Ego Death

The term 'ego-death' originated in Buddhism and Hinduism, and is a description of a small part of the after-Kensho state - 'Kensho' meaning an initial glimpse of enlightenment (Kensho is not full enlightenment as some believe). It's rare for Kensho to lead to a full and permanent condition of ego-death, but higher versions of it (more closely akin to what's called 'Satori', a permanent resting in awareness of what is found in enlightenment) will usually do the job. Ego-death isn't arrived at by intellectual understandings, but gained by the knowledge of the true nature of ultimate reality that is experienced in Kensho/Satori. You don't have Kensho and then, with your knowledge, think, 'ah well,mind, body, ego, do not matter, so now I can have ego-death', it comes with the experience. You come out of it and, if it has been deep enough you emerge with suddenly inherent compassion, knowledge and a total loss of self (ego-death).

The experience of it isn't really what many believe and it may sound less than desirable, as it means a loss of self and to some extent the need and ability to interact in a normal way with others. I experienced Satori 14 years ago and it took me about 8 to be able to begin working again and talking to people in the same way that I had before and to be able to seem normal. What 'you' are goes. I can't stress enough that what you are, how you think, what you want, see and feel is no longer the same. Who I was literally died. To some extent that might sound wonderful, as it does come with a sense of peace and bliss, but on the other hand you have also to try and cope with family who don't understand, trying to work in the real world and balance that with just wanting to do not very much except know what you know.

Desire of every kind disappears, including for sex. People will usually stop dressing appropriately, get rid of all their belongings, some even stop washing. You're in a state where you need nothing more, of any kind, and would gladly sit in a cupboard or a rock in the desert, or a cinema, because you feel and see there is no distinction between any of these locations. Nothing is different anywhere, you stay the same - happy and here - so there's no need for anything to make your life better, or more interesting. You do things becasue...why not? You just act without volition or a need for a goal.

I have few possessions, no money, no clothes that weren't bought 15 years ago, no phone, car, etc.- what could I possibly want with them? Again all well and good, but if I didn't now work for myself it would be nigh on impossible for me to get work. Everything goes.

TBH, I've never met anyone who has reached it through psychedelics. Usually when people talk about in that context they aren't describing the ego-death of enlightenment.

Hope this helps,
MelT

 

It's horrifying. Literally, horrifying. Even dying (because you can't witness your own death) is not as scary as ego-death, I'm convinced. Could possibly be the worst thing on the planet as far as the human psyche (mine anyway) is concerned.

Edit: Just wanted to add, you'll also realize that 'no one' experiences ego death, because you'll see you dont exist That image you hold of yourself, isn't real. Saying these things in public could get you thrown in a mental ward, but it's the truth..

 

I didn't find it to be a scary event at all TBH, it felt, and still feels, like the most natural thing in the world. But, one of the reasons I choose to post here openly on the subject and talk about aspects that others won't is that there are many people who may not necessarily themselves be bothered by it as an experience, but their response to it has certainly negatively affected those around them. I know of one case of someone in Ireland who was put into a mental home for 14 years because he wouldn't deny it as a real experience to his doctors. It's a very misunderstood event.

MelT

 

Ego death is freedom in its purest form.

What I experienced through psychedelics is basically a rebirth, your chance to become whoever you want to become. What I experienced through persistent meditation was a shedding of layers of who I thought I was, to realize that the only thing that makes us think we are all seperated are our bodies. To realize that there isn't a "me" or a "you" in essence, but a one that is broken up into "yous" and "mes".

 

I think you went through the same thing I did while on LSD, which I believe was not letting go of the ego while on the onset of ego death, leading to what seems like a very,very scary experience, yet, at the moment, seems also very,very real. I'm not sure if my experience was an actual sign of ego death, but there was a point probably 2 hours into the trip where I felt like nothing, nothing to identify with that created "me", which was quite frightening and I was unable to "let go" to the experience. I've come to the conclusion through readings on the subject that due to not letting go (in my situation due to the unfamiliar setting and no reassurance that "letting go" would actually be of service) during this ego death period, that I tried clinging to my ego for a sense of "me", which is an un-winnable battle during ego death and the only outcome is very deep fear or even a sense of death or upcoming death, but this depends on each persons actual fears.

Basically I think I tried to hold on to the ego during ego death which proved disastrous, creating a sense of fear which seemed 100% real. But if I had been in a setting where I was almost 100% sure nothing would go wrong and had simply let go and succumbed to the experience, I believe the period of ego death would have been a very meaningful one to experience and to take from.

I dislike using the term ego death as matter of fact though, since I'm not really sure if what I experienced was actually ego death/ego death gone wrong. Any opinions would be appreciated.

 

I have never experienced ego death through meditation. For me i really feel i need a tool to aid. i wish my mind could do all the work but im just not quite there yet. i find salvia is a very good tool in the situation of personal insight or ego death. my last trip was enlightening. i saw everything infinitely and even saw that reality as we know it is skewed, fake. i flew over life. i saw infinite universes all the exact same. luckily i was able to let myself go and not fight against this. i felt lost in a way, trying to find my way back "home". i pulled myself back in through one of the universes. The trip was so real. Even days after i still feel that it was true and that i was seeing truth in its purest form. Every time i think about it, its just so unbelievable. I believe i experienced ego death. i left a part of me back in my trip i can tell. I do feel content with the world because i am certain life consists of infinite space in which everything can be repeated an infinite amount of times.

 

If you meditate, start doing excercises to make yoursef angry then back to happy then to another emotion. Being in touch with your true self the closer you are.

 

The most profound thing about enlightenment is the realization that it was there all along. Accepting it is the hardest part.

It is impossible to describe, for it is beyond language.
It is impossible to convey, for it is beyond sound.

It is not beyond experience though, it is possible to live it.

Having said this, I do want to give you some caution though, it is not some mystical, magical place of all-knowing. Bkadoctaj once told me "Enlightenment is a lonely path", and I would have to agree with him.

It will happen when it happens, not when you expect it to happen. Hope this helps man.

 

Damn Melt, you scared me there a little bit. 8 years to regain 'normalcy'? For real? Like I dunno, I have this deep curiosity for psychedelics, but at the same time I don't wanna feel so far separated from the rest of the world like that. Part of me wants to keep the 'me' that I know; the desires and fulfillment and satisfaction of simple everyday life. The satisfaction of working or the excitement of a party. Yet the other part of me wants to really delve deep into the world of psychedelics. I dunno.

 

All influence, all pressure, just simply fades away.

It's like becoming yourself for the very first time.

Life is presented in a completely new manner.

 

I didn't reach it on psychedelics BTW.

I should stress that it wasn't and isn't a horrible experience, far from it. What was you goes, in every respect, but you aren't left an empty shell and devoid of life. Nobody truly ever comes back though, it took me 8 years to be able to work again really, and to be able to create a normal enough persona to show when I have to work and talk to other people. But 'MelT' is long gone, I don't have his mind anymore. Looking back it's like remembering someone else's memories from an oddly dreamlike standpoint.

I still have satisfaction in life, in experiencing though rather than through any specific event. There are no better or worse emotions, they're all good to feel and to see for what they are. I have now, I can't think of anything that could be better, or fuller. Imagine...this is hard to give an analogy...but that literally looking at reality you see something vivid and flowing, but it isn't out there around you. There is no inside and outside, just experience and movement/non-movement. It 'sparkles', but not in a way I can describe, just with its presence.

It sounds contradictory, but I have no desire for pleasure, because I have both pleasure/not pleasure all the time and it's meaningless to want anything else. I can still enjoy, love, strive if I want to, but the wanting is under my own control now, not under its. I am what I want to be, but I don't need to be anything, that is the freedom. There is no me, and there never was, so nothing can be lost.

Sorry, rambling now. Basically it's not as bad as it sounds. It's worse, and better

MelT

 

Good post

I would agree that it isn't a mystical, magical or even divine place - but it certainly is a place of all-knowing, that's what makes it enlightenment. Enlightenment is the gaining of knowledge of all knowables. Knowing the one, thus knowing the all. The two levels of basic Kensho are divided into two realms of knowledge. If it's of interest to you or anyone else, check out the Five Degrees of Tozan, it's good guidance to inner and outer realisation, a kind of standard work on testing realisation for some schools.

You can certainly have small glimpses of Kensho though without knowldge, they're just not complete and counted as realisation. Still stunning and life-changing though.

MelT

 

Sorry, perhaps I worded my statement wrong the place of all-knowing isn't mystical and magical, but it is all-knowing, even of things beyond knowledge. Hope that clears it up a bit

Edit: Knowing all is knowing Nothing. If you want your cup filled, you must first empty it. The emptiest cup is the fullest of all; so the journey to find it all and to know everything ultimately results in complete emptiness, which is the fullest of all things.

11.

Thirty spokes meet at a nave;
Because of the hole we may use the wheel.
Clay is moulded into a vessel;
Because of the hollow we may use the cup.
Walls are built around a hearth;
Because of the doors we may use the house.
Thus tools come from what exists,
But use from what does not.

 

I agree with this. I was completely against LSD and Shrooms and one night while I was drunk a good friend who ive known my whole life convinced me to try 2 hits of LSD and i became fascinated, but after the trip hadn't still come to the full realization of what I was meddling with. So i tried it again at a friends house. 5 Hits hits of some good LSD (2 we think were bunk) so 3 good hits. I had some incredible realizations while tripping some so incredible about the true nature of reality and the true nature of how the human mind works. I sometimes had thoughts that EVERY person on earth is TRIPPING all the time to an extent. We are all crazy in a controlled and saine manner if that makes sense. Every persons brain is like a sponge and is affected by their surroundings and the people they interact with every day, LSD just makes you much more sensitive to this changes on a much more drastic level while accelerating your though process to let you think deeply from all angles about all subjects. Sometimes this can be frightening because you find yourself steamrolling on eaither scary, paranoid, or even such real thoughts about what we are and how the world is just "like a ride in an amusement park" nowadays that you are frightened beacuse everything you knew and everything that makes you you is just a culmination of the events in your life shaping your mind. As bill hicks put it "We are all dreaming all the time. We are just an imagination of ourselves".

To get to the point of ego death now. After this trip i somehow was able to let it go for a short while even though I had so many questions and so many mental hurdles (not in a bad way neccessarily) because of my experiences. However I let the trip go for a little while and was "normal" and "me" around my friends and family, at least I think so, untill a while later when I started thinking about my LSD experience a lot. I started questioning myself and saying am i really "me"? It started to bother me and to this day I think about if and how the expereince has changed me from the minute I wake up till the minute I go to sleep at night. Sometimes ill let it get to me and ill get some social anxiety because I feel like im not interacting with people the same and there is no me etc..Everyone is their own imaginitve character and personality, and I dont feel empowered, just enlightened and I let it get the best of me. Then I started reading about ego death and felt like that was my problem child. I considered seeing a psychologist just to help take my mind of the experience.

However, ive been doing better lately because I have discovered that you can return to normal and rebuild yourself just they way you were before (yet more enlightened if you just take the positive parts of the trip with you) if you can just not think about the "big picture" all the time and just focus on the little things of your day.

Also, another thing that has been helping me return to normal is to cut WAY back on smoking weed, which is sad cuz i love the reefer, however it does intesify acid trips 100 times and it does bring the feeling of LSD back a lot, at least for me because I go into the weed high thinking about acid.

So basically the more you cut back on weed (altered mental states), and the more you distance yourself from the trip, the more "normal" you will become and your ego will start to return to normal. At least this is what ive been experiencing.

Its been 8 months since my first LSD experience and about 7 since I last took it. As of now i will never be taking it again.

As I like to put it my experiences on LSD were the abosolute best, and absolute worst times of my life. Its like being a child everything is new and fun, but at the same time its a very powerful mind altering drug and EVERYONE REACTS DIFFERENTLY! IE. Some people arnt very philosphical and dont think much about life and reality etc so if your not seeking enlightenment you are much less likely to explore these thoughts and just have a colorful trippy ride, and are much less likely to open that can of worms.

For me ego destruction was horrific. I was always a good kid, and I did go through a point in my life where I was slightly depressed and had a slight social anxiety for different reasons. Then I started gaining weight, lifting, getting healthier and doing MUCH better. I became very comfortable in social situations again and returned to normal. I was no longer depressed and doing very well and was very happy and people for the most part enjoyed being around me. Then the acid trips happened and it opened a whole new bag of issues and I became paranoid that I had permanetly fucked my head up and I would never be the same. This is not the way to think. Lately I got optimistic, backed away from weed, and started to feel like myself again. My ego is slowly returning to normal and Im starting to move on with my life. You may have intesnse realizations, and some people cope better then others, but the thing to remember is that life is still awesome and if your ego does get detached from you, its possible for you to distance yourself from the trips and move on. (Then again ive never take 20 hits at once so idk what effect that would have on someone and god knows I would NEVER want to find out.) Everyone has an LSD limit and you just need to know when enough is enough.

Bottom line, if your going into LSD with prior knowlege that ego death is a real possibilty and youve dont reasearch on negative effects etc. then you should understand you will probably think about this stuff while tripping and thats probably not a good thing. Acid can make you very paranoid over thinks you shouldnt be paranoid about. The best trip I had was my first trip because I had done ZERO research and went into it very excited.


Any questions? Comments would be appreciated.

 

Alright, first off, i agree with whomever it was that posted something along the lines of "it is inexpressible in words." So I can't say if what I had was ego death or not.. What happened to me was what it was, and to sum it up in a couple of words is impossible. What I can do, however, is at least give a general idea in a much larger amount of words.

My second time taking acid, I had an experience just short of horrifying. That was about 3 months ago, and I wouldn't say I'm back to "normal"-- that is, how i was before the trip. Actually, I don't think I'll ever be like i was before that trip. And I don't think that's a bad thing, either. I really can't say what caused my frightening reaction to the acid, but I can speculate that I probably realized and felt some things about my being which simply didn't seem right. I think that I came to see how unhappy I was, how "not myself" I always was on a daily basis. And after the trip I felt like I lost myself, which felt like I didn't know how I got here or who I was. I looked at a picture of myself from elementary school and felt like that me was gone forever, like I'd somehow just been thrown into this present moment randomly.

And now I'm beginning to see that loosing the old "me" was probably the best thing to happen to me. That is, as long as I don't fall back into ways of being that aren't authentic. I'd say that I probably experienced what people call ego death. If it happens to you, you have my compassion. With some strength it may be the greatest thing to happen thus far in your life.

 

Well Sean_Daily420 do you regret using psychedelics? Do you wish you never experienced ego death?

And how does it affect your thought process? Like, do you think about life a lot; do you think about the 'bigger picture' a lot? I ask because I went through an unbearable fuckass depression(unrelated to psychedelics)--and through this whole time, probably 2 years, it was impossible for me to live in the moment. I analyzed the shit out of life, society, the 'bigger picture.' I just miss being able to live in the moment; my mind is always racing--like a philisophical thinker or something. I mentioned this because I'm just sick of thinking about life, and it seems like I'm finally getting myself back together, where I can actually feel emotion again. I don't want a psychedelic experience to fuck me back into that shit I went through for 2 years.

Yet at the same time, I have this huge curiosity for psychedelics, ego-death, etc, that I think it's just my destiny to see what it's all about.

 

Id say before the "ego issues" i was pretty "authentic". I was still very down to earth and brutally honest about things, in a good way. I would make people laugh a lot and was even told I should go into stand up by some people (im not trying sounds cocky or pompous or anything I'm just stating this for the purposes of this discussion). Post "ego break" id say i got mixed up in the head. I also would look back to my early years and think "what would the old me do or say in this situation", instead of just saying what came to mind. In a way I started second guessing myself when trying to be social, which caused me social anxiety. However, ive learned that if I just dont think twice, and take my mind off of it then im myself again. And the more i practice this the more the effects of the trip diminish as if it has a half life to it.

I also agree that feelings and thoughts expereinced while under the influence of LSD are hard to put into words considered the complexity of the expereince. This is also why I believe when people have negative or just outright strange and confusing expereinces on LSD it takes them a very long time to sort their thoughts out post trip.

 

You and I would be damn good freinds!

Yes, now I do regret taking psychedelics. Although I did learn a lot, and It did open my eyes to many things, I would say overall I learned things about the human mind and headed down a path that I now wish I wouldn't have.

I did think about the "big picture" a decent amount before I got into psychedelics. However, I would say that it was containable in the sense that I could have deep thoughts about the meaning of life and analyze society etc. but as soon as I was with friends or with other people I had no problem living in the moment. I was able to enjoy the moment and not think twice about something being "wrong" with my mind or the way I was acting. It wasn't until my second acid trip that I had a ton of "thinking" time. After this I found myself analyzing all social and non social situations of my life from a philosophical standpoint, sometimes more intense then others. Very rarely would I be enraptured by the moment enough to forget about all that stuff long enough to be just myself living the moment normally. Then after a short period of "living in the moment" i would snap back and say "well i just was completely normal for ten minutes" and then say "well fuck here I go again over-analyzing". However (this could be all in my head but at least its been helping) I felt like every time i smoked weed the thought process I wanted to get away from (big picture thinking) would be refueled if that makes sense. So, I stopped smoking for weeks at a time and felt a huge improvement. I would be able to just live moment to moment without really a) thinking about that stuf and b) If I did start to have "big picture" thoughts I would easily be able to ignore them and by practicing this over and over I would feel more and more normal every day.

Then last night I made of the mistake of smoking a grav of chronic to the face and completely tripped myself out. It was horrible. It was also a nice reminder of why I stopped smoking in the first place so now im back to rollin sober.

*Edit: I would like to add that I cant even say for sure that I had a complete "ego death". It could have been partial, very temporary, or even all in my head because of the tons of research I tend to do. However one thing is for certain I let my mind get the best of me because of it and as cage puts it "paranoia fucks with the mind!". haha