Lost in the self-centeredness of the egoic mind, most humans react to every challenge that comes their way, taking it all in at face value. Like automatons, their buttons are easily pushed because they only know what they feel on a very primitive level. Negative emotions such as disgust, anger, and repulsion easily surface and are projected onto others. Because these humans passionately cherish their own opinions, anyone with whom they don’t see eye-to-eye with is doomed to become their enemy. This behavior is not conscious of course, but they will act out this underlying truth, nevertheless. The dysfunctional behavioral dynamic that I'm describing here exemplifies the current stage of human evolution.
The Next Human stage, however, will be one of non-reaction or non- egoic interaction. As your consciousness moves toward this higher state of being, the ego is taken out of the equation. This is the only time that you can truthfully exercise free will. As long as you completely identify with your egoic mind, the “choices” that you make will always be reactionary to the challenges that arise in your life. In other words, your ego never truly takes action, only reaction. But true choice can only come from free will. When this transcendental shift occurs, you will find that the ego will no longer be your master, but your servant. And I believe you’ll find this new relationship to be a much happier and healthier one.
Metaphorically speaking, the ego has imprisoned humanity in its own mind and thrown away the key. It's been able to do this successfully because people so easily over-identify with their ego's emotionally reactive state that is intrinsic to the body's survival mechanism. This fight-or-flight response is rooted in the primal fear of death found in all mammals. But we don't need to feel fear anymore to survive. Our species has already evolved past this point. You don't need to feel fear to know you shouldn't walk into oncoming traffic, just a little common sense. Self Transcendence Life Coaching focuses on teaching you how to identify your own fears so that they can be addressed and transcended.
The fear that we are referring to here is a psychological fear, not a "healthy fear" that keeps us alive in life-threatening situations. Unless you're stationed at the front line of a battlefield every day, you probably don't need to be accessing this physiological fear of survival. Yet, most of humanity continues to be arrested in this biochemical-inducing state of fear that stems from the reptilian brain's "on" or "off" response. Where's the free will in this kind of life?
Most humans live out their lives oblivious to the truth that they're perpetually causing psychic and physiological disharmony to themselves and to others. This physical, mental, and emotional harm manifests as anger, stress, anxiety, nervous tension, worry, depression, paranoia, phobias, panic attacks, and physical disease. It is this same ceaseless psychological state of "impending doom" that ultimately is rooted in the primal fear of death.
If we don't agree, you are doomed to become my enemy.
Let's face it. We live in a drama-addicted society. But if a perpetual state of stress-induced drama continues to be blindly accepted as a state of normalcy, if we continue to scoff, "There's always going to be stress," then the impetus to separate ourselves from its malignancy will be lost.
In the drama addiction cycle, when the body reacts to the fight-or-flight fear of death via the sympathetic nervous system, you are not exercising free will. You are at the mercy of physiological reactions going on inside of your body, and nothing more. Now multiply this reactionary state times every experience in your life that has caused you to feel anxiety, worry, stress, or anger. Is it in the hundreds? Thousands? Is it countless? Well then, where's the free will in that kind of life?
When the parasympathetic mode dominates, we are in a calm, peaceful, relaxed state. The sympathetic nervous system, on the other hand, is designed to put the body in a stress mode. Let's say you get into an argument on the subject of abortion with someone and her opinion clashes with yours, and as a result, your ego has declared her as "the enemy" which, in turn, triggers the primitive fight-or-flight/fear-of-death response. This alarming state triggers the body's release of adrenaline, preparing you for any potential threat. But there is no threat. There is only a difference of opinion.
In addition to adrenalin, the locus coeruleus is activated by stress and will secrete norepinephrine (NE) in the brain. Adrenaline and NE then serve to pull sugar from the glycogen storage in your cells, raising blood sugar levels, and resulting in an exhilarating surge of the intoxicating neurotransmitter dopamine. But here's the catch; dopamine cleverly tricks the brain into repeating a similar drama that created the dopamine high in the first place. And thus, the drama addiction cycle continues.
Ending the drama addiction cycle.
There are many reasons we feel fear, such as fear of being seen in a bad light, fear of being wrong, fear of loss, failure, rejection, being hurt, etc., but ultimately it all stems from the primitive fear of survival. When you are ego-identified, and therefore identify part of your existence with your own opinions, something as insignificant as losing an argument to another is perceived as a psychological death. Only through self transcendence can you overcome your primal fears.
You don't have to read clinical studies to know that stress has an effect on the body. You can feel it. You can feel the pain, the anxiety, the fear surging through your veins. Your muscles cramp, your stomach churns, and your entire body feels, well, miserable. For people who are chronically stressed, it is nothing less than a mild panic attack repeating itself, many times a day, every day, for years on end.
Over time, chronically stressed people begin to become so accustomed to their stress that they begin to know nothing else. Stress is indistinguishable from their daily life. They don't know what it's like to live in a continuous state of calm, peace, and tranquility. And when you try to tell them that there's another way to live, that there doesn't have to be stress in their life, they look at you awkwardly, as if you're speaking gibberish. "How can that be?" They ask, puzzled. "That's impossible," they say. "Life is stress," they proclaim. My personal Spritual Life Coaching Skype sessions can help you to realize that life is not inherently stressful. Rather, stress stems from your judgments and reactions to whatever life brings.
The reptilian brain still rules the world.
Everything in nature evolves. Life was once a single-celled organism. In fact, for most of the past four billion years, life on Earth consisted of the microorganism and nothing more. After bacteria, algae, and fungi formed, evolution leaped forward and the dinosaur appeared on the scene, prospering for 165 million years. The reptiles, turtles, and birds of today are all that's left from the Dinosaur Age.
This primitive reptilian brain or basal ganglia still remains an intricate part of our current human brain today. In fact, its primitive, narcissistic, power-seeking nature is personified by corrupt politicians, dictators, Wall Street bankers, and CEO's of major corporations. And these power players are a tiny minority who directly influence the lives of the masses. In simpler terms, it is they who are running the world.
Like that of a crocodile, the basal ganglia has only two polarized responses; on and off. It is this reactive survival mechanism that is designed to protect the animal from potential danger. This marked the formation of the brain's simple polarity that is exemplified in the ego.
The next major mutation on the planet occurred when life created mammals. This mammalian brain formed itself over the reptilian brain. Instead of just two responses, now the animal can react with a slight degree of variance. In addition to being just on or off, it can be slightly on, halfway on, three-fourths on, or all the way on.
Millions of years later, life mutated yet again into a third brain called the neocortex around 250,000 years ago when modern homo sapiens suddenly appeared out of nowhere from a common "Eve" grandmother. It wasn't until the formation of the neocortex that human's were able to make a choice whether to react or not. This marked the beginning of free will.
The current evolutionary stage of the human brain bestows us with the ability to think, reason, and calculate mental operations in a split second that would rival the processing speed of a million desktop computers all working at once. But, just because we've evolved into this "super intelligent species" that has figured out how to split the tiny atom, clone a wooly sheep, propel ourselves to the Moon and back, and watch music videos on our hand-held iPods, it doesn't necessarily follow that we're a success. Contrarily, because we are still primarily accessing our reptilian, egoic brain, we haven't truly evolved at all. It is obvious that we've evolved mostly technologically, not spiritually. Our collective reptilian brain is still running the world.
Transcending your primal fears.
The concept of God varies from soul to soul depending on each individual's stage of evolutionary growth. When the soul is in its "infant stage", it views God as a parent who looks after it, protects it and nurtures it. Our very own existence depends upon our faith in this God to take care of us and when someone else does not follow our God, our fight-or-flight mechanism is activated, threatening our very sense of survival.
As the soul matures into its "toddler stage", the soul begins to develop its ego. At this point, a new God emerges, and this one is all powerful and mighty. We worship this God because we need to compete, achieve, and succeed in life. We need to feel superior to those around us and our God mirrors this need. He rewards those who are faithful to him and follow his commandments.
When the soul reaches "preadolescence", we need to feel peace amongst a world that is hostile. This peace is only found when we turn to a God that provides love and comfort for us during times of great stress, anxiety, and chaos. He is a God who brings us peace of mind because we pray to him and follow the rituals of his doctrine.
The "adolescent" soul begins to understand that "being good" and "doing the right thing" has a greater reward than merely following the whims of the selfish ego. It's accessing its intuition now and needs to learn understanding, forgiveness, and right action. It turns to a God who reflects these same inner, intuitive, and moral attributes of the Self. This God validates that we need to be a good person, practice high ethics, and exude strong moral values.
The Seven Perceptions of God.
As the soul becomes a "teenager" its creative abilities evolve. New thoughts about the world emerge as we turn to a God who exemplifies our own creativity. We become inspired and motivated to become independent, rebel, follow our own path, and create something from nothing. Subsequently, we become devoted to a God who reflects these same qualities.
In the "adult" stage of the soul, we commune with a source of awareness or consciousness that feels like pure joy and bliss. This source is not of this world, but of a place beyond what we can see, smell, taste, hear, or touch. We turn to a God who performs miracles for us. We begin to notice serendipity and synchronicity in our lives. Our God is now genderless, yet is still perceived as a personality. This God allows for the supernatural to exist simultaneously with the ordinary and mundane.
In the final stage of the soul, or what I call the "butterfly stage", the soul transcends its perception of the prior six stages completely. It is ready to become conscious of it Self. This is the stage of the sage, mystic, shaman, or yogi. When we reach this level of evolutionary consciousness, we understand that life is merely a reflection of our inner being. And that being is inseparable from God. Our concept of God broadens beyond the world of form to a place of the unmanifested no-thingness. This God is one with the all and in no way can ever be separate from any sum of its parts. This God reflects our own unconditional love for all of humanity. This butterfly stage is also the stage of the Next Human.
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According to a recent article in the New York Times, the upcoming revision of the psychiatric diagnostic standards manual, the DSM-V, does not include narcissistic personality disorder. Insurance companies, hospitals, treatment facilities and protocols will no longer be recognizing it or using it to direct treatment. Ostensibly, narcissism has become so pervasive in our society that it is now being viewed by our therapists and counselors as normal and acceptable behavior.
In the movie, "The Matrix," Trinity informs Neo, saying, "The Matrix cannot tell you who you are." And so it is the same with the ego. The irony of it is that most people believe the ego is precisely who they are. It is this blind identification with the ego or "phantom self" that inevitably manifests as some form of suffering in both the individual and the collective. Until we learn to transcend our egoic mind, our current species will be headed for a "system failure" of global proportions.
When the ego reacts, it is ultimately motivated by one thing; power. More specifically, power over the other. As a result of this simple yet potentially dangerous prime directive, the unconsciousness that is the ego is rooted in one emotional frequency; fear.
After studying and observing the fear reactions that the ego plays out on the world stage, you can begin to see the grip that it has on the collective mind, and how just about everyone is to a large degree controlled by their ego, and therefore reacts mostly from a fear-based reality. And as long as the current human is controlled by its own reptilian brain, it will remain on the same level of consciousness as the caveman -- only with much smarter weapons.
No matter what happens in your life, the universe can never bring you tragedy, disappointment, or heartbreak. Rather, it is your judgment, reaction, and resistance to what is happening that creates the suffering. As long as you are identified with a "me against life" or "me against the other" perspective, things will continue to happen to you, and cause you to suffer. As a result, you will continue to be a victim to life. What you resist will always persist. You can't control everything that happens in life, but one thing you can control, once mastered, is your Self.
Reacting from a fear-based reality.
© 2012 Jason Lincoln Jeffers, Inc.
Our human species currently allows over half of its own people to live below the poverty level. It also allows for millions of its own to be slaughtered in never-ending wars. I believe that the success of a human species should be defined by its ability to get along with one another in a cooperative state of peace and harmony. The current state of evolutionary consciousness is exemplified by the fear-based, self-centered, reptilian-brained, egoic mind. It's as if the ego says, "You and I disagree, therefore you are my enemy." And it's this dysfunctional behavioral dynamic that has been the impetus for arguments, conflicts, and wars with one another since the dawn of human history. This is why the ego must be transcended before we can evolve into the Next Human.
