# THE INVOLUNTARY EGOIST

Humans are not by nature individualists and egoists. Throughout human history we've lived for an 'ultra ego in the sky', and had a deep – almost animal – sense of community and belonging in a group.

For thousands of centuries, our beliefs supported the cultural priority of doing things for the common good.

But, these days apart from those who we love (and true love is a rare commodity), we have become our own most important focal point.

There are a lot of philosophical discussions about if the self and it's ego, is illusory or real.

The practical point is that our modern sense of ego is unintentional and involuntary.

Our modern appreciation of the individual is a result of over developing our senses exclusively in their focusing capacity, without even an acknowledgement of the
panaral Panoramic sensing, the parasympathetic nervous system, and the lower brain. See The Panara Systems for details.
experience.

## The Individual Box and Its Social Context

Focusing is always, a selected specific narrow perspective, it separates life into specific bits.

One of the consequences of this is, that in order to find a sense of wholeness, we must make associations to join the bits together again in relationships.

Our modern feelings and ideas about 'self and others', are a natural result of generations of focusing with our senses and our minds.

This approach to life is embedded in our thinking. It is understood in every sentence we think: subjects must have objects. Our psychological sciences emphasise the individual; our sociological ideas stress the importance of relationships between individuals.

These ideas are confirmed by almost everyone. It's part of our herd mentality, probably the only thing we all still agree on.

It's so normal that it seems to make sense. But it's ridiculous. It's only life as seen by focusing.

We have created a fascinating and ludicrous situation which no animal or human in any previous culture has ever experienced, or even imagined.

Once we started to develop this very self-satisfying sensation of independent individuality, it created an energy of self empowerment. It gave us hope for our own pleasure and security, it created want, it promised personal purpose and reasons. And this became a perpetual self-repeating process, always providing new things to focus on next. This is the vicious circle of our individuality.

We may sometimes try to broaden our perspectives, to explore new ideas and beliefs, but we're always trapped in the same old box, just looking for extensions to add to our central identity.

## Repetition, Closed Mindedness and Greed

Learnt behaviour and wanting always repeat exponentially – they always lead to increasing specialisation and accumulation. This applies to all the things we possess, our ideas, and our sense of ourselves.

I'm not only saying that our modern sensation of ego is the result of a sensory imbalance, but it's a chronic condition, it gets more extreme with time. And it's pathologic, in the sense of it being uncontrollable, compulsive almost addictive.

Greed and closed-mindedness are extreme symptoms of the imbalance.

We are dominated by focused sensing and thought. The best of us feel we have to focus on fighting greed and closed-mindedness, or focus on encouraging intelligence and creativity.

But we're oblivious to the way any sensible animal would react, by stopping still for long enough to notice what's going on around us. We've become blind to the panaral way of sensing reality.

This feeling which is 'me' is being understood exclusively with focused thought.

What we are as humans is much more than just what we can do and understand by focusing.

## Vicious Circles – We Focus on Focusing

We try to solve our problems by using the same methods which got us into this mess in the first place.

We think we need to find ourselves and believe in ourselves, even be 'authentic individuals'. But all these are consequences of focused sensing.

Gurus tell us to let go of posessions and desires. But what we are blindly and unintentionally holding onto is focusing.

If we recognised the importance of panaral sensing, we would probably think we need to let go of focusing, or to focus on not focusing... in simple reality we just have to start panaring.

It is not so much the lack of egoism and desire which we need in our modern lives, it is this regular experience of wholeness and selflessness.

This is another way of looking for answers... this is another way of looking at everything... just stop moving, and stop thinking, it's easy for a few seconds with panaral listening... then open your eyes, really, just open them.

We have forgotten this natural behaviour.

Panaral sensing is an alternative way of sensing, experiencing and understanding. We will always come back to focused thinking to understand what's happening. But that's natural, these two ways of sensing developed to be coordinated together.

## Wholeness and Selflessness

The panaral state is selfless, it has to be.

When we open our eyes and ears panarally – fully alert and ready to respond at the first instant – we can't want anything at the same time, we can't even develop a constructive thought. If we did that, we would instantly lose our panaral awareness.

This direct connection with the environment neutralises any need for self-realisation or self-belief and even self-identity.

Focal points are essential in order to get anywhere and do anything, but for our focused activity to be safe and wholesome it is essential to alternate focusing regularly with panaral openness, as all other animals do.

It's vital to be able to stop thinking for a moment and sense life in its selfless wholeness.

## Squirrels Don't Have Paradoxes

Philosophers and poets may think that the focused and panaral worlds merely imply another form of duality or paradox, all such ideas are the fruits of focused sensing.

This isn't a theory... it's clearly demonstrated by every other animals' behaviour – it's practical – watch any squirrel stop for a few seconds on the lawn. Panaral and focused sensing go together like good friends who can't be parted, they are basic to life.

For every animal except the human, the panaral experience is an integral part of their everyday existence.

And, this isn't a belief... Animals don't have to believe in it to do it. It isn't really even a skill. It's simply something we were all born with and have forgotten.

Every animal has the ability to pre-emptively wait for any possibility of a warning sign – still, receptive, anticipating and open, ready and waiting.

The connection only needs to last a few seconds at a time, but we need this regularly, in order to be and stay psychologically safe.

Feeling psychologically safe, whole, alive, and real, all at the same time, when sensing in a focused way, only happen occasionally by coincidence or luck, as when being in love – but they do so always and naturally when panaring.

Panaral sensing evolved because it was the most efficient way to be open and safe at the same time.

We have forgotten this way of sensing the world and being in it. Mankind has lost part of how we always sensed the world around us, part of how life managed to survive and evolve over millions of years.

Please continue with Safety and Beliefs

Back to Chapter Three : Civilisation's Habitual Ruts
Back to THE PANORAMA SENSES Priority Pages