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Psyche

psyche –– The human soul, spirit or mind. Oxford Dictionary

In the real world, the human psyche or entity that dwells within the physical body is defined as being permanent and real and, as such, deemed to be actual. This entity as soul, spirit or mind is a non-corporeal entity that is ‘inside’ the physical flesh and blood body, looking out through the eyes, hearing through the ears, smelling through the nose, etc.

This entity can be conveniently seen to have two component parts: who one thinks one is – a psychological entity – and who one feels oneself to be – a psychic entity. Broadly speaking, who one thinks oneself to be is one’s social identity – the sum of the morals, ethics, values and psittacisms that have been instilled from birth by one’s peers in order to make one a fit and fitting member of one’s particular group in society.

Who one feels oneself to be is ‘me’ at my very core – the instinctual animal sense of being implanted by blind nature to ensure the survival of the species. This genetically inherited sense of ‘self’ is the very basis of the self-survival instinct.

The study of the psyche blossomed in the West when academic study broke free from the churches and has been formalized in the last centuries as the discipline of

  • psychology – (The science of the nature, functioning, and development of the human mind (formerly, of the soul), including the faculties of reason, emotion, perception, communication, etc.; the branch of science that deals with the (human or animal) mind as an entity and in its relationship to the body and to the environmental or social context, based on observation of the behaviour of individuals or groups of individuals in particular)

and the discipline of

  • psychiatry – (The medical treatment of mental illness, emotional disturbance, and abnormal behaviour).

Thus both the social programming and the neuro-biological programming of human beings are now accepted as ‘normal’ and ‘natural’ – inherent in the Human Condition. The instinctual passions of nurture and desire are given credence and kudos whilst fear and aggression are to be controlled within ‘acceptable limits’. Given that fear and aggression are both emotional responses caused by chemical surges that originate from the primitive brain or amygdala, the treatment of any excesses is ultimately a chemical treatment. Anyone exhibiting excessive fear, depression, anger or violence beyond what is considered ‘normal’, and such that they cannot control it themselves, are given chemicals to suppress or counter-balance those sourced from the amygdala.

The sole aim of psychiatry is to treat those whose psychological behaviour exceeds the limits of what society deems normal. In short, when moral and ethical self-restraint fails, and where treatment is available and sought, chemicals are relied upon to stem the tide of instinctual passions. Of course, this usually happens after the event, as in murder, rape, attempted suicides, etc., or not at all in the case of mass ‘outbreaks’ of passion such as demonstrations, riots, wars, genocides, etc.

The Eastern spiritual interpretation of the psyche essentially is that the inner realm consists of two parts – ego and soul – and the aim of spiritual practice is to sublimate and eliminate the ego such that one identifies as being only the soul. This shift of identity is typified by the teachings of self becoming Self, of having discovered one’s Original Face, or in popular jargon, ‘getting out of one’s head and into one’s heart’. Thus the spiritual believer turns away from the real world of ‘mind’, the physical body, and earthly suffering and enters into an imaginary heartfelt, meta-physical, blissful realm. By giving full reign to passionate imagination one taps into and enters a psychic world – well-trodden and extensively mapped by millions upon millions of devotees, billions of sacred words, poetry, platitudes and countless ancient ceremonies, divinations, rituals and traditions.

This psychic world of imagination is so strongly felt, so vast in scope and so seductively overwhelming to the senses as to be convincing real. For those who ‘travel’ in this psychic world there are no limits to affective imagination, and a visit to any New Age bookshop will testify to the both the plethora of beliefs and the passionate conviction of the believers. This collective psychic world seems so all-encompassing – a world so powerful as to be convincingly real – one feels as if one has discovered the Hidden Secrets of humanity – all has been revealed!

The seduction of this psychic ‘other-world’ is essentially three-fold –

  • Its very Ancient-ness – it stretches back into the mists of time from whence ‘I’, as a psychic entity, instinctually feel I came from.

  • It is an escape from the real world and from real world worries and feelings. It offers an ‘inner’ haven of peace and tranquillity. This escape has been historically typified by retreating from the world into caves, monasteries and ashrams where meditative practices are undertaken in order to still the mind, separate from the senses and thus give full reign to affective imagination.

  • The promise of life after death for one’s psyche such that the psychic entity imagines it will survive the ‘death of the body’.

And yet, these imaginative thoughts and passionate feelings only exist as thoughts in the head (or felt in the heart as a direct result of instinctual chemical surges) – this psychic other-world is but a product of one’s own psyche and that of one’s fellow believers and of all those countless others who came before. All this gigantic psychic construct, while appearing real, is not actual. The moment one stops feeding these beliefs, they shrink and eventually wither and die away. The major problem for anyone who has tapped into the psychic world is that to get out seemingly involves only one alternative – to go back to the real world one has left behind. There is now a third alternative – an actual world of unbelievable purity and perfection for those willing to eliminate the total psyche, both ego and soul. For those ensnared in the psychic spiritual world it takes enormous courage to turn around – but the seduction of that which is actual will eventually win out over that which is merely imaginary.

This web-site is for those who will be intrepid pioneers in this process of bringing peace to the world.

Freedom from the Human Condition – Happy and Harmless

© The Actual Freedom Trust