and all this other skeptical crap.

Big thanks, Majestic.

Yeah, deep breathing is not bad, however, for me what works better is I think 61 point body relaxation, feeling my body from within, etc. Tolle's teachings have recently helped me greatly. I created a topic on his teachings, there it is somewhere in Inner Sanctum, I suppose.

Your topic on deep breathing is great, have to try that. Since now I have simply focused on my breathing while meditation but never inhaled and exhaled so fully and deepy all the time. I'm of the same opinion as you - we dismiss the potential in deep breathing. In one book of Michal Tombak (a Polish professor, a doctor, an expert in medicine, in healthy diet, he's open minded, often makes use of fringe, and he sold a few bestsellers in Poland) wrote about his encounter with one buddhist monk. He asked him: 'How to live longer and heathier?' The monk answered: 'Breathy deeply and rarely'. And Tombak claims that while healthy diet can lengthen your life by ten years, proper breathing can lengthen it by 20 years.
BTW, those who say that your practice of breathing deeply and slowly is dangerous because of hyperventilation are just riddiculous.

I'm in the same dilemma. I witness every day the damage my conditioned thinking mind is doing to myself and others, but despite over a year of trying now I can't seem to make significant progress. I've tried various drugs and meditation regimens, and have had powerful experiences/insights from them, however eventually the ego always catches up and returns me right back to baseline in the end.

I think the problem is we don't really realize the scope of the ego. After all, it is everything 'we' are. Everything we do to get rid of the ego is still the ego acting. Anything we 'do' seems to be wrong because the doer is always the ego. After realizing this I assumed that I needed simply to stop 'doing'. But making the effort to eliminate effort is still an effort. Seeking seems to be riddled with these mind-bending paradoxes.

Eventually I came across some ideas that suggest another alternative. All of our action is limited to the egoic mind, so somehow we must the mind to get beyond the mind. The way to do this is to turn the ego in on itself. Use our conscious awareness to understand ourselves as we are, not as we want ourselves to be. You can't fight the ego, only be aware of the process of ego as it is. As Ramana Maharshi said, "seek the seeker". If you have a thought, don't fight it. Instead, find out just who it is thinking that thought. If you do happen to resist or fight it, find out just who it is that is doing the fighting. After a about a week of practicing this (I just started recently), I experienced for the first time ever an immediate awareness of my thought process without actually being the thinker. This experience was the first progress I've had that feels authentic.

If anyone wants to read more (I don't really describe it very well), check out this page: http://www.hinduism.co.za/self-enq.h...y%20-%20Theory. The ideas themselves I believe come from the Advaita philosophies, which are also worth looking up. There are some great quotes to be found here: http://advaita.org/.

Also, The First and Last Freedom by J Krishnamurti gets at very similar ideas.

Thanks for tips, Speesh. I'll check out that Krishnamutri and Maharashi. Big thanks for the link.

As for fighting the ego, or trying to get rid of it... Yes, this is paradoxical, but only now have I realized that the title of my topic is absurd and foolish in a way If you're trying to get rid of the ego, or fighting it, or not accepting anything in you and would want it to be different so that there is some illusory sense of 'better future' or happiness in an abstract future, then it won't do any good for you. Now that I've watched some stuff from Tolle on youtube this is kind of obvious.

Have you heard of Eckhart Tolle? I started a topic on his teachings. I think it is his teachings that have helped me the most, recently. And he himself admits that his two biggest influences are Krishnamutri and Maharashi, too. I strongly recommend videos on youtube from Tolle's lectures, as well as the book The Power of Now.

Now I'll look at that self-enquiry thing.

Thanks for tips, Speesh. I'll check out that Krishnamutri and Maharashi. Big thanks for the link.

As for fighting the ego, or trying to get rid of it... Yes, this is paradoxical, but only now have I realized that the title of my topic is absurd and foolish in a way If you're trying to get rid of the ego, or fighting it, or not accepting anything in you and would want it to be different so that there is some illusory sense of 'better future' or happiness in an abstract future, then it won't do any good for you. Now that I've watched some stuff from Tolle on youtube this is kind of obvious.

Have you heard of Eckhart Tolle? I started a topic on his teachings. I think it is his teachings that have helped me the most, recently. And he himself admits that his two biggest influences are Krishnamutri and Maharashi, too. I strongly recommend videos on youtube from Tolle's lectures, as well as the book The Power of Now.

Now I'll look at that self-enquiry thing.

I've had great progress stopping the thoughts....or rather just focusing more on the outside world.

The key is to just relax and just be aware...it'll probally take practice, but it will get better.