Revolution of Self
An Awakening Battle Plan
You cannot make the egoless state into a future goal and then work toward it. All you get is more dissatisfaction, more inner conflict, because it will always seem that you have not arrived yet, have not “attained” that state yet. When Freedom from ego is your goal for the future, you give yourself more time, and more time means more ego. Look carefully to find out if your spiritual search is a disguised form of ego.1
Quality of life improves in parallel with one’s level of self-awareness. I have spent years researching this phenomenon and waiting for any sign that would indicate otherwise, yet none appear.
The bulk of what I teach revolves around self-awakening because I understand how dramatically it can improve the lives of those who walk this Path. It is truly the key that unlocks a near infinite number of doors.
What I have found is that although many become interested in the idea of self-actualization or awakening, they rarely follow through with lifestyle and mindset changes that would actually further their development in this regard.
Unlike hollow philosophies and even many religious practices, working on Self requires action.
Over the past few years I have written on the subject of self-mastery quite a bit, so I figured I would consolidate some of these resources into one place. Let the following tips and resources help you take action and form a battle plan for your own self-awakening.
Confidence and Willpower
In “Building Superhuman Confidence” I wrote:
One of the problems with our current society is it has allowed so many of us to just kind of float through life in a bubble, not really developing any means of providing palpable value.
Subconsciously, this destroys self-confidence. The more you work on your Self, the easier it will be to show confidence.
If you want to become a more fulfilled, happier person that is capable of exuding rock-solid resolve and a confident demeanor, you must work on the Self. Do this not as a means to an end, but view this contentment and confidence as the natural byproduct of living a life worth living.
We are made to believe that outside circumstances are what builds confidence and joy: money, job titles, relationships. However this is backwards thinking.
Good things follow forth from inner-peace and self-surety. Confidence comes from within, it is the result of self-awareness. When you live life with surety, you communicate with clarity to the universe.
Life Begins Where the Ego Ends
In “Knowledge Disparity and Self Mastery” I wrote:
The ego is the single greatest roadblock to true self mastery.
Naturally, to understand how to dismantle the ego, one must first admit their shortcomings and seek genuine knowledge. It is this knowledge, and the wisdom that comes with it, that helps tear apart the constructs that the ego has built.
While there exists a popular notion in some circles that we “need” the ego and that the identity it provides is part of what makes us forceful and effective in the physical realm, this has been soundly debunked many times over.
Reduction in ego always leads to a greater degree of effectiveness, not to mention residual happiness. It is because the ego, even when small and contained, creates unnecessary blockages and hurdles for the mind, thereby weakening our potential to interface with the energy around us and manifest what we want.
Ego also breeds ignorance and foolishness. These hurdles can make it difficult to follow a spiritual path, because it is the ego’s job to maintain itself at all costs, even at the expense of our quality of life or cosmic destiny.
Ego will choose to be right, play the victim, engage in self-pity, or make excuses for weak behavior more often than it will allow you to be righteous and purehearted. With ego, there is always some attachment to negative emotional states or past memories, which are part of the ego identity. Trying to square a high vibration lifestyle with these negative states is more difficult than you would think - naturally because these are conflicting phenomenon.
The Power of Mindfulness
In “What Does Mindfulness Mean? The Power of Self-Reflection,” I wrote:
The act of becoming conscious and self-aware is akin to gaining mastery over an invisible, celestial orchestra, the harmonious ensemble of thoughts, emotions, and actions that shape our reality.
This conscious self-awareness serves as the celestial conductor, guiding and directing this grand symphony of the self, thereby unlocking unlimited potential and control.
A self-aware individual is a mindful one. Mastery denotes control, and control is impossible without full awareness of one’s thoughts, emotions, and actions.
It is this juncture that many struggle with. It’s easy enough to “do spiritual things” (eat better, work out, pray, etc), but creating that separation between the ego and Self can feel arduous, even frightening. Some think of it almost as losing oneself, or changing into someone else.
“I don’t want to become a detached monk on a mountain,” is something I hear often. As if spirituality and self-mastery is synonymous with having no emotion or no longer having a “life.”
The opposite is actually true. You can’t even begin to experience the full range of emotion and depth of the human experience until you drop the ego and learn to control your emotions and thoughts directly. Until you are in the driver’s seat, all of your experiences will be lessened and watered down to a certain degree.
This is where mindfulness comes in. It is mindful practices that teach us how to reduce the ego’s grip on us and allow us to think and feel what we want, on our terms.
Mindful individuals experience a greater range of emotion and better quality thoughts, and as such, naturally gravitate toward positivity and a richer, deeper lifestyle.2
Understanding Perception
In “Leaving the Nightmare,” I wrote:
If you really took a step back and observed how much the average person complains in one day, you would be able to easily see how they create their own hell.
Complaining is a response of the ego. It infers a weak mind that needs supplication and pity from anyone within ear shot, regardless of the severity of the circumstances.
In this context, complaining is what we call a negative affirmation.
Learning to control how you respond to what goes on around you helps to shape your experience. We live in a reciprocal universe, and until you master this two-way energy exchange, you will remain stuck in what I call the Nightmare.
The Nightmare is the revolving door of suffering that we create through our own negative perception and unhelpful actions. Because perception is such an important element of our existence here in this realm, mastering it is a top priority.
Perception isn’t just about how you interpret things. It’s about seeing the world in a proper light so that you can make healthier and more productive decisions. Furthermore, perception also dictates how reality responds to you.
There is a constant exchange of energy going on between our consciousness and the world around us. This interplay is what is responsible for a great deal of what we experience day in and day out. The energy with which we expend when reacting to a certain situation gets cycled back into moods, mental states, and then into more physical events.
How we react to a situation is in some ways even more important than the event itself.
An event, after all, is the result of a certain combination of energy and intent. We are experiencing the result of other actions, most of which are metaphysical in nature.
It is how we react to and thereby transmute these experiences which will determine how the future plays out.
Since we are interfacing with a multitude of different conscious beings, everything we experience is not 100% the result of our current actions and reactions - there is a blend between past karma, the thoughts and actions of others, and our current mindset and reactions, something to the tune of 20% / 10% / 70%, although this varies from individual to individual.
Life is heavily weighted toward individual action and reaction. For the most part, it is the energy we create in the moment that will pave the way for future events.
Master your perception and 70% of the game is already won and will arc in your favor each and every time.
Discovering Your Higher Self
In “Aligning With Your Higher Self” I wrote:
Knowledge of Self is power. You can better understand your purpose and how to direct the course of your life if you truly know who you are.
Until you shed your ego, it will be difficult to connect with the higher aspects of your Self, which limits your ability to direct and control the course of your life.
We are at our weakest point when we associate with the false self, the ego. This is done through identifying with arbitrary labels (job titles, nationalities, race, etc) instead of our divine qualities. Similarly, when attached to the past, we give up our present identity and power.
Other ego-based states of mind, such as playing the victim and basing our emotional and mental state on physical circumstances, will always limit our capacity to be in tune with our higher selves.
There are several reasons for this but the most obvious is because of the differing frequencies.
“Higher Self” is just a spiritual / new age term referring to our etheric and astral bodies, and more specifically, the seat of our consciousness that resides on these frequencies. Association with these frequencies is nearly impossible when attached to lower vibrational concepts such as physical identifiers. You will never meet a deeply spiritual person who cares one iota about things like race, job titles, or other physical name tags and honorifics. Nor will you find someone who is self-actualized who obsesses over the past or worries about the future.
These two states of existence are incompatible.
Embracing The Law of Attraction
Self-mastery and manifestation are two related concepts. Attraction is a solid metric of mastery. The more attuned someone is to the spiritual dimension, the stronger one is in mind and body, the more likely they are able to manifest what they need at a given time.
Mastery of Self naturally leads to effective and consistent manifestation.
In “How Does the Law of Attraction Really Work?” I wrote:
Every thought, feeling, or belief emits a specific vibrational frequency.
When we say, “like attracts like,” it means that similar frequencies resonate with each other, creating a sort of symphony that the universe listens and responds to.
As we adjust our emotional state and thoughts – our vibration – we shift the universe’s response, making it possible to attract experiences that align with our desired frequency.
Self-mastery creates a snowball effect. Higher quality thoughts and emotions create energy that is more in line with an abundant life. While this isn’t always the case, and some of us are called to engage in tribulation in order to reach higher states of consciousness, by and large a life of mastery will lead to a life of abundance, in some form or another.
The quality of what we attract also relies, to a certain degree, on our perception.
Two people of differing states of consciousness can have the same experience yet have wildly different reactions. One may be deeply grateful, give thanks to the universe, and exude positive energy that winds up producing more abundance down the road. The other person may have expected something else based on their attachments, feel “let down,” get upset and depressed, and think of the event as a disappointment, complaining about it and even resenting it.
Which Path do you think creates the better life? The same circumstances can lead to very different manifestations, depending on who is transmuting the energy.
Perception is incredibly powerful, which is one reason why so many spiritual traditions and religions offer beliefs and practices that are physically counterintuitive or even absurd on the surface. Giving thanks to God even in the face of tragedy might seem psychotic to someone on the outside who has no “faith,” yet the spiritually-minded person knows exactly why such a mindset is superior.
Having a positive mindset in the face of extreme negativity gives you and everyone involved a much higher chance of experiencing better circumstances down the road. It is also healthy for the mind and body, as dwelling in a lower vibrational state (grief) puts stress on the body that accelerates physical decay and death.
The Path of Self-Mastery
I recommend reading through some of the linked resources in this article, as you may gain greater insight into your Self and how to live life abundantly.
Something worth noting that I often see people struggling with, is whether or not to adopt a certain philosophy or religion when following the Path, or feeling as though they have to drop one belief system for another. Some believe they are all corrupt and useless, while others have strong opinions on some and couldn’t care less about the others.
Don’t get distracted. Every last religion and philosophy on the planet is a framework for understanding certain aspects of esoteric wisdom, yet none are “complete” in the sense that they provide the entire picture. At best, all a religion or a philosophy can do is augment your self-mastery practices and provide some context on certain complex topics.
When starting out, some find it beneficial to adopt a particular religion (or to shun one), and while there is value to be had in doing so, it is very easy to form an identity around these systems and mistake them for a higher sense of Self.
Even the most illogical religions on the planet have value for those who use them as vehicles toward a higher consciousness. Likewise, the most logical philosophy on the planet is useless if it doesn’t actually help you evolve or impart self-mastery. It is for this reason why many self-mastery practitioners abide most religions and some truly fantastical belief systems, while mostly deriding politics and philosophy.
The former actually augments the spiritual path to some degree, while most political theory and philosophy muddles the mind and pampers the ego. There are a few exceptions to the rule, but the point is, if you care too much about a particular religion or philosophy (for or against) you’re losing the plot and need to detach.
When you start really diving into esoteric practices that encourage self-mastery, you quickly realize most of this stuff doesn’t matter. You’re just as likely to find a self-actualized Catholic as you are a self-actualized Buddhist. Saints and gurus have existed in every tradition, and while many maintain mainstream belief systems to be a detriment to spiritual evolution, they are merely tools, nothing more.
Use them or don’t, but at all costs, do not make them your personality or identity. This is where people stumble.
Remember in all things, it’s better to have no opinion on a subject if having an opinion means loss of emotional control or mindfulness. Many self-actualized individuals appear fairly “belief system agnostic” for this reason, because there is an understanding that strong emotionally-charged opinions on arbitrary subjects take away your personal power and control, which is obviously counterproductive for a happy and successful life.
Eckhart Tolle’s “A New Earth.” Recommended reading for anyone looking for a greater understanding of personal identity, ego, and how to master the Self.
Goes without saying but those who are in control of their own mind don’t waste time on negative thoughts and emotions. One of the big points that separates someone who is self-actualized from someone who is sleeping at the wheel of life.