No self – No problems

I put forth that simple proposition to a friend of mine the other day and he responded with "I think destruction of the self is abhorrent."

Now I pondered that response for the last couple of days.

Why would a simple idea like no self engender such fear in a relatively intelligent man? And here is what I have come up with.

My friend may be thinking one of two things.

#1 What happens to me if I did let go of self? Would I lose me? Would I just blink out of existence? Become the whole in the donut? Scary propositions.

Or #2 Someone or something else would rush in and fill the void left behind when my “self is no longer a player. Invasion of the body snatchers, or in this case invasion of the ego snatchers. Another scary proposition.

Let me state for the record, I haven’t let go of self either. I think fear holds us bound to our egos, our selves all our lives. Some very brave souls have broken free, but I’m not one of them.

But if I had the courage to release me from self, I don’t think either #1 or #2 would happen. At the end of the day it’s still me. It’s always been me. Just maybe me without my pathetic ego running the show all by it’s self. Ego is fear. That is just about all it is. It in it’s self isn’t a bad thing, just a very limiting one.

There is so much more to us than our fears of people, places and things.

this hypothesis confuses destruction of the self with finding of the self.
i believe the good things we are looking for will come from finding our true self,
not by destroying it so there is none left to "get in the way".