Speaking of self-love can sound narcissistic when you think about it. That’s because thinking as the “I-ego” is self-centered. Using the I-ego pronoun expresses the self as unique, a separate existence that must perpetuate itself, its past uniqueness, into the future. The I-ego is based on the division between my self-center and everything else in the universe as the other. It is the source of conflict between the environment and the result of the environment: my created I-ego, which is uniquely concerned with its physical security, emotional certainty, and spiritual immortality—to survive and avoid suffering in this ungodly world.
In truth, selfless, unconditional love arises only when the I-ego disappears, as the separate self in thought is no longer required; when the self disappears, only Love remains.
So, how does the self disappear, you may ask? The I-ego does disappear; it is dissolved by the penetrating light of awareness shining on my thinking. The light of awareness, when switched on, shines a light on the endless train of thoughts—one after another—flowing in psychological time from the darkness of my past to some imagined brighter destination in the future. When the light of awareness gets intense enough, it becomes a laser that can blow up the T&T (Time and Thinking) Railroad to derail my thoughts and stop my thinking. When the thinking train is derailed by awareness, thinking stops, time stops, and the I-ego disappears. Awareness replaces the damaged railway with transcendence from thinking to meditation. Awareness is a disruption in thinking caused by focusing on calming my thoughts or through the immediacy of intense mental conflict or physical crisis with my environment. This intense focus of attention disrupts the horizontal timeline of continual thoughts at a point of urgency, where awareness dissolves the I-ego, opening the timeless vertical dimension of the silent, eternal present moment. Awareness dissolves the ego from blocking the flow of life energy through my heart to my unburdened mind.
This awakening is the mind’s transcendence from thinking to true understanding—creative intelligence.
Sustaining that awareness, literally, over physical time allows meditation to happen—a flowering of the creative intelligence of the mind, unburdened by the past and unified with the ever-present physical sensations of the body that is always connected, in constant discovery with the ever-changing environment of life arising in the eternal present moment.
As J. Krishnamurti explains: “So, to find out what is true, what is the significance of life, what is immortality—without which life becomes a chaotic triviality, a senseless, blind suffering—you must have intelligence, and to awaken that intelligence you must strip the mind and heart of stupidities.”
The I-ego, Krishnamurti continues: “that consciousness is the essence of acquisitiveness of ‘mine.’ This limited consciousness is the very root and cause of stupidity, suffering. One of its manifestations is the constant craving for security; security in the realm of one’s entire being, physically, emotionally, and mentally.”
When the I-ego disappears, by letting go, there is freedom from all the survival programs of my past (memories of unresolved feelings that have yet to be surrendered) stored in my thinking mind, based on fear, that creates division from everything around me—the cause of endless conflict and suffering from which I will use anything outside of me to try and escape. When I-ego disappears, by letting go, there is freedom from attachments—the constant craving for security, certainty, and immortality, and freedom from fear of losing my identity, possessions, and existence—the ultimate fear of death. When I-ego disappears, my addiction to thinking ends. The end of thought is my release from the prison created by my memories: the intellectual prison of what I remember and how I have adjusted to survive my environment in the past. As the guide I-ego uses for survival to adapt to my living environment now—all of my substance addictions have been rooted in my addiction to thinking.
Substance addictions are in “addition” to my addiction to thinking.
My addiction to thinking, I-ego, uses substances to escape my prison created by not letting go of thoughts associated with negative feelings from my past that have not been completely surrendered. When the self disappears, there is letting go of those painful memories that can bring freedom from substance addiction through awareness of my thinking. The laser-focused attention of awareness dissolves cravings for additional substances to escape from the prison of being trapped in my thinking.
Finally, self-love is reclaimed when I-ego accepts all my flaws and limitations to the point of unconditional acceptance where the self-in thought disappears, and only Love remains. The unconditional Love we freely share with others to make this world more loving, compassionate, and God-like—our true Self-nature.
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