The choice of "choiceless observation"

I received a few comments on the post yesterday titled "Is the selfish really selfish or stupid?" commenting that self-interest is the primary motivator for many, especially the ones who have faced tough situations in their childhood. They will naturally be driven by wealth and power. This made me ponder over the issue further. 

An example came to my mind that would probably clarify the perspective. We have cricket teams of different states that compete against each other and the finest of the layers from the state teams are selected for the national team. Once these players are selected to play for India, they become players of the Indian team and lose their state identities. Neither the players nor the spectators identify them with their states. 

Similarly, we all come to this world. Our first abode in this world is this body. That is the reason that we identify with this body the most. There would be very few in this world who do not fear death. Probably death is the most prominent fear among human beings. We all spend a significant part of our lives accumulating the ways and means to make the body comfortable like a comfortable home, a vehicle, air-conditioners, furniture, food, and clothes. We want to accumulate more and more wealth and power to ensure the availability of these comforts for our lifetime. We identify with our bodies the most and therefore body is the center of our self, at the deepest level.

We, human beings, live in family and community. Therefore, we get emotionally attached to our family and community. Unless there is a threat to the survival of the body, family and community are our strongest identifiers. Our "self" gets extended to the family and community. As we make efforts for the protection and comfort of the body, similarly, we make efforts for the protection, comfort, and promotion of our family and community. We wish to accumulate more and more wealth and power to ensure the protection, comfort, and promotion of our family and community for a long period of time. 

Now coming back to the example of cricket, like a state player losing his identity as a state player once he starts playing for the Indian team, do we lose identification with our body once we become part of a family or community? Probably not. So long as there is no threat to survival, it appears that we love our family or community more than ourselves. However, as soon as there is a threat to survival, our love for the family and community becomes secondary. I am almost sure that there would be very few Bhagat Singhs, who can sacrifice their life for the country. Not only today but at any time in the history of the world, we would find very few such persons because identification with the body is very strong. If there is discomfort in the body, it's almost impossible to ignore that. Our body and mind are so strongly tuned to react to all types of bodily discomforts. That's why it is not easy to face physical torture.

What is the root cause of this obsession with the body? It is the biology. The human body has developed, over millions of years of its evolution, a self-defense mechanism in the form of sensations. Pain is a natural mechanism to draw the attention of the brain to react and respond to the defense of the body. The moment we cut a part of the body by accident, immediately that part of the body starts paining and our attention is naturally drawn towards that part of the body and we rush for first aid. If this natural defense mechanism of the body is not functional, the body will not be able to survive such accidents and we will die of excess bleeding and several infections.

Thus, pain is a natural alarm of the body. So far so good. Moving further, we human beings evolved further and one major milestone in the process of evolution was the development of the emotional brain. We started living in family and communities. As a result of this community living, humans developed emotions towards the members of the community and family. This emotional brain makes us feel good in the company of family and community members because we feel safe. There is no threat to our body. Similarly, the company of the enemy community makes us feel uncomfortable since there is a threat to the body and we react either by being defensive or aggressive. 

Slowly, as civilizations grew more complex, these likes and dislikes did not remain limited to the family and communities. Rather they grew to more complex phenomena such as money, organizations, nations, knowledge, positions, and authorities. These likes and dislikes of the emotional brain are thus associated with family, community, money, organizations, nations, knowledge, positions, authorities, etc. Latest research in the field of neurology has revealed that these likes and dislikes also operate in the human body through body sensations. Each like has an underlying pleasant body sensation and each dislike has an underlying unpleasant body sensation. The memories of these pleasant and unpleasant sensations are stored deep in our unconscious mind which is referred to as Chitta in our scriptures. 

I recently read a book written by a leading neurologist on trauma. In “The Body Keeps the Score”, the author “Bessel Van Der Kolk”  writes in chapter 8 as follows:

“Change begins when we learn to “own” our emotional brain. This means learning to observe and tolerate the heartbreaking and gut-wrenching sensations that register misery and humiliation. Only after learning to bear what is going on inside can we start to befriend rather than obliterate, the emotions that keep our maps fixed and immutable.”

Thus the Neurology of the day also acknowledges the underlying mechanism of the emotions in the form of body-sensations. Now coming back to the question of identification with the body vs family or community, it all depends upon the strength of the sensations that have been formed by our emotional brain. Somebody may have so much love for the family or community that the underlying pleasant sensation may outweigh the unpleasant sensations due to the threat to the body. Such a person may sacrifice his life for the well-being of the family or community. 

So, in sum and substance, probably all of us love only ourselves, and since "others" make us feel secure and "loved", we extend ourselves to them and occasionally this "extension of self" becomes stronger than the "self".  But the center of our existence always remains this body and generally this "extended-self" disappears as soon as there is a threat to the body. In the moment of disaster, it's generally me first.

That paints a very gloomy picture of the world. Is the world really so gloomy? In reality, yes. That is why there are so many battles in the entire history of humanity. The rich have always oppressed the poor. There has been widespread intolerance and hatred. However, that is where spirituality comes to the rescue of the humanity. Is there something beyond this body? Quantum physics of the day has proved beyond doubt that all the sub-atomic particles come out of "a field" (which they have termed as Higgs field) and merge into the same. This process is going on millions of times a second and since this process, is happening so fast, we are not aware of this. Anyhow, the science of the day has proved that our awareness is quite limited. We can see only a very narrow band of light and listen to a very narrow band of sound waves. There are billions of micro-organisms inside our body and we are not aware of them. 

A question arises as to whether we are particles or waves. It all depends on the point of observation. In Indian traditions, there are many spiritual practices whereby we learn to observe ourselves. This is not an intellectual process. Intellect has very limited capacity. When we are talking of observation, it means direct observation of reality, without assigning any meaning to the same. For example, while practicing Vipassana, we observe different sensations in different parts of our bodies. The sensations, that are real such as itching, pain, vibrations, and so on. We observe them dissociating the meanings we have already assigned. For example, if there is a pain in the legs, we see the sensation as it is without associating pain with that. That process of choiceless observation helps us experience reality as it is. The strongest of the associations with the "self" and "extended self" start losing their strength giving way to the direct experience of reality.

Not so that by a few minutes of observation, one is freed of all the associations with the "self" and the "extended self" but the process begins. It may take years or many births to drop all the associations with the "self" and the "extended self" depending upon the strength of the associations. Every day we keep developing new associations. However, even a moment of dropping these associations is sufficient to make one realize the "true self". However, that realization almost disappears as we come back to the world of "self" and the "extended self". Still, once a person experiences the "true self", even for a second, there no longer remains any confusion regarding the choice of "choiceless observation".