Self-inquiry vs the egos/Is - How it works - the neuroscience

Q.  In our personal exchanges, and elsewhere in your blog, it’s been stated that the ego wants to “fight back” against its own death. That’s it’s “afraid” of dissolving. 

Michael Gazzaniga
UC Santa Barbara

Roger Sperry
Nobel Prize
for Split Brain Work 

In its terror of no longer being needed it grows sharper teeth and longer claws and starts cussing like a demon to stop the process. Which makes it seems we’re describing an entity - a thing that, although an illusion, “wants” to be alive. 

So this is my question: If the ego was just a code, simply neurons bound together a certain way, it wouldn’t grow stronger at being dissolved, right? It would just atrophy like any other muscle.

G.  Re the "ego" growing stronger with sharper teeth and longer claws, remember that the "ego/I" isn't one entity, it is thousands of entities/constituencies that may, or may not be involved in certain decisions/choices/activities. 

Important findings on how the brain operates in these situations came from the “split brain” Nobel Prize-winning research done by Roger Sperry and Michael Gazzaniga on folk who had their left and right halves  disconnected by severing their corpus callosum to alleviate epileptic seizures.   

Sperry's and Gazzaniga's clever experiments showed that different parts of the brain had very different functions and could operate discretely including generating false stories "explaining" their strange behaviors. 

Evolutionary psychology extended this understanding to conceptualizing the brain functions for decision-making as being “modular”.   Robert Wright, featured in several blogposts, wrote the “The Moral Animal: Why We Are The Way We Are” which is strongly recommended as it created the field.

"The Moral Animal" is such an "important" book that it was one of three books that the actor playing Neo, in The Matrix, was advised to read in preparation for the role and the famous choice of whether to take  the "red pill".

Wright explains in his “Why Buddhism is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment” how these modules function:

       1.  They aren’t in physical compartments

       2.  Their functions overlap more than smartphone apps

       3.  There are “cheater detection”/”who can you trust?” modules

       4.   The modules are fluidly interactive, lack obedience and harmony and sometimes collaborate, and sometimes compete, even fiercely.

      5.  There is no hierarchy.  It is a “free-for-all, self-organizing system”.

(For full disclosure, "i" am in this book.)  

This work was extended by Griskevicius and Kenrik in “Fundamental Motives: How Evolutionary Needs Influence Consumer Behavior”.

Decisions, like "should we fight this?" or "let it proceed?", didn't manifest until this self-inquiry process started to upset things.  

However, once "self-inquiry" started, many entities saw that it was going to seriously threaten their existence and functions.  Concern rapidly spread and modules were recruited on a wide range of issues.  

Angry "anti-self inquiry" mob

Those included were worried about losing the pleasures of their many possessions, changed relationships to friends and family, desires for all sorts of sensual pleasures, and attachments to core beliefs they lived by. 

A huge band of angry, frightened “anti” modules/constituencies were recruited against this self-inquiry process.  

Against this angry mob, the “pro-self inquiry” constituency, at the beginning, had little to offer in the way of better pleasures and hence got few recruits.  

Asking “Where/when/what/who am I?”, throughout the day or in sitting meditation, there were brief periods of quiet from the endless “blah, blah” after a question was asked, but for several weeks, few pleasures.    

Elephant shown
100,000 X too small

However, what is often misunderstood is that the important result is the brief "space/break/stop" (SBS) after the unanswerable self-inquiry question.  

The massive "off-line"/"elephant" part of the brain with 500,000 times the capability of the "on line"/"rider" part (see blogpost "Right-sizing your "I", understanding confirmation bias") sees this SBS as a break from the usual chaos, and reaalllyyy likes it. 

As 99.9% of what goes on is done by the "elephant", including generating pleasure with its neurochemistry, it begins to pursue it.  Every SBS is data to begin changing its networks to spend more time in that space.  

Doing self-inquiry periodically during a busy day provides a sharp contrast with  prevailing chaos and has high "data value".  No SBS is wasted, and every "aha", or nondual experience makes a permanent change, as shown in studies in the blogpost "What is an 'E(e)nlightenment experience?...a new scientific, secular model".

After a few months, “life” feels different, less stressful, more relaxed, more pleasurable as dopamine manifests.  Self-referential, “blah, blah” is less “sticky”, thought strings are shorter and less emotionally-charged.  Attitudes to others are more open.    

The "elephant's" assessment of pleasure/pain for all activities, reflecting the 3 to 5X stronger weighting to pain for evolutionary reasons, is shifting significantly and more dopamine goes to the "pros".  The “pros” recruit more modules and the “anti” group is not as overwhelming as it had been.  

   

"Pro self-inquiry"
recruiting poster

With several more months of self-inquiry and “letting go” practices, significant changes become more evident,  and the “pros” recruit more modules.  The "antis" become more troubled.

As the self-inquiry work goes deeper, it gets into "don't go there" traumas, deep fears and strong fundamental beliefs and conditioning.  Beliefs like "I am my body, thoughts, and mind", and "I am in control and have free will", are challenged. 

The “antis” fight back recruiting many powerful new modules that hadn't been challenged before.  The “pros” struggle to continue the self-inquiry and letting go processes.  Any fall-off or lost interest in self-inquiry invites an attack.

This "battle" determines how far the work proceeds.  If the "antis" are strong enough to get folk to stop their practices, which happens to many folk, that is as far as it will go.   

Antis vs Pros

However, the elephant hasn't been asleep.  To work against the "antis" and get to its goal, it releases more dopamine for more pleasure with SBSs, particularly longer ones, strengthening the "pros".  

If practices continue, the common report is "It's clear that i'm no longer running things...the brain is doing it all by itself".   

Now, since it is fully in charge, the elephant generates endogenous opioids with the dopamine, so there is no inclination or possibility to "return" (or "un-take" the Red Pill) from this "supreme abode" as cited in the Bhagavad Gita on pages 20 and 21 in Dancing Beyond Thought.   It is also where "Bliss is the primary measure" as the Ribhu Gita says many times in Evolving Beyond Thought.  

As most of you know, none of this is under your "control" as to whether you do, or don't do this work, as it is all predetermined, and everything and everyone is the Field of Universal Consciousness/"Her".  This work is all about letting-go into that full understanding and recognizing that She does it all.

However, perhaps this post will, as happened with the cognitive neuroscience around awakening and the Default Mode Network, alleviate the anxiety that can arise around not knowing "what's going on down there!!!?".    

BTW, i was "impersonated" on Facebook, which was caught by a friend who notified FB, and they quickly removed the false profile.  As i've heard, folk have been "friending" accounts just to make this possible, so beware.