projections of self

Ever since I began my exploration with psychedelics what has intrigued me to no end has been the darkness or what some may call the lower self and I refer to him throughout this blog space as my shadow. I spent many years and ceremonies fighting him before I had an about face and started to get to know this aspect of self. We are brothers and we continuously fight however now that I’m awake and aware of my psychic split I have been making amends and am on my way towards reconciliation, inner peace, and harmony. I will get there and it will be soon.

I have written a great deal about this relationship and my intent in this post is to not rehash this part of my journey. Rather, I wish to explore what is called my higher self. It is another concept of the psyche and I have for the most part neglected it on this spiritual path of mine. Weird, right? It is strange because it is the ideal everyone on the vaunted and hallowed spiritual path heads towards and considers the pinnacle of spiritual achievement. The good old pure and holy sect. I’m very curious and eventually I do get around to examining all facets of what I have gotten myself into. Nothing is sacred or off-limits, demon or angel. Conceptually, this higher self is resembling the ideal that a great deal of the big religions push upon their flocks as the ultimate in spiritual attainment. I’m referencing here the Buddha Mind and Christ Consciousness. In Christianity, the ideal of Christ as being selfless and loving is tinged with the idea of judgment. You are being judged and are expected to become like Christ and as a human it is an impossible task.

Now, this aspect of judgment leads me to believe the God we humans created can be thought of as the psychological concept of the superego where the superego takes on the role of shepherding you into your place in culture and society and dictates what is expected of you. If you do not live up to these expectations, you are shamed into conforming. From birth to death there is always an authority figure in our lives beginning with our parents until we rebel as we mature. Society and government then assume the role of authority when we give in and decide to play the culture game in order to access the rewards of life. There is always this layer of conforming to someone else’s wishes that prevents us from being really free. So, when we transfer the authority figure onto the religious racket we get the ideal that the parishioners are trying to live up to and failure to do so leads one to believe they have a way to go before they become pure and holy. This understanding of the higher self leads me into thinking that this concept of the higher self we strive for is just another way we have transferred our need for authority onto the spiritual path when in truth the game is to become free.

I get this intuitive feeling that the higher self is an obstacle on the path that obfuscates and prevents you from accessing the inner knowledge of self and who you are that in turn will set you free. It’s an exquisite game and the game board designer was very crafty in throwing in these blocks and wrong turns in the maze of life that prevent you from ever solving the puzzle. The problem always comes from looking externally for the answer. It gets you every time and the ruse of the higher self accomplishes just this task. It points you towards an ideal of spiritual attainment or enlightenment that you will never reach and you devote all your energy to desperately trying to become like Jesus or the Buddha. You remain deferential to this external concept of God as the master ruling authority, to wit the king of the universe, and never realize the real master of the universe is you and you are playing a pretty good trick on yourself.

I see the similarities with my shadow because upon discovery and exploration of my lower self I was warned many times by him to turn back, that he will kill me, and to look no further. Ultimately, he was teaching me courage through transformation of my weak-assed self as in all honesty you are not going to get far on this path without massive helpings of courage and bravery. The exploration of the higher self does not result in overt threats of death but instead places before you an ideal you will never attain and then lords over you your lack of ability to reach the ultimate goal to keep you in your place and you never realize your divinity and connection in this most interesting game called life. It is only when you give up this crazy idea of becoming ultra-holy and spiritual that you get into the inner temple. As long as you cling to the belief in sinlessness you’ll never reach your destination.

These similarities in preventing the self from discovery of just who they are led me to believe the lower self and the higher self are the same psychic entity whom we treat as the other. In essence, the higher and lower self are projections of self. The higher self being something so great that is unattainable and the lower self being all the things about me that I bury. I objectify these traits and create psychic manifestations. I double down on who I think I am and use the higher and lower self to prevent me from seeing the truth. When you see the truth, it means the adventure is winding down because you solved the puzzle. It was fun to keep the game going as long as possible but now you are awake, the cover is blown, and you see past the veil. I look around at my fellow game players and smile because they don’t know. I’ll keep quiet about it and just enjoy the show.

Unfortunately, the show I can only enjoy for so long before I start to question why I did this to myself. I love the adventure and I love puzzles. The hero's journey is this adventure to figure out the riddle and after many incarnations where I lost my life, eventually like the addicted video game player, I made it to the end of the game. I beat the final boss; you know that dragon who kept laying waste to me and making me re-start my game while hopefully remembering some of the pitfalls that had previously tripped me up. So, here I am. I beat the game! It soon became obvious to me what's next on the path. This is my world and it is a mess. Now that I know what this all about, I have an eternal project which involves reconciliation of my opposites and tempering these extremes with love. This will get me out of the mess. I've got forever to accomplish the task. Now that I'm awake it's time to get to it.