Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Quotes on False Ego

It is natural for us to want to be happy, satisfied, and free. But due to ignorance of our true identity, our natural longing becomes misdirected and leads to further bondage and unhappiness.

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

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If you, the self, erroneously identify with the physical body—if you believe “I am the body”—then this deluded condition is called false ego.

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

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If you wrongly identify yourself with your body—your senses—you will erroneously conclude that you can achieve happiness through material sense gratification.

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

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The foundation of racism and racial conflict is the false identification of the body (“clothing”) with the person.

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

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A materialist identifies the person they love with the physical body that person inhabited. Therefore when that person or atma leaves their body and just a corpse remains, the materialist will not know what to think. He will be frightened and confused by the corpse -- because although the body is present, his beloved is not.

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation



~ Jagad Guru (Jagad Guru Chris Butler)
© 2008 Science of Identity Foundation

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - The First Thing We Must Understand is the Reality of Our Identity

A famous football player in the United States who recently retired was discussing the particular event that made him decide to quit playing. He had been running with the football toward the goal, with two tacklers chasing him. As his legs started giving out, he thought, “Come on, you old legs—don’t give out on me now!” This is like a race car driver who talks to his car: “Keep on going, Betsy—don’t let me down now!” In other words, you use your body as a type of vehicle; but like all vehicles, it is bound to break down sooner or later.

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

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The material body can be likened to a computer/machine. Each person operates his own private computer/machine, and when he is finished using his machine, it no longer has any value because no one else can operate it. When the operator is present, the value of the computer certainly exceeds the net worth of its ingredients. Without an operator, however, a computer has no useful function, and is worth no more than the scrap value a junk dealer will pay for its component bits of plastic and metal.

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

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Perfection means being in tune with reality. The first thing we must understand is reality—the reality of my identity, i.e., my essence, position and function. Who am I? Just as a person does not identify himself as being the shirt that he is wearing, he also should not identify himself with the body that he is wearing.

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

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A person who understands that (1) one day the body will cease existing, and that (2) he himself will not cease existing, naturally becomes less interested in material gain and material pursuits (which he knows will be taken away one day) and becomes more interested in making spiritual advancement—advancement in wisdom, love, and compassion.

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

~ Jagad Guru (Jagad Guru Chris Butler)
© 2008 Science of Identity Foundation

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Discovering Your Real Identity

WHO ARE YOU? DISCOVERING YOUR REAL IDENTITY

What is your essence? Is it matter—a mere collection of material atoms and molecules? Or is it something else?

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

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You are your body, right? You are chemical in essence ... right? At least, that’s what one of America’s most influential scientists claims:

I am a collection of water, calcium and organic molecules called Carl Sagan. You are a collection of almost identical molecules with a different collective label.*

Like Sagan, most people believe that they are their body. So if you ask them who they are, they think and respond in terms of bodily labels.

“I’m Susan. I’m blond, 29 years old, a mother, and still 36-24-36!”

“I’m Henry. I’m a white American male and proud of it!”

“I’m John. I’m a lawyer. I’m 40 years old and getting older every day.”

“I’m Alice. I’m a female student. I’m fat and I’m a Methodist.”

Name, race, age, sex, religion, nationality, occupation, height, weight, and so on—all these are bodily labels. Therefore if you consider your body to be yourself, you automatically identify yourself with such labels. If your body is fat and ugly, you think, “Woe is me! I am fat and ugly.” If your body is 60 years old and female, you think, ”I am a 60-year-old female.” If your body is black and beautiful, you think, “I am black and beautiful.”

But is the body really the self? Are you really your body?

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

*Carl Sagan, Cosmos (New York: Random House, 1980), p. 127.

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Many people believe that a person is the brain or some part of the brain. You may be one of them. If so, the following should boggle your mind:

Recent studies on the turnover of the molecular population within a given nerve cell have indicated that ... their macromolecular contingent is renewed about ten thousand times in a lifetime.*

In other words, the matter making up each brain cell is completely renewed every three days.

Your brain—that mass of matter which is contained in your skull today—is not the same brain that was in your skull last week.

Jagad Guru Chris Butler - Science of Identity Foundation

*Paul Weiss, “The Living System: Determinism Stratified,” in Arthur Koestler and J.R. Smythies, eds., Beyond Reductionism (London: Hutchinson, 1969), p. 13.


~ Jagad Guru (Jagad Guru Chris Butler)
© 2009 Science of Identity Foundation