will power and self: the shamanistic couplet

It has been a very personal quest to figure this out, and that is why I have become very irritable when life has got in the way of this endless parsing of data. It has to do with the difference between an orientation towards the Ego, or towards the Self, and how I orient myself in relation to these.

"The self" is roughly equated with Nietzsche's "abyss" (a kind of nihilistic serenity that is at odds with conformity to social mores and conventions, but can exist alongside them.) It is also, in my thesis, associated with the pre-Oedipal identity (as opposed to the Oedipal identity, which is, of course, ego oriented). We all have both self and ego, but few people realise this. To be able to realise it is to effectively double one's identity -- which is shamanistic!!!!

I had been trying to understand the Western ego for some time. I was particularly trying to understand it when I did my honours dissertation. I find that although it is a psychological construct that we all share, the degree of emphasis that Ego is given, in relation to the Self, is strongly a feature of cultural determinants and conditioning.

The Japanese and black Zimbabweans (and to a lesser degree, also white Zimbabweans) tend to give a stronger functional emphasis to the Self and its perceptions, rather than to the Ego and its evaluations, in the ways that they orient themselves towards the world. This means that their perceptions are imbued with a stronger sense of Animism and (for want of a better term), "jouissance", in comparison to those whose approach is relatively more Ego-oriented.

I understand, now, that it is a well established error that imagines a more ego-oriented approach to have something to do with stronger will power. This is a fundamental insight that I have gained through studying Marechera. One who is oriented, relatively, more towards the Self than towards the Ego can, in fact, have tremendously strong will power. The combination of will power with a STRONG orientation towards the Self (rather than towards the Ego, in the way that one experiences the world) is to be associated with shamanism, as a spontaneous product of a cultural and (therefore, also) neurological orientation towards perception.

One simply is not a shaman without strong will power, as the whole of shamanistic training is in fact geared towards developing stronger will power in order to handle more shocking and mind-blowing perceptions. To handle these perceptions well enables one to be more oriented towards the Self and less oriented towards the Ego.

The shaman's devaluation of an ego-oriented relationship to the world also has much in common with other mystical traditions. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_(illusion)