"As I get older, the less I identify as my current state and the more I identify with the person who transitions through states."
This sounds neat, but once you set the states aside - what's left? :) Who's that person? Our identity is a sum of these states. The rest (navigating through states) is an illusion. Just like movement in a video is an illusion created by consecutive frames. The sense of continuity is a magic trick.
I could agree that some (perhaps most, who knows) self-identifications are unnecessary and burdening, toxic even. And possibly cost more than the value they bring into our life, especially since we tend to cling on to them for too long.
"This too shall pass", if meant as a universal motto, isn't an attitude that would inevitably stem from this observation, though (in my view).
Say, being a parent is also a phase, in a way, it's just a state of my life and personhood. Not the essence of myself. But I do care about my son nevertheless. This makes me more vulnerable and potentially frustrated, but well, that's what constitutes being a person.
"What we are angry about tends to be a reflection of ourselves more than the current state of affairs"
That's no different from what we're happy about, etc. Without personhood all is just an enormous cloud of elementary particles floating in the dark
> Without personhood all is just an enormous cloud of elementary particles floating in the dark
I don't understand. Dropping personhood and ego doesn't mean dropping feeling, wisdom or meaning. In fact, it is precisely when the ego is dissolved that we can feel most meaningfully connected to ultimate reality. Our personhood is not what makes raw matter ("elementary particles floating in the dark") vibrant, alive and coherent. Personhood is a very useful social-cognitive illusion but, when dropped, the world tends to become richer not more empty. Nah?
This sounds neat, but once you set the states aside - what's left? :) Who's that person? Our identity is a sum of these states. The rest (navigating through states) is an illusion. Just like movement in a video is an illusion created by consecutive frames. The sense of continuity is a magic trick.
I could agree that some (perhaps most, who knows) self-identifications are unnecessary and burdening, toxic even. And possibly cost more than the value they bring into our life, especially since we tend to cling on to them for too long.
"This too shall pass", if meant as a universal motto, isn't an attitude that would inevitably stem from this observation, though (in my view).
Say, being a parent is also a phase, in a way, it's just a state of my life and personhood. Not the essence of myself. But I do care about my son nevertheless. This makes me more vulnerable and potentially frustrated, but well, that's what constitutes being a person.
"What we are angry about tends to be a reflection of ourselves more than the current state of affairs"
That's no different from what we're happy about, etc. Without personhood all is just an enormous cloud of elementary particles floating in the dark