But does a bodhisattva really shift the perspective in the way in which Campbell is? Campbell seems to be advocating the embrace of sorrow, saying “yes” to all of what life dishes out, the good and the bad and the painful. Experiencing it fully. Is this consistent with Buddhism?
The ego is the image that one holds of ones self. The normal mind over-protects that image by distorting and deceiving the conscious. The same happens with the super-ego, the image of ones self portrayed to others. It is identical to nations and royal families trying to deceive their people into believing them to be more or more pure than they are. It is the story of Dorian Grey.
The self image is a type of demon in that divides the mind. By releasing the very idea that there really is a “self” at all, one gains freedom from all of the tremendous distractions of trying to defend it. The mind is then free to see far more of the real truth, whether good or bad. Once a mind is set free from its addictive distractions, it has more than enough processing power to see reality for what it is. But that still doesn’t mean that it can communicate such a vision to someone else. Thus experience is required, not merely recommended.
The communication to someone else, is the same problem in social form. The mind could not see reality due to one part trying to maintain an image or ontology that was not quite rational. Since everyone tends to do that when dealing with other people, the same problem occurs. No matter how truthful a statement might be, others interpret the statement in a sense of defense of their own mindset and thus do not gain the truth that was available in the room for them. They stubbornly defend their blindness from each other. The inner mind is doing that every moment, "inner dissonance.
Enlightenment is attained by the honest removal of inner dissonance (not using artificial means to merely force everything to comply with a single image, such as what a government might do to be rid of its dissonants).
More on becoming…
Becoming is a preferred concept word because it doesn’t bring all the misunderstood notions of non-anything. Becoming is full of latent potential, a delicious what happens next? and next? and… Of course there is no “next”, just the fluidity of experience. Only mind can “fix” experience (duality) temporarily. So there is no divorce of self, just brief periods when self is absent. There is not, and never has been, any human that hasn’t participated in life. The notion of any complete lack of self is nonsensical, but this doesn’t mean that self must be the center of the universe. All experience is transactional among all the constituants in any experience. It is the cosmic dance between all becomings…
Rainey,
It’s a specific “self” that is refuted - the self as single, independent, and permanent.
I feel like you may have misunderstood the stuff about moments - the point is that nothing that exists is unchanging. I think we’re both saying the same thing, but coming at it from opposite directions. Early Buddhists had posited a smallest unit of time, which “adds up”. Later analytic philosophers started with that notion, and proceeded to deconstruct the unit idea entirely.
Yes, unless I’m misunderstanding something.
I like the word, but words aren’t magic. I can as easily misunderstand becoming as having teleological significance as I can emptiness as having nihilistic or pessimistic overtones.
James,
Well said.
“The notion of any complete lack of self is nonsensical…”
I disagree with that. But then the Buddhist definition of self has little to do with a robust personality or willfulness. The Buddhist self isn’t something to be gotten rid of through practice, it’s something that can never have existed in the first place.
The self is much like love, in order to gain the greatest of it, one must give up the want for it. No one loves anyone as much as the one who only loves others, attending so very little to herself. And that is why so very few do it. It is confounding, requiring almost total depression or blind devotion in order to give up so much that one can start over and take the higher road.
In the secular world, one is brainwashed and inspired, even chemically, into concern only for ones self (“be humble to no one”); an internal itch that cannot be scratched, an anxiety that is simply unceasing. By thus a hierarchy is raised, a mountain upon which a great manipulator is warmed and comforted by the struggles and suffering of others fighting to defend their self.
Thus the battle is on two fronts, medically and psychologically, both outstandingly difficult. Man against men. Mind against madness. The futile eternal conflict of fear of losing what was never truly possessed due to the desire to protect it.
The war is one that could be easily won, if it were not a war in which one was already born and raised. One must give up the battle in order to win the war. And who can give up the desire to win against his torture in order to win peace of mind? Only they who give up for other reasons and have the wisdom to begin anew void of wanting for that which is not within clear grasp and a clear vision of the pitfalls already set in place by an intelligent adversary, a trickster with great experience and influence.
The path has become so narrow as to almost not exist.
Hi,
My limited understanding of Buddhism is that the focus is not about the self but instead on selfhood.
Not on existence but on the nature of existence.
I guess, this just may be a very limited understanding.
Cheers
Simms
PS. This is my first post
An ideal concept and fairly easy to understand. Less so in practice. Have you ever heard of or known of any human who was not aware of self? Despite our ideals, duality is never vanquished. This leads to an interesting question: Can a Buddhist post a selfie on facebook? 
Hi Simms, welcome.
You may very well be right, but I don’t think everyone automatically knows what you mean when you differentiate self from selfhood, existence from the nature of existence.
Maybe you could elaborate?
I think from a Buddhist point of view it’s a fact that the self, as defined in a Buddhist context, doesn’t exist in any way, shape, or form. A fact, not an ideal.
What exactly do you mean by “vanquishing” duality? I may or may not agree…
What’s a selfie?!
Did you notice that in the first two sentences you wrote you referred to the term “I” ? And that is the point. I have no problem agreeing that there is no “self”, but I, and you, and everyone else functions in a self world most of the time. In meditation or creativity we can let I/ME go for brief periods, but I/ME returns and self attempts to “fix” the universe once again. That is duality and that is suffering. Duality is the pervasive environment and the FACT that it is illusion doesn’t make it go away. Consider: You are never or rarely in a state of selfless hunger, you think and say, “I am hungry.” Oops…
What is a selfie? That was me being a smartass. A selfie is when you use your phone/camera held at arms length to take a picture of your “self” and posting it on one of the social sites.
Good discussion here. Carry on. 
It is most likely me that’s misunderstanding.
To participate (“joyfully” Campbell recommends) in the sorrows of the world presupposes attachment, does it not? Isn’t sorrow a state of affairs that’s arrived at by desire? And a misinterpretation of reality, according to Buddhist thought? Wouldn’t a true bodhisattva be rather unengaged and detached from that which can cause sorrow?
Thank You for the welcome Anon,
I guess what I am trying to say is that the concept of self conjures up the notion of an entity, whereas the notion of selfhood is more aligned with the development of a person’s character or inner qualities. Likewise, existence conjures up the notion of an entity, whereas the notion of “nature of existence” conjures up the notion of how a person experiences life.
So, to my limited understanding, Buddhism is a choice about what a person focus on (pays attention to) and so it has a limited field of interests. We, as humans, often tend to view this narrow field of vision as a positive/negative assertion about self or existence.
Or, Buddhism is about the development of a persons character through the development of appropriate attention. Where appropriate attention aligns our experiences with our desires. The feedback process which allows us to determine if our attention is appropriate or inappropriate is the consequences of our attention.
For example, if someone calls me an idiot then they have called me an idiot only once. If I mentally repeat the events of this person calling me an idiot then I am calling myself an idiot as the actions of the other person have since ceased. In effect, that person has harmed me only once whereas I have harmed myself many times by mentally repeating what they have said. This is inappropriate attention as it magnifies the harm of the original event. Appropriate attention would reduce the harm of the original event.
Some desires increase the way we harm ourselves and some desires reduce the way we harm ourselves. Buddhism is focused on the later and not on extinguishing all desires.
Tentative,
I guess my point is that the Buddha, or any enlightened person, will refer to their self as “I”.
The Buddhist self which is refuted is not the same thing as the Freudian ego.
Rainey,
I’m not a Campbell scholar, so I’m guessing a bit on interpreting his words. A Bodhisattva joyfully accepts suffering, but he doesn’t seek it out for its own sake. A bodhisattva is fully engaged in living - that’s the whole point. But yes, a bodhisattva engages in virtue, i.e. actions that lead towards joy and away from suffering. Suffering presents an opportunity to purify and transform
