I would like to open a discussion about empowerment. I believe that empowerment is what we need the most. This is my post I made at Avalon forum.
Well, I am done with New Age. To recover from this deception takes time as we have been compromised on so many levels. I am switching my focus on empowerment. Everybody of us has an inner longing to love, to be loved, to give, to deeply care about others. Sadly, many people experience deep emptiness and a hungry heart! According to research, only 10% people experience a deep emotional connections with a partner after 15 years of marriage. After 25 years of marriage, only 1%!
So, what went wrong?
I have searched for the answer for a period of time. I see a big correlation with New Age programming.
Well, my favorite part is the transcendence of the ego promoted by Eastern teachings and a new generation of “spiritual” teachers of the New Age like E. Tolle.
It is the most dangerous concept for our well being. I don’t even like to use a term the ego but the sense of self. There is a vast research that has shown that people who have a strong sense of self (ego!) are the most loving, caring, tolerant, and giving. It is a pure delight to be around those people! They are inner directed. Furthermore, they are secure within themselves, and as such, their functioning in not affected by either criticism or praise from others. They are able to engage in intense emotional relationship without trying to modify the life course of another. They are relatively free from ego defenses. On the contrary, people who have a weak ego or poorly defined sense of self are very vulnerable to being molded or changed by others. They react to beliefs, attitudes, and values of others, trying to change them. They experience a high level of anxiety; therefore, they have less energy available to pursue goal-oriented activity. They have difficulty to distinguish the feeling process from the intellectual process, and as such, they are governed by their emotions. They are conscious of their emotions, but emotions are experienced as a heightened level of disturbing energy that they can’t understand, therefore, put into words. As a result, they oscillate between uncontrolled emotional outbursts and depression.
So, New Age beliefs are handy to escape the emotional intensity. However, they don’t tell us the damaging consequences to our psyche and to the sense of self, as the self is being fragmented. The more the self is fragmented, the more difficult is the process of recovery to fully functioning. Palehorse beautifully expressed the consequences of accepting and following the New Age teachings.
Expert from Palehorse
beyond-within.com/blog/person...al-boundaries/
When I came across the idea of universal oneness, I had no problem accepting it, because I had very little concept of “me” as an individual to begin with! From all descriptions of “enlightenment” that I’ve come across — you might say I was enlightened before I started “seeking” anything. Be that as it may, it wasn’t a state I was happy to remain in, and I eventually found out why.
I have stripped away aspects of myself, shut down other aspects, experimented with changing everything about myself that it’s possible to change, and spent years without a functioning ego. At the end of it I found myself with a lot of fragmented and damaged aspects who did not cease to exist; they were just waiting around somewhere in the astral (literally) for me to pull my head out of my arse, stop trying pretend there is no “I” and start reintegrating them. Hypothetically, I could have probably continued along that path until there was nothing left of this conscious self, leaving me an empty shell that would eventually die and be no more. But from what I’ve seen, those parts I stripped away would simply go off on their own evolutionary track, and the higher self that this incarnation is part of would continue to exist, probably saying to himself “damn, lost another one to that whole “enlightenment” fad.”
When I got my ego back up and running, I found a pre-existing core “essence” that flourishes and successfully coexists with others when I’m true to myself, and protests loudly when I engage in self-betrayal. It has preferences, desires, goals, ambitions — and finds the process of figuring out how to achieve them as fun as the end result is gratifying, before transitioning on to a new adventure. I’m free to experience what I want without feeling like I’m “suffering” if I don’t get it, because I view life as a game, and one that I don’t take particularly seriously at that; it’s all just experience.
My preferred approach to my ego is to get rid of my socialization and conditioning — a collection of usually conflicting and mostly dysfunctional constructs imposed from without that I did not choose — and turn what’s left into my own creation. I am in the process of releasing everything I may have believed myself to be, and replacing it with whatever I choose to be. Far from losing my sense of self, if anything I am gaining one that is self directed, co-created, fluid, evolving and ever-expanding. In a word: free.
So, we may ask what is happening with our body and emotions when we are trying to get rid of our ego and shut down our mind? The result is emotional numbness. People in this state are not aware of anything they call emotions or feelings. This is true even if they are under the influence of strong emotions. On occasion, however, they may have outburst of anger, particularly, under the influence of alcohol and other drugs. They experience physical sensations that accompany emotions but not emotions themselves. They often consume drugs that target physical sensations with an emotional origin. While in this state of emotional unawareness, people are able to inflict great emotional damage on others. Strong emotions that are unacknowledged can cause irrational behavior and pain. People on this level of emotional unawareness can’t develop deep and loving relationships with others. Well, we can’t have a deep and loving relationship with others if we don’t understand them on emotional level. It is called empathy where we don’t need to think about, see, or hear people’s emotions but we sense it. In fact, the empathy is a form of intuition about emotions.
There is another dangerous aspect of New Age belief system associated with the transcendence of the ego. People who follow those teachings don’t have personal boundaries. In fact, they don’t know what personal boundaries mean. As a result, they cross others boundaries, causing pain and emotional hurt. Emotional numbness and the lack of understanding of others boundaries inflict a great pain and damage relationships. I talked earlier about New Age idea that “We are all one”, so I will not repeat myself.
What is the solution? Emotional awareness. It is as simple as that. However, it is not an easy road to achieve the emotional awareness as we were trained to suppress our feelings since our childhood and suppression was intensified by Eastern teachings. I am afraid, that people who are deeply involved in New Age spirituality may not achieve it as the fragmentation of self is very deep. I hope that I am wrong!
My final thoughts. We are here to passionately love, passionately create, and experience this reality through the whole spectrum of feelings and emotions. I was so close to loose what I cherish the most! We are emotional beings and I would not want to loose my feelings and emotions in the name of spiritual enlightenment. In fact, Eastern teachings and New Age teachings offer a spiritual death of the soul.
And we need to open our eyes and to see pain and suffering of others. We can’t be blind any more!
I will continue to search and learn. Scott Peck said, “When we are searching, we are learning, when we are learning, we are growing”. I would add that we need to question everything and take our power back! And love. I believe in power of love. But love is a verb!
Well, I am done with New Age. To recover from this deception takes time as we have been compromised on so many levels. I am switching my focus on empowerment. Everybody of us has an inner longing to love, to be loved, to give, to deeply care about others. Sadly, many people experience deep emptiness and a hungry heart! According to research, only 10% people experience a deep emotional connections with a partner after 15 years of marriage. After 25 years of marriage, only 1%!
So, what went wrong?
I have searched for the answer for a period of time. I see a big correlation with New Age programming.
Well, my favorite part is the transcendence of the ego promoted by Eastern teachings and a new generation of “spiritual” teachers of the New Age like E. Tolle.
It is the most dangerous concept for our well being. I don’t even like to use a term the ego but the sense of self. There is a vast research that has shown that people who have a strong sense of self (ego!) are the most loving, caring, tolerant, and giving. It is a pure delight to be around those people! They are inner directed. Furthermore, they are secure within themselves, and as such, their functioning in not affected by either criticism or praise from others. They are able to engage in intense emotional relationship without trying to modify the life course of another. They are relatively free from ego defenses. On the contrary, people who have a weak ego or poorly defined sense of self are very vulnerable to being molded or changed by others. They react to beliefs, attitudes, and values of others, trying to change them. They experience a high level of anxiety; therefore, they have less energy available to pursue goal-oriented activity. They have difficulty to distinguish the feeling process from the intellectual process, and as such, they are governed by their emotions. They are conscious of their emotions, but emotions are experienced as a heightened level of disturbing energy that they can’t understand, therefore, put into words. As a result, they oscillate between uncontrolled emotional outbursts and depression.
So, New Age beliefs are handy to escape the emotional intensity. However, they don’t tell us the damaging consequences to our psyche and to the sense of self, as the self is being fragmented. The more the self is fragmented, the more difficult is the process of recovery to fully functioning. Palehorse beautifully expressed the consequences of accepting and following the New Age teachings.
Expert from Palehorse
beyond-within.com/blog/person...al-boundaries/
When I came across the idea of universal oneness, I had no problem accepting it, because I had very little concept of “me” as an individual to begin with! From all descriptions of “enlightenment” that I’ve come across — you might say I was enlightened before I started “seeking” anything. Be that as it may, it wasn’t a state I was happy to remain in, and I eventually found out why.
I have stripped away aspects of myself, shut down other aspects, experimented with changing everything about myself that it’s possible to change, and spent years without a functioning ego. At the end of it I found myself with a lot of fragmented and damaged aspects who did not cease to exist; they were just waiting around somewhere in the astral (literally) for me to pull my head out of my arse, stop trying pretend there is no “I” and start reintegrating them. Hypothetically, I could have probably continued along that path until there was nothing left of this conscious self, leaving me an empty shell that would eventually die and be no more. But from what I’ve seen, those parts I stripped away would simply go off on their own evolutionary track, and the higher self that this incarnation is part of would continue to exist, probably saying to himself “damn, lost another one to that whole “enlightenment” fad.”
When I got my ego back up and running, I found a pre-existing core “essence” that flourishes and successfully coexists with others when I’m true to myself, and protests loudly when I engage in self-betrayal. It has preferences, desires, goals, ambitions — and finds the process of figuring out how to achieve them as fun as the end result is gratifying, before transitioning on to a new adventure. I’m free to experience what I want without feeling like I’m “suffering” if I don’t get it, because I view life as a game, and one that I don’t take particularly seriously at that; it’s all just experience.
My preferred approach to my ego is to get rid of my socialization and conditioning — a collection of usually conflicting and mostly dysfunctional constructs imposed from without that I did not choose — and turn what’s left into my own creation. I am in the process of releasing everything I may have believed myself to be, and replacing it with whatever I choose to be. Far from losing my sense of self, if anything I am gaining one that is self directed, co-created, fluid, evolving and ever-expanding. In a word: free.
So, we may ask what is happening with our body and emotions when we are trying to get rid of our ego and shut down our mind? The result is emotional numbness. People in this state are not aware of anything they call emotions or feelings. This is true even if they are under the influence of strong emotions. On occasion, however, they may have outburst of anger, particularly, under the influence of alcohol and other drugs. They experience physical sensations that accompany emotions but not emotions themselves. They often consume drugs that target physical sensations with an emotional origin. While in this state of emotional unawareness, people are able to inflict great emotional damage on others. Strong emotions that are unacknowledged can cause irrational behavior and pain. People on this level of emotional unawareness can’t develop deep and loving relationships with others. Well, we can’t have a deep and loving relationship with others if we don’t understand them on emotional level. It is called empathy where we don’t need to think about, see, or hear people’s emotions but we sense it. In fact, the empathy is a form of intuition about emotions.
There is another dangerous aspect of New Age belief system associated with the transcendence of the ego. People who follow those teachings don’t have personal boundaries. In fact, they don’t know what personal boundaries mean. As a result, they cross others boundaries, causing pain and emotional hurt. Emotional numbness and the lack of understanding of others boundaries inflict a great pain and damage relationships. I talked earlier about New Age idea that “We are all one”, so I will not repeat myself.
What is the solution? Emotional awareness. It is as simple as that. However, it is not an easy road to achieve the emotional awareness as we were trained to suppress our feelings since our childhood and suppression was intensified by Eastern teachings. I am afraid, that people who are deeply involved in New Age spirituality may not achieve it as the fragmentation of self is very deep. I hope that I am wrong!
My final thoughts. We are here to passionately love, passionately create, and experience this reality through the whole spectrum of feelings and emotions. I was so close to loose what I cherish the most! We are emotional beings and I would not want to loose my feelings and emotions in the name of spiritual enlightenment. In fact, Eastern teachings and New Age teachings offer a spiritual death of the soul.
And we need to open our eyes and to see pain and suffering of others. We can’t be blind any more!
I will continue to search and learn. Scott Peck said, “When we are searching, we are learning, when we are learning, we are growing”. I would add that we need to question everything and take our power back! And love. I believe in power of love. But love is a verb!
Nevertheless, they are our best teachers as they show us our weakness or wounds and places where our hearts are closed. But sometimes, our feelings may be strong to protect us against people whose energy is harmful to our well being. 
cos there is ony home .. to re remember 
