Disidentification
Hello there.
Identity is the condition of being one's Self.
One separate Self.
Another word for this - is Ego.
You cannot have a sense of Self without simultaneously
having a sense of Other.
Identity served Universal Expansion,
because Oneness cannot conceive of Itself.
Obviously, to conceive of something,
you have to be standing on an opposite platform.
"White" is needed to conceive of "Black",
"Black" is needed to conceive of "White".
And so, Universal Consciousness
needed singularity,
in order to become conscious of itself.
Just like a fish cannot conceive of water
until it has experienced air,
and so, identity was conceived.
A more practical way of explaining this as it relates to you,
is that the separate Self or Ego
is the necessary condition for you to experience
Oneness or Enlightenment.
Whenever we associate something with our Self,
we 'identify' with it.
It becomes part of us.
We see it as not-separate from us,
but as part of us,
if not 'us' in our entirety.
So let's imagine that 'you'
(the concept of You) is this.
If you identify with a thought,
that thought becomes you.
If you identify with a person,
that
This starts to become your concept of Self.
This is what Attachment really is.
So I
I
This is what your Personality Structure,
your Ego, essentially is.
It is a giant combination
of all of the things
that you identify with.
It's a composite
of things you're attached to.
Now, if any one of these things that we're identified with
is threatened,
that is when we have an extreme reaction.
Let's say that somebody comes in
and threatens somebody that we're attached to,
(or we perceive there being a threat);
It's almost like I'm trying to pull at it,
do you see that gravitational pull?
That's the emotional reaction you're getting as a result
of the threat to that thing you are attached to
or identified with.
If the thing we have identified with
is ever threatened,
we experience it as a threat to our own survival,
because we don't know the difference
between that thing that we're identified with, and our Self,
so we see it as a personal-attack.
One could argue,
that Identification is okay
as long as we're identified with things that feel good.
But, not so fast...
Any form of Identification with something that feels good,
is a simultaneous identification with the
of that thing that feels good.
Another way of saying this is:
All truly extreme positive states
carry within them the seeds of the exact opposite,
or the potential, for their opposing polarity.
For example,
worthiness carries the seeds of unworthiness.
Excitement carries the seeds of disappointment.
Far more troubling however,
is that we identify, often,
with things that cause us to feel bad.
By doing so,
we now have the motive
to keep that thing alive within us,
to continue to reinforce it.
We need it in order to maintain our sense of Self.
A great many Spiritual Teachers will emphasize the importance
of disidentifying with things that are external to us,
especially
But it is my opinion
that these things that are external to us
are not the things that are causing us
the most amount of suffering.
What's causing us the most amount of suffering,
is our identification with things that we perceive to be
We are the most-identified with the three primary aspects of ourselves.
Those being: Body, Thoughts and Emotions.
Each of these three aspects is inherently a different expression
of Source Consciousness.
We mistake these expressions to be the totality of who we are.
A bit like a painter who has become so identified with his painting,
that he has forgotten that who he ultimately is
is more than his painting.
In other words, we think we
we think we
and we think we
And as such,
we are so attached to them that they affect us immensely.
They cause us to suffer.
Those of us who have painful emotions,
painful thoughts or a painful body,
suffer to the degree that life becomes an absolute torment.
This is the reason that disidentification
is one of the highest forms of spiritual practice
that you can take on.
To become disidentified with something,
you have to simply see it as
as separate from you.
You could disidentify with just about anything.
You could disidentify with your pain, for example.
To disidentify with your pain,
all you have to see
is that your pain
is like a separate Self.
You can conceptualize of your pain
as a separate entity.
And when you experience pain,
you can observe that pain as if you're watching that separate entity reacting.
In this way you do not take the pain personally,
because you have disowned it.
But the most important thing you can do
(as it applies to disidentification)
is to disidentify with your thoughts,
disidentify with your emotions
and disidentify with your body.
You will notice that your attachments to external things,
people, places etc.
will just fall away simply on their own,
as a result of doing this.
Because those external attachments
are filtered
with our emotions,
with our thoughts and with our body.
The hardest part about spiritual practice,
is the complementary contradictions
that inherently exist within a multidimensional universe.
Truths are not necessarily the same
on different dimensional levels.
Sometimes, they contradict themselves,
but each are true in their own right.
Ultimately, at the highest Truth,
all
The painter is
So any form of disidentification
is to enhance the Self & Other-ness
within this Universe.
When nothing is 'other' than you,
not your mind, not your body,
not your emotions, not other people,
not your kitchen table, not your dogs,
nor the clouds, nor the cement on the sidewalk ...
But to even see, much less experience this Truth,
you must first disidentify
from the very things that are keeping you locked
in your own intense sense of identity.
The False Self is like a composite of things you are identified with.
Like onion-layers, you strip each thing you're identified with away,
to expose the truth of Who and What you really are.
The True Self is then revealed.
We do not engage in this
'Separating-from with things we're identified-with or attached-to' process
with an attitude of resistance.
To do this, would just be to perpetuate the issue.
Instead, what we do is to completely allow ourselves
to become aware of the identification.
And, in the awareness of the identification,
we're, in that moment, disidentified
with the very thing we're witnessing.
The best way to think about this is
to think of these things that you're identified with,
like rose petals,
that simply, when exposed to the light of the sun,
will begin to fall away from the stem.
To try to push-away the things you're identified with,
only causes you to become
It only causes you to feel rejected by
You essentially cause an intense survival-reaction within yourself,
in response to your own self-rejection.
You cannot try to take something away from yourself,
without hurting yourself.
As it applies to body, mind and emotions,
you cannot try hard or disconnect from those aspects of yourself
without those things being perceived internally by you
as Self-Abandonment.
The way to begin allowing
these aspects of you to fall away from the True Self,
is to recognize all the things that you're attached to.
For this reason, I want you to take out a blank sheet of paper
and I want you to write down all the things that you think
you might just be attached to.
Keep in mind, of course,
that the
extends far beyond this one you're about to create.
~ Giggles ~
But this is a Consciousness Exercise.
A good way to find things that you're Identified with,
is to look at all the things you identify as "Mine".
For example,
the minute you say 'My friends',
you are Identified and thus, attached to them.
Also, look at all the things
that you would fill-in-the-blank with when you say:
"I am ______".
Those things
For example, the minute you say:
"I am sexy",
you are identified with being sexy.
Also, try to identify the thoughts and beliefs
that you're attached to.
For example, one belief you might be attached to is:
"Money doesn't grow on trees".
Try to recognize the emotions that you're Identified with.
Emotions that you're identified with are the ones that are
They come up more often.
They might even set the emotional atmosphere of the totality of your life.
For example,
disappointment might be one of them.
Also, I want you to try to recognize
the aspects of your body that you are Identified with.
For example, if you see yourself as fat,
you are Identified with being fat.
Remember, anything you identify-with will cause a strong reaction within you.
The Ego has owned it
as part of the composite that makes up what it is
( its Self-Concept ).
Whenever those things are threatened,
the Ego will go into a state of reactivity and defense.
The Ego has motive to maintain these aspects of your life,
even if they cause you pain,
because It sees the loss of these things as annihilation.
We can even become identified with pain itself.
Isn't that an interesting twist?
Now this, of course, is one of the most painful conditions you can experience,
is to become Identified with pain,
because the Ego will seek pain out
just to reinforce its own sense of Self,
its own identity.
But there is an interesting little flip-side:
People who are Identified with pain,
often end up in
that in one fell-swoop,
they end up disidentifying with themselves completely.
It's a form of Emotional Suicide.
This is, in essence, what's happening in a spontaneous Awakening Experience.
All this being said,
the real practice begins
when we become aware of what we are Identified with
the minute that those things arise
or cause a reaction within us.
The easiest way to do this,
is in response to emotions.
You can use strong emotions
like an alarm bell or a meditation bell
that alarm you to the fact
that your direct undivided-attention and presence
is required in this moment.
There is something you must recognize,
there is something you must become aware of.
By recognizing something,
by becoming aware of it,
you are in that moment,
in the perspective
of what we would consider to be
your Eternal Self,
observing the Temporal Self,
instead of purely being immersed in the Temporal-Self perspective.
Instead of being under water,
you are above the surface, looking at the water.
When a strong emotion arises,
face it within yourself,
instead of reacting to it
or reacting in a way to try to get away from it.
When you feel it, you use the feeling as a reminder
that this feeling is the Emotional Body
becoming activated like an electric fence
or
As in:
"It's not
It is not the emotion itself causing the suffering you feel,
it is the fact that you identify with it that is causing the pain you feel.
This is all it takes to disidentify with something.
Don't try to stop caring how you feel
and don't try to change how you feel,
just recognize it and let it be there.
A fun little side-note about this is that
if you use these sort of "triggers"
that happen as a result
of something you're Identified with
being pushed-on or pulled-on,
in that very moment,
if you can become intensely present,
you have opened yourself up to Insight.
You'll experience intuition and insight
dropping into your Being
as a result of being fully present
with that strong emotional reaction,
instead of reacting to it.
For example, you might notice what it
and
You might receive insight
that allows you to help dissipate
that charged reaction.
When it comes to negative emotions,
you can see that you identify with those negative emotions
even in the words we use.
For example, we might say:
"I
implying that
instead of that Who we are is
... of being angry, or experiencing anger.
Don't worry about disidentification causing repression or suppression.
Disidentification is in fact, the opposite of suppression.
It is the moment in which Choice or Free-Will
is introduced into the experience,
so you now have the free will of choice
to choose how to express that emotion.
But it's helpful to think of it this way:
In the moment that you are completely aware and present
with the emotional reaction,
or with the thought you're thinking,
what happens in that moment,
is that you're introducing
the pure light of your Consciousness
to those shadows,
to those things ...
So, it's almost like
the light of your Consciousness
dissipates them or burns them up,
almost like a film-strip being exposed to flame.
By recognizing a thought
and observing it and letting it be there,
you're not actually adding any fuel to it,
because you've stepped out of your participation
inside
In other words, you were
now you're
This stops the thought attracting other like-thoughts.
So you have essentially stopped the momentum of thought,
which stops the negative spiral.
When it comes to the body,
if you think that you are your body,
any time your body changes,
you essentially lose your Identity.
... that must be spooky ...
We can practice observing the body
as if it were an experience we're currently having,
rather than who we are.
This is the whole idea behind the fact
that we're a Spiritual Being
having a Human Experience.
When you recognize your Body, (see It, feel It, experience It)
you are in fact, in that moment, not your body.
you're disidentified with It.
You are not your Ego ...
You are not your separate Self ...
In the moment that you become aware of Ego,
you are in that moment, disidentified with Ego.
And what you can acutely see,
is what you are
When you are acutely aware of what you are
then the filter that is separating you from the awareness of what you Are,
is removed.
And all that is left
in the wake of that realization,
is your True Self,
your true Being.
It is a state of Peace,
it is a state of unwavering Grace.
Have a good week.
Subtitles by: Tanya Duarte www.tanyaduarte.com