Not Just An Illusion: A Journey to Embrace Our Wholeselves
Since embarking on the start of the second decade without my Charlie by my side… (Still going to scold you for leaving me in 2015 when I catch up to you, beloved) …I have been trying to find something to fill the emptiness his transition left. To find an answer to the question that plagues me—What’s the point? This started me on the path of exploring spirituality. Not religion, as I have many thoughts regarding organized religion, none of which I’m letting out of the Pandora’s Box in my head.
The sort of spirituality that most consider ‘woo woo’ stuff. For me, this is an exceptional challenge because I have aphantasia. Go find a guided meditation that does not have the instructions to “visualize” something or other. Or something that will get my ADHD brain to shut up long enough. Aside from that, there are two topics that stick in my craw—the world as an illusion and the ego as a significant barrier to enlightenment.
Why, when even quantum physicists say that reality is an illusion, do I have a problem with that concept? Because words matter. And ‘illusion’ has always meant not real, or fake. And if it isn’t real, and when we “transition” that it will be so much better than here…then why stay here? What’s the point? Even if we are theoretically the “creators of our own reality,” if reality is fake, why go through the effort? Sometimes they will say that reality is a simulation, which is borderline illusion/fake. But it’s an improvement, because I will liken a simulation to video games. And if, to video game sprites, their simulation is real, well. Then the real world is real enough.
Though thinking of reality as a video game made me wonder about my relationship with my higher self. I don’t believe it controls me. According to some spiritual beliefs, the higher self cannot experience negative emotions. So when we transition, our eternity is going to be all happy-happy joy-joy. Probably happier-happy-happy joy-joy. How could the higher self know true happiness if it never experienced negativity? Was my higher self purposefully causing me to experience negative things or emotions just to feel something through me it can’t? Kinda pissed me off because I’m frustrated and tired of being stressed, sad, depressed, and feeling alone even around other people. And yes, I’d thought about ending my life subscription early, but I’m stubbornly trying to solve this mini-game puzzle, and none of the solutions presented thus far have solved that yet for me.
Which brings me around to the ego. Oh, my gods, the way so many talk about the ego. How “you aren’t your ego,” and “you’ve forgotten who you really are and you’re here to remember,” and even so much as to say, “the ego is like a scuba mask, letting you interact with the simulation, but it’s just a thing. Letting your ego make decisions is like letting a scuba mask decide which way you’re going to swim.” Not direct quotes, I’m not digging for exact wording. Besides, the spirit of what I’ve understood is there. And how the ego is talked about is how I’d been made to feel for so long…unwanted, unnecessary, discardable.
Now, hear me out. If God/source/whatever created everything, then why would it have created the ego? Why let it think that it’s its own entity? What if the ego is that part of our spiritual self that is simply…a young child? One that wants to prove it can do things itself without help? Wants validation? Yearns for connection with something that won’t disappear because others’ physical vessels are the only way to find any hint of connection? There are so many right now talking about how humanity as a whole and the entire world are moving to a higher vibration. For so long, we have imagined and described any transition as “leaving” here and “going” somewhere else. That we’re evolving. It doesn’t mean we’re going anywhere. We’re evolving in place.
After long discussions with myself, I feel like the view is all wrong about the ego. Of course it’s selfish and self-focused. Every child is that way and (usually…hopefully…) learns better as they mature. Perhaps the way forward isn’t shunning, abandoning, or disposing of the ego. Perhaps it’s guiding it so it, too, can move to these higher vibrational states. Helping it to trust the higher self so they can work together. Together, they can create something even more phenomenal. And no one needs to feel alone.