by Michael W. Taft The next time you’re talking to yourself, in your mind, ask yourself this question: Who or what is talking to who? Are there two different people in your head, one that… Read More »How to Deconstruct Yourself
by Michael W. Taft Philosopher Thomas Metzinger says, “Nobody ever had or was a self.” Sages and seers have historically instructed us that the ego “doesn’t exist,” and that we only need to see through… Read More »Deconstructing the Perception of the Ego/self
In this super-short video, meditation master Shinzen Young defines enlightenment (very accurately) in under two minutes. Tl;dr summary: You realize that there’s nothing inside you called a self. The activity of the ego is present,… Read More »Shinzen Young Defines Enlightenment in Under Two Minutes
by Jessica Graham When we talk about meditation, it’s often in the context of relaxation and stress relief. These have certainly been a wonderful benefit of my own practice. There is, however, another word that… Read More »Terror On The Cushion
In this short video, Michael W. Taft discusses the ego—something which feels as if it is an eternal entity, but which actually is nothing more than a brain-generated function.
This is a video of me speaking at the Portland Float Conference last October (2012). I’m adapting Shinzen’s ideas about how to deconstruct the ego to the environment of a flotation tank. Thanks to the… Read More »What Is the Self?
Hey, a book co-written by Peter Baumann and myself, Ego: the Fall of the Twin Towers and the Rise of an Enlightened Humanity is available for pre-order on Amazon. It’s about the evolutionary background of… Read More »New Book: Ego
by Michael W. Taft The name of this blog is “Deconstructing Yourself,” but what does deconstruction have to do with meditation? In short: everything. Deconstructing your experience—in the sense of analyzing or seeing through experience—is… Read More »Meditation — Why “Deconstruction”?