No Self, No Limits.

Who are you underneath it all?

One of the reasons that the illusion of the self is so persistent, is that it’s easier to imagine that there are many “self”s in the head than it is to recognise that there is no self at all. There’s the confident self, the happy self, the shy self, the insecure self, all of them feel real and at times all-consuming, all of them appear repeatedly and consistently in our minds in ways that make them feel familiar, even comfortable. I mean, who would we even be without all of these characters?

For instance, someone who is trying to motivate themselves might notice that there’s a “self” in their mind who doesn’t want to do anything. A voice, telling them to give up or masturbate or start tomorrow. This unmotivated person might briefly see this aspect of themselves clearly as a character that is playing in their minds rather than continuing to mistake it for who they are.

But then they might notice that there’s a different voice in there too. Perhaps the one that encouraged this self-examination in the first place. This voice is in conflict with the unmotivated character and wants the person being possessed by it to overcome it. To stop making excuses. It counters the unmotivated character’s reasons to procrastinate with reasons to persevere. The unmotivated person might be able to see this as a character inside…