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Mind, Body & Persona: Vehicles or Prisons for Our True Nature
When we identify with and live from our true nature, its Presence as Oneness, Joy, Unconditional Love, and Creative Unfolding is palpable and ever-present in each and every moment.
Our true nature transcends mind, body, personality, and history. Our true nature is the harmonious Field of Being in which mind, body, personality and history arise as vehicles for manifesting and expressing the infinite awareness that we are, which is both transcendent and immanent. Life arises as an organic, intentional unfolding --- creating, manifesting, and dissolving the multiplicity of forms of its expression in each moment of NOW.
For almost all human beings, however, a "fundamental error of Being" occurs --- an error of mis-taken identity --- so that the physical, emotional and mental expressions of Being are no longer perceived as vehicles of our true nature, but are mis- identified as aspects of a separate, finite "I" or "me" in the world. In the instant of this misidentification, the vehicles for the expression of our true nature shift to being prisons that hide and suppress our true nature.
A Case of Mistaken Identity
The mistaken identity called "I" or "me" is a conglomeration of inherited, conflicting, and unexamined points of view that gives rise to a world of separation, duality and opposites that take the form of thoughts, beliefs, and ideals (I am separate, I am the body, I am my mind, I am my personality, I am not you / him / her / them / it / the world, I am separate from God, good/bad, right/wrong, in/out, subject-object, pain/pleasure, approval/rejection, credit/blame, control/chaos, win/lose, dominate/avoid domination, birth/death, I'm not good enough, I am good enough, It's too good to be true, life is hard, get them before they get you, "Original Sin", Heaven/Hell). In this mistaken identity, we have eaten of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil --- a symbol that represents our swallowing and digesting the illusion of duality --- while the truth of the unchanging nature of our Oneness and the interrelatedness of ALL ---symbolized in Genesis by The Tree of Life - is hidden from our view.
The fundamental source of all suffering within and between human beings is a case of MISTAKEN IDENTITY.
Identify as being a separate, finite, historically-based entity called "me"--- a character in a story about "your" life --- and mental, emotional, and physical suffering, compounded by a futile struggle for harmony, security and survival, is guaranteed.
Rather than allowing what is to be and allow our infinite, true nature to shine forth as the guiding light for life, it is suppressed and co-opted by the false "me" whose whole purpose is the continuity of its own survival at any cost. When it is unrecognized and unexamined, it takes over and supplants one's real life. Cut off from our real compass and guide, we are unable to express ourselves in the world with effortlessness and clarity. Identifying with and reacting to the thoughts, beliefs, stories, and circumstances given by the world of appearances is the consequence of the error. With the focus of life on survival of whatever we consider ourselves to be, the range of expression begins to focus more and more on reactive negative emotional states (guilt, shame, apathy, grief, resentment, jealousy, greed, anger, pride) that are fear-driven (paramount are the fear of not getting what "I" want, the fear of losing what "I've" got, and the fear of dying).
The "Disappearance" of the Actor Clayton Moore at the Hands of The Lone Ranger
The words "person" and "personality" come from the word, "persona" --- the name of the mask worn by actors in the plays of ancient Greece. The "persona" was something that was used to represent a particular idea, a position or view of life, a state of mind, or a feeling. Its form, shape, color, and expression was made to convey this, and the job of the actor behind the mask was to communicate as powerfully as they could that point of view represented by that character in the play. At the end of the performance, the actors would take off their personas - the masks--- and the characters ceased to exist, their reality being only a function of the intention of the unseen ones behind the masks in collaboration with the author of the play. An actor in the Greek theater was one who could put on a mask and pretend to "disappear" for a short while by imbuing the persona with their life force.
We put down our personas or masks each night when we fall asleep and rest from our roles. If we know our true nature, we are able to use the masks we have for their true purpose, as vehicles of expression. However, if our true nature becomes seduced by the mask we are wearing, and we believe we are the mask, what occurs is what I refer to as "the Clayton Moore Syndrome".
The fictional characters of the Lone Ranger, "his faithful Indian companion, Tonto", and the Lone Ranger's "great horse, Silver", first began their existence on a popular national radio show in the mid 1930's. For children who grew up listening to that show, Rossini's "William Tell Overture" will forever be identified in their consciousness as the theme music for The Lone Ranger, and the cry, "Hi-yo, Silver, away!".
In the early 1950's, the actor Clayton Moore was hired to play the character of the Lone Ranger on television. After a few years, Moore so took on the persona of "the masked man" that by the time the long-running series went off the air, Moore completely identified with the Lone Ranger, dedicating the rest of his life to living from and espousing the Lone Ranger's creed of honesty, selfless service, and justice, always wearing the mask and costume whenever he appeared in public (except if he went out in a crowd incognito), and spending the last 40 years of his life being The Lone Ranger at county fairs, rodeos, conventions, supermarket openings, school assemblies, and anyplace else where he felt he could inspire people to live from the principles of "the champion of justice in the early days of the old west" that he believed he represented.
Clayton Moore is the only actor who has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame where the actor's name is hyphenated with the name of a character that he played. It reads, "Clayton Moore-The Lone Ranger." Moore insisted on it, since for him, there was no separate Clayton Moore anymore. For the identity called "The Lone Ranger", Clayton Moore, an actor, ceased to be important, and was only a necessary vehicle for the masked man to be expressed in the world.. Moore died in his eighties of a sudden heart attack, living representing the character and the code of the Lone Ranger to the end.
Wearing the Mask Rather than Being It
In contrast, it is possible to fully act out but not identify or be stuck in our created persona. Academy Award Oscar winner Meryl Streep is recognized as one of the great film actors of our time. Watch her performance on the screen, and she disappears completely into the character she is pretending to be - her voice, accent, body language, facial expressions, everything takes on the history of this imaginary persona and seduces us in believing in that moment that this character and its situations and problems are real.
Yet Ms. Streep is known on the sets of her films as being someone who can immediately drop all of the aspects of her character in a nanosecond (no matter how seriously and deeply that character was suffering or emoting a moment before) , once the director says, "Cut!" In the next instant she is telling a joke, taking up where she left off in a hand of cards, or continuing without pause an earlier discussion she was having with someone. How can she do that? Because she knows that she is pretending, that the identity she was playing is not who or what she really is! She can wear her character's identity lightly.
The gradual disappearance of Clayton Moore into the false identity he had taken on is analogous to what happens when we buy into our imposter "I". It has no inherent reality. It is nothing more or less than an impermanent, transient role "full of sound and fury", a temporary vehicle for creative expression that arises instant to instant from the formlessness of unchanging Being.
It is not surprising that most of us do not realize that the historical character we are playing called, "Me," is fictitious. After all, we have been indoctrinated since birth to buy into and believe we are our body, personality, and thoughts. When we talk about, "my body" or "my mind" or "my personality", we very seldom stop to inquire who or what is this "my" that has a body and mind and a personality?. In this dream state, we both believe that we have a body, a mind, and a personality, and simultaneously identify that we are the body, the mind or the personality! We are asleep to the impossibility of both having something
(something I own or possess) and being it at the same time.
To be awake is to be aware that we are not only acting this part called, "Me", but are also the writer, director, and editor of the movie called "my life." Until we realize that, we are lost in the dream we created. Awakening to our true infinite, unchanging nature, we realize that we have choices regarding how we use our ever-changing vehicles of expression. As the observer/witness rather than a mere participant in the play, we have the power to determine what lines and play directions we act out and recite.
The Illusion of Ego
The ultimate illusion, persona, or mask we identify with is the fictitious construct called, "ego."
Many therapists, unaware of the existence of the infinite Beingness that is the Source of All, believe that they are their "ego", and that is what they mean when they say "I" or "me". Subsequently, they work with their clients to enhance, strengthen, or reinforce the "sense of self," which is the ego or sense of individual separateness, so that their patients will be able to "have boundaries", and not be controlled by the demands, desires, or authority of others. The cosmic joke is that ultimately both positions, "me" and "they" strengthen the illusion of duality and are the ego illusion in action.
Some self-improvement programs are focused on identifying oneself as the ego, and strengthening the ego sense (BE A WINNER!). In this context, the attribution, "my ego", is not recognized as specious. Who is the my who possesses this ego? Our true nature possesses nothing, owns nothing. My is simply more ego in disguise.
In some spiritual disciplines there is much talk and work done attempting to destroy, corral, suppress, overcome, or subdue the ego. Various doctrines have considered the ego to be evil, bad, selfish, dark, an "evil inclination", or the source of all suffering.
What often goes unnoticed is that whether one wants to strengthen the ego as oneself, or destroy or avoid it, all moves simply validate the illusion that ego exists. All actions, in behalf of or against the ego, give power to the illusion of its existence. To attempt to either destroy or strengthen the illusion of ego is tantamount to attempting to destroy or strengthen something in a dream.
What is ego? Ego is not a thing, it is a function. Ego is a fictitious construction that arises when Infinite Awareness identifies itself as a separate mind, body or persona,. In that instant, our true nature becomes lost in the illusion of a separate mind, and the mind construct "ego" functions for its own continuity, survival, and security, replacing limitless Being as the source and guide of one's life. From that moment on, the world comes into being as duality, and one functions in a world of "I" and "Others" for the survival of the false "I" or "me".
Suffering is not a function of ego. The emotional, mental and physical suffering we experience in our inner and outer worlds is a function of identifying with the false ego construct, and operating for its survival as a separate, always-threatened entity for which the recognition of one's true nature is the ultimate threat to its existence.
The domination of the ego-driven life ends, and our true nature awakens to guide and unfold life, when (1) we dis-identify from and realize that we are not the ego, and (2) we realize that the reality of the "me" and "I" that is the ego isn't and never was.
With this dual realization, we awaken in an instant to our true nature by doing our version of the director's command, "Cut!"
We realize this transient drama being acted out is an ever-changing illusion on the screen of awareness, and the notion of a separate ego or "I" is the ultimate illusion / persona/ mask.
What a game of "Hide and Seek!" That which is formless and without face has pretended to have a face and be concerned with losing it!
(Part 2 of "Awakening from the Dream of Mistaken Identity" continues in the next article "Awakening from the Dream of Mistaken Identity - Part 2." In it, we examine the inquiry that allows us to awaken to our true nature, and offer you a thought experiment regarding operating "in the zone" that leads to mastery)
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