Most people tend to identify themselves as “opposed to” other people, as in “me” as opposed to “them;” what makes you “special,” an individual, “you;” that you are not like them. For if you could not distinguish yourself from other people, you would not be you, right? Right! That is the point.
Setting yourself against others is contrary to a non-dualistic view of reality; it is nothing more than ego food. Thus, perhaps, we should not so much be focusing on the body-mind problem (of duality), but rather the self-other problem.
When I say the answers are all to be found within — and the keys to the prisons-of-illusion your ego has built are to be found within your self — what I mean by that is the answer, the key, is that, ultimately, there is no self.
It’s a riddle. Life is about “other” people, as opposed to the “me-me-me” mentality of this society. But if you are looking at, and dealing with, other people as “other” people, through the distorting vision of your ego, then you are missing the point. It is difficult and subtle; the idea/solution is simple, the execution is very complicated and can be very difficult and confusing. Reality may be that there is no “you” and “me,” that we are all just processes, part of a larger process, and so on.
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From my personal notes, 8/19/99.
