Seamus, I never thought of that. Good point.
Botched Programming, Thoreau says in order to find yourself you must first lose the world. This was something I somehow knew intuitively. I was never the type of survivor who tried to bury the memories or anything. I was always studyin and analyzin with a militant ferocity. I've already posted a few threads about the major breakdown I forced on myself after I spent 23 months on my phases and 6 months on aftercare. I played along until I could move out of my folks house and get an apt. with my straight girlfriend. A month after we got the apt. I started eatin acid regularly. I used the LSD to help me recover from $tr8 by using it as a catalyst to mental breakdown. I had at least 3 distinct personas or egos that had seperated out from who I was. One was the child who walked into $tr8 in Mar of 85 and who had withered and atrophied into a very fragile and scared part of me, hiding away from the world in the darkness of my soul. The 2nd was the $tr8 ego which I became in the joint and who I hated and detested but was trapped in, and the 3rd was the red-neck/hippie personality I adopted as a coping mechanism in order to make some attempt to relate to the world outside of the cult.
At one point, after about a year an' a half out I became aware of this dynamic within me. I was standing on the balcony of my apt. in the depths of financial and romantic crisis due to my inability to relate to society. I hadn't been able to keep a job anywhere since I left $tr8. I'm sure you can imagine the trouble I was in. I remember when it all first hit me; that I was developing seperate egos within myself. Seperate egos who were at war with each other. It was incredibly painful and scary to face. But there was no choice. I had to walk through the suffering.
I had to not only lose my world, but everything I knew. Everything I was attached to I had to break away from. I had to lose myself and I did.
This all went down in the years immediately after $tr8. I lost all my references. Couldn't have the simplest conversation with strangers at the bus stop. Couldn't understand the context of anything anyone was saying to me. I just could not relate and I don't think I even really wanted to at the time. It was very painful for me, but I knew I had to break free and gain strength before I could live my life.
Now, I'm not prescribing a drug induced nervous breakdown here. But in order to break the chains of conditioning which were put upon you in $tr8 you must seek to lose all contexts and all references, forget everything you know. Be re-born through new understandings. Go on an adventure. Let your life be that adventure. Seek to lose the world and you will be left with yourself. Once you know yourself you will begin to recognize your reflection in the world and understand how you project your own ego onto it. Once you realize the many forms your ego takes in the world you will begin to see the world for what it is and know your place in it.
It is a hard road to go down. You might not even get any rides. Might have to walk the whole road alone. Have courage, for one day Death will smile at you and I for one will want to smile back.
Sorry if I come across as arrogant. I have no fear of hypocrisy. My words speak for themselves and are only representations of "the narrowness of my own experience" as Thoreau put it, in Walden, and since I re-read this thread today, I realized I had an idea for you and for any who would so boldly ask such questions.
Lose it all and you will be left with what is real, or go to Bhutan for a year and live with the locals. Whatever path you choose to take, it has to be completely outside of your normal experience, in order to break you free of your conditioning.
These are my thoughts.
God is in you. I wish you Peace.
