Pure Awareness Sutra 2018

Pure Awareness Sutra

through Tenabah c2018

1. I am not my thoughts,

thoughts come and go,

but I remain.

2. I am not my emotions,

emotions come and go,

but I remain.

3. I am not my sensations,

sensations come and go,

but I remain.

4. I am pure awareness,

where thoughts, emotions,

and sensations,

arise, abide, change,

and pass away.

5. Here and now,

I choose to rest

in pure awareness

as pure awareness.

6. Here and now,

I choose to let

thoughts, emotions,

and sensations

flow without me.

7. I choose to not

resist any thoughts,

emotions, or sensations.

8. I choose to not

cling to any thoughts,

emotions, or sensations.

9. I choose to not

identify with any thoughts,

emotions, or sensations.

10. I choose to not let

any thoughts, emotions,

or sensations define me

or limit me.

11. I choose to be pure awareness.

12. I choose to not be any thought.

13. I choose to not be any emotion.

14. I choose to not be any sensation.

15. I choose to not be any body.

16. I center myself

in pure awareness,

being the pure seeing itself,

without any seer behind the seeing,

and without identification

with what is seen.

17. Pure awareness

is unconditional love,

accepting everything as it is.

18. I am unconditional love.

19. I accept everything as it is.

20. Pure awareness

is intuitive wisdom,

seeing everything as it is.

21. I am intuitive wisdom.

22. I see everything as it is.

23. Pure awareness

is creative freedom,

manifesting everything as it is.

24. I am creative freedom.

25. I manifest everything as it is.

26. Pure awareness

is creative imagination,

manifesting everything as it is.

27. I am creative imagination.

28. I manifest everything as it is.

29. I am pure awareness,

pure consciousness,

pure love,

pure wisdom,

pure freedom,

and pure creativity.

30. I am above and beyond

thoughts, emotions, and sensations.

31. I am not any identity

based on thoughts, emotions,

and sensations.

32. No thought, emotion, or sensation

defines who or what I am.

33. In the silence of

no thought,

no emotion,

and no sensation,

I am still present.

34. In the activity of

thought, emotion, and sensation,

I am still present.

35. I choose to be present

in the dramas of the world,

without being caught in them.

36. I serve the healing

of the world, with compassion

and with non-attachment.

37. I take care of my body

in this world, with compassion

and with non-attachment.

38. I help my family and friends,

in this world, with compassion

and with non-attachment.

39. Pure awareness is breath of space,

the heartbeat of creation, pulsing

everywhere, permeating everything.

40. I am breath of space,

the heartbeat of creation, pulsing

everywhere, permeating everything.

41. Pure awareness is breath of time,

the heartbeat of creation, pulsing

everywhen, permeating everything.

42. I am breath of time,

the heartbeat of creation, pulsing

everywhen, permeating everything.

43. I inhabit my body through the fusion

of breath of space, breath of air,

and breath of energy.

44. I am an embodied breath.

45. I am not a breathing body.

46. I am the breath of life in the body.

47. I am the heartbeat of the body.

48. I am the wakefulness inside the body.

49. I am breathing from the breath itself inside the body.

50. I am the breath that moves the body

and floats the arms and legs.

51. I am the vibration inside the breath.

52. I vibrate inside every cell as the pulse of the breath.

53. Pure awareness is like the sun,

radiating everywhere equally,

illuminating everything,

experiencing everything.

54. I am like the sun,

radiating everywhere equally,

illuminating everything,

experiencing everything.

55. Pure awareness is like the sky,

allowing clouds

of thoughts, emotions, and sensations

to float within its spaciousness,

without clinging to them,

without identifying with them,

without reacting to them,

and without resisting them.

56. I am like the sky,

allowing clouds

of thoughts, emotions, and sensations

to float within my spaciousness,

without clinging to them,

without identifying with them,

without reacting to them,

and without resisting them.

57. Pure awareness is like the sky,

without boundaries,

no place

where my awareness ends

and your awareness begins.

58. There is only one awareness.

59. We are this one awareness.

60. Pure awareness is like the ocean,

with the ocean expressing itself,

through individual waves.

61. I am like the ocean,

expressing itself

through my individual wave.

62. Pure awareness is like a mirror,

reflecting everything without distortion,

without reaction,

and without interpretation.

63. I am like a mirror,

reflecting everything without distortion,

without reaction,

and without interpretation.

64. Pure Awareness is luminous presence,

simply being itself.

65. I am luminous presence,

simply being itself.

66. Pure Awareness is luminous presence,

the unity of being, space, and energy.

67. I am luminous presence.

68. I am the unity of being, space,

and energy.

69. I am pure consciousness,

the unity of awareness, wakefulness,

and noticing.

70. I am pure love,

the unity of empathy, acceptance, and kindness.

71. I am pure wisdom,

the unity of peace, humility, empathy, curiosity, patience, contemplation, attention, and knowing.

72. I am creative imagination,

the unity of freedom, creativity, unconditionality, motivelessness, spontaneity, and joy.

73. Noticing my enlightened Buddha Nature,

I become enlightened.

74. Understanding my enlightened Buddha Nature, I become enlightened.

75. Accepting my enlightened Buddha Nature,

I become enlightened.

76. Consciously feeling

my enlightened Buddha Nature

with non-dual awareness,

from being the pure seeing

rather than any seer,

I stay enlightened.

77. I am non-dual awareness.

78. I am the seeing without a seer.

79. I am the seeing,

in unity with the seen,

without identifying with the seen.

80. I am not my memories,

my thoughts, my emotions,

my sensations, my reactions,

my perceptions, my bodies,

my possessions, my relationships,

my interpretations, my beliefs,

my opinions, my causes, my intentions,

or even where I focus my attention.

81. Here and now,

I choose to remember

who and what I truly am,

and not let any past memory,

or future fear,

or even future hope,

replace this.

82. I am the wakefulness

that breathes from the breath itself.

83. I am united with the One Awareness

that breathes in all of us as ourselves.

84. I let myself be breathed by this One Awareness

and rest in this breathing as this breath

and let this breathing undo all my illusions

about who and what we all are.

85. Merged with this One Awareness,

I am breathing inside everyone

as I am being breathed.

86. In the Unity of Being Breathed,

the Breath itself is One,

and we are free.

Moving Through the Bardo in Quantum Slipstream

 

This article is linked with the following YouTube video and provides the background to understand and use the video:

https://youtu.be/oqJPGy61XPU

I have been writing notes underneath the YouTube videos that I have been composing, but it has been limiting what I can say to a certain number of words.

THE LAW OF FALLING

One of the odder chapters in the book BEELZEBUB'S TALES TO HIS GRANDSON by Gurdjieff is entitled "The Law of Falling".  In this book, Gurdjieff describes space ships that went through space that "fell in the right direction".  When I first read the chapter, I did not get the inner meaning of the space ships.  But then I read COMMENTARIES ON BEELZEBUB'S TALES by John Bennett and found this book unlocked the symbolic key to understand the meaning of the chapter, and after understanding how to decode the chapter, I found I could unlock other chapters of the book as well.

The law of falling has to do with "gravity waves" moving throughout the universe at 3.75hz and how Robert Monroe was found to have left his physical body behind and move into his energy body or lucid dreaming body at this frequency.  It is a state of surrender to Divine Grace, where you surrender and let go, and fall into the pull of Divine Grace, and let it move you through all the challenges of the spiritual path.

The archangels who invented this "surrender drive", which is the essence of the spiritual path in many spiritual traditions, however, found that the devotees of this path had trouble when their space ships encountered the gravitational power and atmosphere of other worlds.  When they were near a world, they would have to shutdown their surrender drive and deal the situation on what Star Trek called "impulse drive" and even modify impulse drive with "thrusters" to navigate the issues of the local environment.  Very gradually, they would get unstuck from the gravitational pull of a world, reach "escape velocity" of this pull, and they return back into empty space, and then activate "surrender drive".

In the book by John Bennett, the atmosphere of a world is our meeting with other human beings, especially family, friends, acquaintances, and enemies who "push our buttons", "activate our issues", and "pull us into their emotional dramas".  The atmosphere is the charged emotional environment and its intensity.  When we understand how to "let go" in meditation, we are soaring down the spiritual path and processing everything very well.  We are doing high level processing in a high state of consciousness, and then we are pulled down through a sanskaric activation, and are back at a slower and more mundane level of working through our issues and overcoming our ego state.  We are entangled or caught in the atmosphere of another world or another complex human psychological process, one which may even be actively pushing its own agendas on us, trying to coopt our energies for their own purposes, and even trying to jam our analysis of what is going on so that we can figure out how to free ourselves from this "gravitational eddy" that we have now got stuck in.

Another group of archangels solves this atmospheric gravitational eddy problem by developing a back up engine.  This back up system will absorb the emotional energy of the atmosphere and then, at the right time, transform it and fire it out of the impulse drive engine, boosting the power of this drive in the process.  This is the equivalent of doing "Tonglen" in Buddhism, where one breathes in the negative afflicted emotional energy of the atmosphere and transform it into positive loving energy that we gift and breath out into the atmosphere.  This energy conversion system allows us to dissolve our ego state more quickly and free us from the gravitational grip of the other person.  In other words, we realize, how much it seems to be about the other person, that it is always about something inside of us and the other person has hooked into, and we learn how to breathe in the afflicted emotional energy and let it transform our ego state, and when we do so, we boost out of this whole situation, and then, when out in space again, we activate surrender drive, and continue.

The improved space ships worked better than the older ones that only knew how to surrender in ideal conditions.  Their upgrade allowed them to use adversity and gravitational eddies in order go back into "outer space", beyond the gravitational pull of an atmosphere, and then engage "surrender drive".

Surrender drive is like "warp drive" in Star Trek, while atmospheric navigation is like impulse drive and control thrusters in Star Trek.  One has to use them when they "drop out of warp" (or drop out of dynamic surrender into the sacred and have to engage the situation and surrender the ego in an ordinary way).

In other words, "surrender drive" or "warp drive" does have issues with ordinary space and time.  There are a lot of reasons why one "drops out of warp" (loses the feeling of surrender and falls to a lower vibration).  When it encounters minimal resistance, we soar.  When we get pulled into a lower frequency, it still takes time to ramp up to escape velocity and re-engage warp (surrender drive), and, again, feel the spaciousness of a high state of consciousness.

What I would like to propose is a further upgrade beyond what Gurdjieff indicated in his chapter, and that is to upgrade "warp drive" to "quantum slipstream drive".

QUANTUM SLIPSTREAM DRIVE

There is not a lot of write up in the Star Trek canon about the difference between "warp drive" and "quantum slipstream".  What warp drive and trans warp drive is about is dropping into a subspace field where the laws of ordinary space and time are no longer fully operative, and the speed limitations of relativity (that we cannot go faster than the speed of light, which would limit us to travel 1,000 light years to the nearest solar system) are transcended.  However, when we are back to interacting with people in ordinary space and time, we naturally slow down and have to deal with them under the laws of ordinary space and time.

Quantum slipstream does not involve punching a wormhole through subspace and moving inside a subspace tunnel.  What it does is to find or create a "fold" in space and time, and ride inside of this fold.  This means we are interacting with ordinary space and time in a new way.  It is like being in a subspace and subtime field while interacting with ordinary space and time, moment to moment, within a bubble which on the inside is beyond space and time, and on the outside (the bubble membrane itself) is part of ordinary space and time.  This means that we do not have to vibrate down to where others are to interact with them, and therefore they do not have to hinder us.  We can flow within slipstreaming while seeming to interact with them through a kind of translation matrix, and still stay centered in our surrender drive even better.

This would represent a second upgrade to the drive system of our "space ship" or "meditation matrix".

UPGRADE PROCESS #1

In order to upgrade our space ship to the new drive, we need to understand the previous versions and their limitations.  Then to understand "space" and "time" in a dual way.  We understand space as it is from a higher order of reality, where space, time, and matter are illusions and "dreams in consciousness".  This means that every planet is an illusion and there is no matter or emotion to transform through tonglen or ordinary ego reduction in the spiritual traditions of planet Earth.  Every ego is seen to be unreal, a construction in consciousness that we made and then believed we are, and made real to us, and then believed it was us.  Part of the upgrade is that we realize that no one has an ego.  And that every ego is an illusion.  If we make the egos of others be real, then we are stuck in our own unreal ego that we have now made real.  The making real of the ego is how we get stuck in our ego.  If we see it as an illusion, then we are free from its grip.

The key idea is that we cannot make the egos of others real and make our ego unreal to us.  The same logic that makes the egos of others as real to us will also make our own ego real to us.  This key idea needs to be deeply internalized in order for the upgrade or initiation to happen to a higher vibrational level than "warp drive level surrender" required, where the ego merely needed to be transcended or broken through, whether real or unreal.  In slipstream, the ego must be seen to be an illusion that we are making real and getting stuck in.  If we do not make it real, then we cannot get stuck in it or in any atmosphere in any world.

UPGRADE PROCESS #2

The second key idea is that we do not need to prove to them that they are wrong for making their ego real.  We can stay in the higher view that they are already pure conscious awareness that they have chosen to be lost in an ego state where they are choosing to believe it is real and make it seem real by believing in the state, and let them do so.

Meanwhile, we do not have to believe in what they are doing to themselves and still see that they are pure awareness that is imagining their world and believing it is real.  We can see where they imagine they are and where they actually are simultaneously.  If we can do this, then we can "stay within the quantum fold" and keep on flowing.  It is part of what Jesus was trying to share when he taught people to be "in the world, but not of the world".  To be more precise in terms of this quantum slipstream drive, "seem to be in the world to others, but not believe you are in the world at all".  You stay in the center of the bubble, and let your bubble interact with their bubbles, while flowing inside and staying in your own process.

UPGRADE PROCESS #3

The third idea is that we stay in "circular surrendered breathing" which I have covered before.  This breathing has several components:

(1) Whisper chanting "ah" on the inhale and "dheeh" on the exhale.

(2) Breathing in and visualizing liquid light coming from a six inch sphere floating above your head and coming in through the soft spot at the top of the head.

(3) Visualizing the liquid light relaxing, energizing, and renewing all the cells it flows into, and then feel it come into a nine inch diameter sphere in the heart center, and from there, on the exhale, pumping into the whole body, nourishing and energizing each and every cell.

(4) On the exhale, one whisper chants "dheeh", and feels one merges with all the wisdom of the higher Buddhas to surrender, trust, allow, and abide in a power coming from Luminous All Pervading Space (God) and to let this Power do everything for us with our moment to moment permission.

(5) One removes all pauses between inhale and exhale, and feels a continuous breathing that merges inhale and exhale together.  The feeling is of one continuous circle of breathing with only a gentle "turning" between inhale and exhale.  There is a feeling of flowing and adapting to each moment which is the purified spiritual wisdom essence of the water element.

(6) One lets go of the subtle ego called the "breather" or the one who imagines it controls the breathing as an entity that is not the breathing.  One instead "breathes from the breath itself as the living breath itself".  In Buddha's words, you breathe from inside the breath, rather than being a thing that is trying to control the breath from outside the breath.  This controller ego is what gets enmeshed in subtle power struggles with every ego in an atmosphere or world.  When we release this, inside our breathing, then there is nothing to hold us in the illusory dramas of a world.  There is therefore no gravitational pull to break free of.

(7) After feeling that we are breathing from the breath itself as the breath itself, there is one more step, which is to "let us as the breath be breathed by Luminous All Pervading Space" (God).  This removes any last trace of something that needs to be surrendered to God or Space.  We let our process by held.  It is like linking into a tractor beam that gently pulls us past everything and keeps us on track.  Because it is not from us, we do not have to struggle with anything.  This is Quantum Slipstream Divine Grace.

This circular surrendered breathing is the drive system of a quantum slipstream upgraded space ship.

UPGRADE PROCESS #4

The fourth and last upgrade needed to engage in quantum slipstream drive is to concentrate on the crystal at the third eye point, and hold the thought "engage quantum slipstream drive".  If we ever hit a bumpy patch of space, time, and an atmospheric drama gravity well, we concentrate on the thought "engage quantum slipstream drive" and engage in the seven gears of circular surrendered breathing.  This process restabilizes us in quantum slipstream.

Some secondary processes are, (1) "I let them have their illusion, even if it is about me, (which it always is, since egos generally want to make every other ego real and struggle with each other) and let myself have my reality, which includes them in unity with me, and thus I am instantly freed."  This would correspond to the highest level of "forgiveness" that Jesus had taught.  (2) "I release them to do whatever they want, and give myself permission to live from my freedom too, and then use my freedom to do circular surrendered breath".  (3) "There is nothing real in this situation to fight or resist or even transform."  (4) "I let this illusion be as it is and flow beyond it".  (5) "I surrender into the all pervading light and let it take me home".  (6) "I used to work hard in impulse drive and even with the limitations of warp drive, but I do not have to any more."  (7) "I can bypass all this unless I make it real, try to avoid it or struggle with it, I do not need to fight an illusion, only see it as such and let it go."

A dream taught me how to engage this quantum slipstream and I found that when I moved through the thickness of the "dark night of the soul" that is dissolved.  It was no longer being held together by my belief in this dark night or in the belief of those early spiritual warriors who struggled long and hard to go beyond it, and who believed that those who came after them would have to work as hard or they were "avoiding the inner work".  I found I moved through the same spaces, but they did not feel solid or heavy any more.  I found that when I was tempted to make the obstacles real, and my body was tightening something inside as a reaction to "what is", that I would remember to re-engage quantum slipstream and go into circular surrendered breathing and was instantly freed again.  It felt like "traction control" in my Saturn car when it was on an icy road.  Whenever the car seemed to slide on the ice, traction would instantly engage and realign the car, and it would not deviate from its chosen course.  The body part would spontaneously relax, and even ancient tension patterns would melt away in this drive state.

Narcissism Part Four (Random Notes)

 I found that, in studying many Narcissist videos and in reading books, a few notes are worth mentioning here.  One is that the term "Narcissist Personality Disorder" (NPD) is worth not using.  This is for a number of reasons that is worth mentioning here.  The term is a clinical term and technically requires a diagnosis from a psychiatrist to establish.  The term has some issues worth mentioning.  The NT, Narcissist type, is a person with a certain kind of profile and cluster of behavioral strategies that are interlocking and tend to work together.  Looking at it this way, whether or not it is a pathology or a disorder does not arise.  One problem with labeling the NT as an NPD is that there is some issue with calling it a disorder.  In a usual pathology, there is a sense that the person is handicapped by having this disorder.  Yet an NT is highly functional and therefore does not fit this understanding of what it is.

In a strictly legal sense, the requirement of a doctor diagnosis to label someone NPD is curious, because the NT, being invested in forming a "public mask" has no wish to undergo a diagnosis that will expose them in this regard.  It is also clear that the number of NTs who have been diagnosed as NPD is very few compared to those who have never submitted to such a process.  Rather than get into a legal mess and confusion about this, it is better to side step this issue completely.

The term "Narcissist Type" is more general and is unlikely to cause the same issues.  It is also not clear if NPD and NT mean the same thing.

My reason for writing notes here is because this NT is a type that has the potential to cause people harm.  If it were not so, I would not bother to compile these notes.  The writing I am doing here is just to "future proof" the reader and also for a person who is suffering in a relationship with an NT to recognize what is happening and learn to break free from what is a toxic relationship, or, if not able to do this, to understand what is going on so that one can more successfully adapt to the situation.  With awareness and understanding of what is going on, one can form more realistic expectations of what is possible and take more clear steps to claiming one's own life and fully living it.

One issue with the NPD term is that the psychiatric community and the clinical counselling community seem to believe that this NPD person is not curable and that the NPD person is not "redeemable".  Because of my spiritual understanding of the Uttara Buddhist Tantra, everyone has "buddha nature" and therefore everyone will eventually get enlightened, everyone will get "redeemed".  It may take many lifetimes, but it will happen to everyone.  Part of the reason why NPD people are considered not redeemable is practical.  The covert narcissist type will insincerely plead for help and keep hooking in a person who is trying to leave them.  As humans, we have the tendency to be helpful and especially want to help those that we love get cured.  This helpful love can keep us trapped in such toxic relationships.  So councilors will say that they are not redeemable or not curable to help people to break free of them and leave them, to save those under their psychic grip.

The councilors are probably right in this regard that they are not really redeemable, but not for the reasons that I would regard as true.  In order to walk a path of spiritual healing and spiritual liberation, a person has to sincerely want to be healed and allow themselves to be healed.  NTs do not want to do this, because their strategies are perceived as working for them and they do not want to give up what works for them.  Unless some crisis happens, where they realize what they have lost by living their strategies, they are not yet ready to be helped and healed.  Part of their strategy is to plead for help to hook people in, to play helpless to suck people into their drama vortex to emotionally manipulate them, and to wear a mask to hide their real agenda to control people to make them give them what they want.

In my notes here, I do not care if an NT and an NPD are the same.  My wish is not to do anything clinical or to pathologize any one through a label.  I am also not interesting in trying to cure anyone who is not open to, ready to, and willing to be healed and helped by another.  I believe that free will is sacred and that every step on the spiritual path requires willing choice.

I am writing down these notes because the NT exploits several natural human tendencies which are essentially good.  One is to give people the benefit of the doubt and assume that, even when bad traits show up, people are essentially good.  This means that, even when an NT is "unmasked", people will assume that it was a temporary lapse into bad behavior in a good person.  An NT, because they, like all sentient beings, have "buddha nature", they are "good people".  But this goodness is, in a sense "buried twice", once behind their public mask and then again behind their angry hidden self that they believe that they are.  People need to be aware of their commitment to live from this "angry hidden self" and stay away from them until they are ready to confront and come to terms who they have made themselves to be.

In Tibetan Buddhist, the NT is called an "Asura".  It is sometimes called the realm of the "jealous gods".  Karmically, they have worst karma and more suffering than most human beings.  In one Buddhist system, the Human realm is placed above them, and in another Buddhist system, the Human realm is placed below the Asura realm.  They are both right.  This is because they seem to get the upper hand over humans.  They can generally outwit, manipulate, dominate, and subjugate humans through a kind of psychological control and push pull emotional dynamic that keeps humans confused, reactive, tormented, and submissive.  They use a kind of jealous competition, paranoid psychic scanning, subliminal undermining, push pull emotional victim drama, and predatory seduction to work on humans.

To merely get sensitized to the Asura type (AT) is not enough.  Unlike many other types, this NT or AT is predatory.  They want to hook in others and exploit them for their own purposes.  They realize that this usually requires them to be covert, to hide and lie about their real motives, to work from behind a positive social mask and act like an expert, a helper, and a good person.  They "love bomb" and make you feel that they are great and can even make people fall in love with them before they undermine the person and exploit the person.  In order to be immune to their predation and their strategies, one needs to deeply understand one's own self.  The AT will study the people around them behind the pleasant chit chat that they do in the love bombing phase.  They will find weaknesses to exploit, desires that they can hook into and manipulate through pulling these strings, and guilt levers they can activate.

Some ATs are not so skillful in their manipulations, but as the AT evolves, they will get better and better at it.  Some are very good at what they do.  Hence, these notes.

Narcissism Part Three: Early Warning Identifiers

 This is the third article I am writing in regarding to the Narcissist Type.  I have been studying this subject both in my direct experience and viewing several discussions on videos with counsellors who are trained to work with people who are suffering from "Narcissistic Abuse" within a relationship.  I am writing this article for several purposes.  One of these purposes is to review what I am learning and to be able to place the understanding of the Narcissist type on the Enneagram and to map out the dynamics of this type.  At this point, I am organizing my notes to upscale the video discussions to a higher level of empirical and psychological precision.  The discussions that I find are excellent and very empirical and experiential in an informal way, but still lack a precision that I feel that I need to feel complete with this subject.

One issue that I have is that I have looked at a few videos that are trying to give people some "early warning identifiers" so that people can disengage soon enough to avoid getting "enmeshed" in this Narcissist type.  What I have found is that the Narcissist type, probably through their own history of being wounded in their formative past experiences, unconsciously wishes to "trauma bond" with someone and pull this person into a relationship or friendship where he or she will engage in a dysfunctional power struggle which is characteristic of enmeshed family systems that so many people were raised within as children, with a high probability that the parents were Narcissist types.  The Narcissistic Abuse is part of the trauma bond experience and when fully formed can be a difficult bond to terminate and move on from.  In other words, the abuse itself is not merely an unpleasant aspect of the experience of being with them, but serves a function in keeping the relationship or friendship continuing through time.  The abuse is also not merely part of their need to be in control (which many of the counselors focus on) or their need to "win" in the power struggle that they create with their target person, it serves to create a dysfunctional bond that emulates their dysfunctional family system that they were raised in.  The bond can be very strong and be very hard to break.  It anchors into the target person as a "survival imprint" and the target person can be very anxious and even feel guilty if he or she tries to leave the relationship or friendship.

In some of the videos that I have been studying, the identifiers for the Narcissist type, especially the "Covert Narcissist", are, in my opinion, not early enough.  They identifiers are excellent to verify that one is already in a relationship, friendship, or business partnership with an Narcissist type, but not so excellent when it comes to sensitizing oneself to "early warning identifiers" so that one can disengage early enough that one pulls out of the enmeshment before it fully forms.  The "early warning identifiers" (EWIs for short) also need to be precise enough so that one does not accidentally mislabel a person who is not a Narcissist type and unwittingly lose a chance to form a good and worthwhile friendship or relationship.  One challenge with forming the EWIs is that most people have some narcissist traits and therefore the mere presence of Narcissist traits is usually not enough to form a valid EWI.

What I needed to do in my notes is to define a "narcissist scale" that goes like this:

(1) potential narcissism.  What Freud called "primary narcissism", where children have a kind of natural and innocent self centeredness that could develop into an Narcissist type.

(2) mild narcissism.  Where an ordinary person evolves some of the personality traits of a narcissist, but they have not congealed into a full blown Narcissist type.

(3) covert narcissism.  Where the traits develop into strategies and congeal into a full blown Narcissist type personality.  What I feel the line that is crossed is when the Narcissist type uses lying deliberately, not from fear of punishment or fear of being shamed, but as a strategy so hide their real agenda so that it can work upon people who do not see through the camouflage.  The hiding of the agenda is necessary for the strategies to work.  In other words, the deception is necessary.  Many of the counselors have emphasized this and have noted, intuitively, that Narcissist types do not merely lie.  Their lying is different and functions differently.  This is often not fully explained well.  They are called "masters of lying" or "compulsive liars", but neither of these descriptors touches upon the "how and why" of their unique style of lying.  It is also clear to me that the Narcissist type uses several different lying styles.  For instance, they wear a public persona mask and hides who and what they are (lie#1).  They will deny that they did something even when they are caught "red headed" or with a "smoking gun" (lie#2, and which may be reinforced by "gaslighting" where they will convince their target that he or she must have been mistaken and aggressively pressure the person to disconnect and lose confidence in their own experience and what they are learning from their experience, which can cause very serious psychological damage and render them vulnerable to be exploited by others).  They can make up a story and pull people into a victim drama to shift blame and control those around them through guilt (lie#3).  They can be vague and elusive when one is trying to pin them down and figure out what is going on (lie#4).  They can be overly complimentary in the beginning to make you feel safe around them (lie#5).  They can exaggerate faults to make a person feel worse about themselves and undermine their necessary self esteem (lie#6).  They can minimize their own faults or minimize how impactful their faults are to those around them (lie#7).  They can pretend to forget their agreements to rationalize breaking the agreements (lie#8).  They can hide their "pervasive anger" behind a pleasant mask so that one is surprised later on when the anger bursts out of them (lie#9).

(4) overt narcissism.  This is the stage where the traits are out in the open and can be verified more easily, though even when an Narcissist type is overt, there is still a mask of illusion.  They will still blame others, for instance, for what they do.  If they burst out in anger and show their pervasive anger, they will say that "they had to do it" because others "forced them" and they "had no choice".  This blaming others for what they do (lie#10) can fool some people who believe that the Narcissist type only needs to get rid of their enemies or to punish them to feel better.  When the Narcissist type is overt, there are styles of overtness.  They can work a community or group, and hold sway over them.  They can rise to power through a corporate ladder, steal other people's ideas and work to prove to bosses that they are worth promoting, etc.  They can pretend that others are "behind them" when targeting someone (the flying monkey effect, lie#11).

(5) tyrannical narcissism.  This is the stage where a person may rule through fear, murdering or poisoning opponents, torture people so as to make others comply for fear of being tortured, use censorship and media control, slander rivals with lies and propaganda, and even expand his or her empire to dominate other countries.

By having this scale, one can see that the EWIs are about differentiating between stage 2 and stage 3.  The mild narcissism is a trait of relatively ordinary people and because of this we forgive others when these traits show up.  The traits are not united into a fully organized strategy and life pattern that appears in stage 3.  What this scale implies is that stage 4 and 5 Narcissist types must start with being a stage 3 covert narcissist first.

I felt I made progress in forming my EWI list when I realized that Narcissist 3 types will operate behind a mask public persona when we first meet them.  They intend to fool us into believing the mask and therefore the mask is the key to forming a reliable EWI.  This is because the "mask" is part of a strategy and is not merely a random developmental trait that is forming due to the social pressures and dysfunctional family stresses that we all pass through.

The mask will pretend to be an expert or authority about certain things, will pretend to be good, generous, and even altruistic, and generally the mask will minimize faults.  It will have subtle arrogant flavor and may even communicate that they are better than others.  This is because an Narcissist type 3 is in competition with everyone and needs to prove that they are superior to others.  If someone seems to be more expert than they are or if their altruistic ethics are questioned, they will be tempted to put their rivals down, belittle them, and point out any fault, and even wait in ambush to jump on a weakness when it shows up.  It can be seen very early, even in the very first meeting.  There is aggression and "love bombing" with an exaggerated goodness or expertness being shown.  They might pretend to already be a success or an expert or very good at something, before they have taken the time to form those skills.  They feel that they do not have to work at achieving things like other people, because they have natural talent and are "entitled to success" and blame others not recognizing their talent for their failure or blame others for sabotaging them.

The Narcissist Archetype (part two)

 This is the second chapter regarding Narcissism aka the Hasnamuss type of Gurdjieff.  I am using the term "Covert Narcissist" (CN) for this type, because this more easily distinguishes the CN from other uses of words that do not adequately differentiate the basis idea from other uses of the same word.  I would use "Hasnamuss", because G used the word much more precisely, but I prefer to use "Covert Narcissist" because G concentrated much more on the Political, Religious, and Economic ones who were big players in planetary history.  I wish to concentrate on the "Petty Tyrant" ones that Castaneda wrote about and who may have derived the teachings from "Don Juan" (who may or may not be a real person or who may be a fictional composite of various teachers that Castaneda studied with at various times in his life).

Following G's lead, I wish to remain very practical and to have people become sensitized to this "archetype" for various reasons, mainly to make human life easier, less stressful, and safer to live.  As one evolves spiritually, one tends to become prosperous, happy, and more aware.  The very success of what one will has done will make one more attractive to CNs, who will want to "get" whatever it is that is making one thrive.  CNs are predatory, covert, and disguised as something else.  They learned to survive their childhood by evolving their "strategy" and got relatively good at this.  The habit formations or tendencies that predispose them to form this strategy are probably more than one lifetime old.  When faced with challenges, they will tend to default to this strategy as a "natural" inclination.  I put natural in quotes, because it is not natural for Buddha Nature to behave this way, since BN only knows how to lovingly accept everything as it is, be creatively skillful, and flow with intuitive wisdom.  BN will never violate conscience or move out of integrity with itself, once deeply realized.

Because CN is an archetype, it is not the same kind of typing as in other systems.  There are people who embody this archetype more or less perfectly, while other people only embody some of its traits.  There is also a part of everyone who is like this archetype.  It is ultimately an inner pattern deeply related to the nature of the conventional ego.  In this sense, it corresponds somewhat to the shadow side of ourselves, our hidden blind spot that prevents us from fully and easily growing on the path, our dominant negative trait and its defenses from being fully acknowledged and released (which G called our "chief feature" which in turn fed our "false personality" which in turn our conventional ego personality is built around.  What this means is that individuals who embody this archetype will be hard for us to see and believe.  We will be fooled by them until we are sensitized to their traits and also how they hook into the parts of ourselves that we are unconscious of and give these people the power to influence us.

The CN is well defended against change.  So much so that Ramani warns people to not try to change them, but to get out from their grip on our lives.  Zheung is more helpful, since she is aware of the necessity to have some interaction with them, since there are many situations where it is almost impossible to avoid them.  When people figure out that someone is a CN, they often make the mistake of confronting them with what they are doing.  This alerts the CN that you know and they will punish you for learning what you did.  When this happens, they might do what is called "gas lighting" (which is in reference to a movie where a person convinces another person to not believe in their own experience by undermining a person's "basic trust" in themselves and what they feel is true, something we need in order to fully live our lives and become life effective good people).  The dual self system of the CN will have the mask part present someone who is "objective, considerate, and open minded" (but has sensitive feelings that one hurt in them because one lacked empathy), while the core self is actively undermining one, systematically invalidating various points, making one question and doubt oneself too much, attacking what one cherishes about oneself the most, imputing bad motives that one does not have, pretending that they know better and see through one, being an authority that can interpret one better than one can, putting one down with a critical tone, misinterpreting and twisting words that one says to make what one says appear ugly and horrible, and then often saying bald bad statements and false stories of things that one does not "remember" doing (because they never happened) and even imputing that one conveniently forgot about these fictitious events because one's ego and that because one is the real narcissist.  They "flip it" back on one and can be so persuasive and convincing by the sheer force of their angry emotion from their core (which the mask self may deny that they have even when they are shouting and raging at one).

The details of this CV pattern is something that G did not go into within any depth in his writings, not in the depth that I feel is necessary to get a full handle on the CN and become sensitized to their presence and how to neutralize their affect on one and one's friends.  G wanted to figure out this pattern for oneself and did form groups that would discuss the writings that went into this.  One does need to study this pattern both intellectually and then through experience and observation.  Even having this writing is not enough by itself.

There is also a need to do a parallel self study and notice how the person is affecting one, how the person is hooking into one, how the person is probing one for information, how one unwittingly gives them the information they want to undermine us by how free we are with our stories of our past, and our stories of our weaknesses, strengths, our triumphs and failures, and our hopes and fears.  All this will be used against one at the right time.  They will test to see what information brings up one's fears, worries, and doubts, and can use these to threaten one, undermine one, or attack one.  Meanwhile, the CN will speak in generalities and present a fictitious mask to hide behind, and make up a story with a lot of detail which is a substitute for honest sharing.  They may change their name as a way of hiding their past.  They might travel from place to place when they are found out by the locals, and only return when people have forgotten what they did or emotionally moved on.  They may make an insincere apology to make people believe they have changed, and hook into our willingness to "forgive and forget" (the Sufis recommend to "forgive and remember" instead, so we do not fall for the same trick twice).

For a loose set of character traits to understand the CN, there are 9 basic traits (G had 7 mentioned in his writings, I am expanding on them):

(1) being critical, skeptical, and invalidating.  They will be believe one's innocence and suspect that one is hiding the real fault or defending it.

(2) giving to get, love bombing (in the beginning), putting pressure on one to believe that they are "too good to be true", presenting oneself as an expert or already successful.  They want to give a very good "first impression" so that when they undermine one, have bursts of temper, and hurt one, then one will try to get their real self back or try to recover the former self that one might confuse with their real self.

(3) competitive, trying to up one, trying to be the knowing authority, seducing one with some deal that makes them get what they want from one, bait and switch, and doing some kind of marketing push to have one "buy" something.  They feel entitled to success and do not believe that they have to work to succeed, unless their "story" pretend that they believe in hard work.

(4) making up story, generating emotional drama, playing victim to make people feel guilty, giving a sob story to get empathy.  This may contradict their story about how great they are, but if this is pointed out then they will say it is because people do not see their natural greatness and do not let them succeed.

(5) flat affect or overt over acting an emotion to see if you buy it, unless it is anger.  They disconnect from how they feel.  They might use some drug to further disconnect from how they feel.  They will not be empathic to how others feel.  If one is emotional, then it is always a problem one has.  One is labeled as "childish" or emotionally out of control.  If one is suffering, it is because one is neurotic.  They are the sane ones and they are emotionally in control.  This may contradict their own emotional dramas, but when this is pointed out, they deserve to feel their emotions and it is one's fault for how they feel.

(6) paranoid scanning and probing.  This takes the place of real empathy.  They are constantly checking how one reacts to see what they can get away with.  They are forming a chart of one's weaknesses and faults to know what will sting and hurt one.  If they make a wrong assumption about what hurts one, they will remember this and try something else.  Putting others on the defensive and making them squirm makes them feel safer.

(7) playing dodge ball and hit and run, forming a moving target and never letting oneself get pinned down.  They will twist words that one says while never getting pinned down on what they mean.  They will counter attack and make it about one, rather than acknowledge their contradictions.  They will minimize any faults that they have or blame some illness, limitation or handicap that makes them how they are, and accuse one of being empathic to their faults or understanding.  Meanwhile they will magnify one's faults and make them so big that one looks horrible in their story and deserves to be punished or feel ashamed that such a glaring fault is allowed to run amok in society.

(8) always needing to be in control, trying to dominate, commanding others and bossing them around, denying any fault or even denying what is obvious, like shouting that one is not shouting, deliberately misrepresenting and exaggerating to get more effect, saying "you always" and "you never", and making any small issue into a really big one until one backs down and lets them get away with "death by a thousand little cuts".  Enjoying one's suffering because it makes them feel better than one is.  Dominating through intimidating outbursts.  Conditioning people to walk on eggshells and make them docile, obedient, and compliant, accusing one of being insensitive, not empathic, angry, and cruel if one does not.  Threatening to tell others or make one look bad, or make up hurtful lies if one does not obey or back down.  Hammering down until one caves in.  Making sure that asserting oneself is going to cost one.  Either/or black and white thinking.  They are always right and one is always wrong.  One is always unfair if one asserts oneself and they are always right in pushing for what they think they need.  Targeting one person while leaving others relatively alone or compartmentalizing relations so that no one knows what is happening in other places.  Pretending in public that they are innocent while making one look crazy.

(9) pretending, passive aggressive, not following through on any agreements, saying one thing to get one off their back and doing the opposite of what they said that they would do, changing the rules, never intending to really commit to anything, but agreeing in order to hold the other person to what they committed to.  They can seem very understanding at this point and everything may even seem resolved, but nothing is resolved.

Some people may have a few of these traits, yet a CN will cycle through these stances in a kind of strange dance with one, and lock into the one's that are "working" in the moment.  In a way, they are their own shadow side, since they have two selves, one hiding behind the other.  In this sense, this type is strangely a little more aware than others, but only within a limited frame of reference.  They are always struggling in survival mode.  They are always trying to gain the advantage, even when normal others are not perceiving any need to struggle at all.  There is a demonic element in this that is usually related to some betrayal or wound that haunts their past.  One can feel this icky, nightmarish, and hostile energy exuded from them at times.  There is an event called the "unmasking" when one sees this.  It wakes one up from a peaceful complacency into what G called "the terror of the situation".  It is like suddenly noticing an angry dog showing its fangs and not seeming very rational or sane, and looks like it could bite one at any time.  One will get nervous and instinctively anxious (our instincts usually do not get fooled by CNs, but may not know how to tell one what is happening).  It will feel like trauma to feel this, but it is a natural reaction.  How one processes this will determine how one awakens to a higher and more peaceful life on Earth, how one makes sense of everything.  One looks at all this square in the eye and grows up and goes beyond this.

The Narcissist Archetype

I wanted to share some information regarding a certain type of individual who is the outer cause of a lot of suffering in the world.  The name for such an individual is a "Narcissist".  This type has also been previous called "the Psychopath", "the Sociopath", and "the Hasnamuss".  The term "Narcissist", as well as the other terms, with the exception of the term "Hasnamuss" (from Gurdjieff), needs to first be clarified, as the terms are not used consistently in literature and in several models of psychotherapy and spirituality.

For instance, in the literature of Greek mythology, the character of Narcissus is a person who falls in love with his own reflection in a pool of water.  This became the archetype for the idea of a Narcissist and became linked with any person who is preoccupied with themselves to the point where they are not aware of others except as "echoes" (in the Greek story, Echo is a being who falls in love with Narcissus and ends up only being an Echo of him) of themselves.  In other words, they project their unconscious contents on other people and do not really see other people as they truly are.

Later on, Freud wrote about "primary narcissism" where children tend to naturally be preoccupied with themselves and their own needs, and only later on in life begin to experience other people as different from themselves and as distinct individuals.

The terms "Psychopath" and "Sociopath" came later on and referred to a person who does not socialize the way normal people do and is only concerned with their own fulfillment and does not care about the feeling of others, and is even willing to exploit people and even kill them if they get in their way.  They do not feel a need to play by the rules of society, do not need to be polite, kind, and considerate of others, but will often pretend to be so that they can prey on others to get what they want from them.  The term from Christianity "wolves in sheep's clothing" comes from this kind of awareness, with sheep being the docile members of society who are willing to follow ordinary social rules, be a basically good responsible human being, and fulfill one's religious and social duties, and treat their neighbor the way that they want to be treated.  The wolf in sheep's clothing is a person who disguises themselves to fit into society, but who preys on the ordinary "sheep" that normal people are.

This "wolf" type sometimes calls normal people "sheeple", implying that they are blind followers of a dogmatic religion.  Whether or not this label is appropriate of the nature of the religion, most normal people have a kind of conventional religion and believe in being good people, taking care of family and friends, and have some sense of responsibility to what they understand as "God" or a "Higher Power".  This conventional level of spirituality is important and does help people to get along with each other.  This conventional level of spirituality is what Gurdjieff would say is the "Exoteric Circle" of humankind.  When one goes deeper and understands spirituality psychologically, then one becomes a member of the Mesoteric Circle.  When one awakens directly to an awareness of the spiritual dimension of life, one then becomes a member of the Esoteric Circle of humanity.

This wolf in sheep's clothing type of person is more in alignment with how the terms Psychopath, Sociopath, Narcissist, and Hasnamuss is used.  The first two terms are often used for certain types of criminals and does not fully fit the archetype that I am choosing to write about here.  It would be, however, possible to say that all Psychopaths and Sociopaths are Narcissists, but not the other way around.

The term "Hasnamuss" is actually more precise than the term "Narcissist" with Gurdjieff mentioning for different kinds of Hasnamuss individuals.  The Hasnamuss type, too, is mentioned along with a typing system that includes the Good Householder, the Lunatic (Fanatic), and the Tramp (a Dysfunctional Being who is not able to live in society and hold down an ordinary job, or master certain basic responsibilities).  This typing system is not the only system of types of people that Gurdjieff taught about.  This particular one was related to which people could be "candidates" for spiritual work in the "Fourth Way", the path that Gurdjieff taught people was possible to grow within.  This path is the path through "consciousness" and involves centering in consciousness and developing your mental, emotional, and physical sides of your being simultaneously, rather than one at a time.  This would be different from the path of a philosopher who just develops his mind, a devotee of Bhakti Yoga or Christian Contemplative Prayer who just develops emotionally and, hopefully, through love, and a Hatha Yogi or Tai Chi practitioner who just develops physically.

According to this system of typing, only the Good Householder has a real chance to develop themselves in the Fourth Way.  It is because they have already become "life effective".  They know how to be conventionally responsible, hold down a job, and how to be in a mature loving relationship with a married partner.  In Freud's terms, they know how "to love and to work" (this is what Freud said the goal of psychotherapy, to produce what may be called a Good Householder in G's terms).

The reason why G gave the teaching of these four types is because he did not want people to waste too much of their time on three types that were not already Good Householders.  A Lunatic or Fanatic has "false values" that are strongly fixated in them and very hard to change, and this type does not want to change them, but instead to convert you to their religious or political cult.  They are false, because following what they are fanatical about will make you less life effective.  A fanatical religion or political party will make people less able to function as normal, law abiding, and peaceful citizens.  The normal citizen or Good Householder is the basic unit of a healthy and functioning society.  The crystallization of these false and extreme values prevents them from being able to "do the Work".

The Lunatic or Fanatic does have a theoretical chance to grow along the lines of the Fourth Way or any advanced model of human spiritual growth, and sometimes a skillful therapist who organizes a healing group within some program can gradually help these people become functional and even mature citizens.  But it takes a lot of energy to do so and most Good Householders who find and commitment to a Higher Growth Path cannot afford the time and energy to help these people.  They often need all their energy to help each other within the Higher Growth Groups, both spiritually and economically.  G was a very practical down to Earth teacher who wanted people to use their time wisely on what was possible, and to avoid what was practically impossible.

The Tramp type does not have any values.  They have a certain kind of laziness that does not want to be responsible.  They find fulfilling the requirements of ordinary life, holding a job, and learning to keep one's agreements with their married partner, learning how to talk with a person, understand them, resolve issues with them, and function within a committed relationship (again, Freud's "to love and to work") to be a chore that they do not want to do.  They do not like to be told what to do.  They do not want to "pull their own weight".  They do not care if their lack of self responsibility makes them a burden on others.  They are happy to be taken care of and taken into a household, but when they do so they do not do the "little things" that make a household work, like doing their share of the chores, even when they are fully capable of this.

When G said that the Tramp has "no values", the Tramp will probably say that they do.  Everyone values something.  Tramps value no one making them do anything and resist nearly all chores.  A mental set of "values" that one thinks that one believes that one has is not what G is saying that they do not have.  For something to be a "real value", it has to energize you to act.  If you value kindness, then you will immediately move into action when someone drops their groceries in the parking lot outside the grocery store and help the person.  If you value a craft, you do the craft well even if you do not get paid for it.  A real value is part of you and will motivate you to do things naturally.  Thus a Good Householder wants to have a job, take care of their own needs and the needs of others, especially their family and their friends.  Even if there is a part of themselves that is like the Tramp, a part of themselves that resists getting up in the morning and going to work, they will do so anyway, because they value the job and getting paid well for good work.  It allows them to truly love and care for the people that they care about.

There are also some forms of clinical mental illness where a person ends up having no values and become like a "vegetable".  These people are relegated into wards where they are given their basic physical needs.  Sometimes these people get healed enough so that they make some strides to become Good Householders or High Functioning People who are able to live in the world as Good Householders.  Sometimes a good therapist working under the right conditions and with a good program can transform a number of these types into functioning adults and good citizens.  But again, it takes a lot of time and energy that GH's within the 4th Way or some other growth system do not usually have.  G's advice is to let them go and let them find their own way.  Sometimes the suffering involved in trying to survive in modern life does make a few of them rise up to becoming a responsible adult.

This leads to the Hasnamuss type who is different than the Good Householder, the Fanatic, and the Tramp.  What makes this type different is that this type is predatory.  This type actively targets Good Householders to exploit them, to at least take away their hard earned money that they need to pay their bills, take care of their family and friends, and keep their life on track.  This type is more intelligent than the Fanatic and Tramp.  They do not target these types, though some of the criminal Hasnamuss types will enlist the Fanatics and use them to do their bidding.  In a similar way, they can sometimes exploit the Tramp by threatening them, punishing them, and forcing them to do things.  The Hasnamuss type does not have a "conscience", which to G was a sacred organ that when activated can guide use to fully develop ourselves into a mature and balanced individual who lives from their mind, heart, and body in a living functional unity.

There are different sub-types of this Hasnamuss type.  One is called the "covert narcissist" which I am going to concentrate this writeup upon.  The other sub-types, like the Grandiose Narcissist, are more overt and more obvious.  My feeling is that these subtypes will be rarer as human history unfolds and societies learn to purge themselves of these sub-types.  At present, they can only really be found in "niches of power" in the corporate world (as CEOs and despotic managers, or in any entrenched position of power), the religious world (as leaders who generally do not mind commanding people into a holy war or the killing of "unbelievers"), or the political world (who can be tyrants and poison their rivals).  In general, even these more obvious sub-types are still "covert" in the sense that they are pretending to be someone they are not.  They may present themselves as some kind of savior, hero, and reformer who is willing to "do what it takes" and make "the hard choices" that is needed to make life on Earth work.  Where you can identify this type is that they like the feeling of having people get tortured by them or even killed by them, and it gives them a feeling of power to have these things done to people by them or by people who are under their power.

The first trait of this type is that they have "two selves".  One is the presenting self that is their mask or disguise.  The other is their "core self" which has their "real feelings" (though in higher teachings, everyone has Buddha Nature, and their "core" is ultimately not real either).  The core self is like the ordinary self of the Good Householder and is as real as the ordinary self of the Good Householder.  This mask is necessary to prey upon Good Householder, who they pretend to be like.  They do not hold the values of the Good Householder at all, but will pretend to.

In order to maintain the mask, the Covert Narcissist (CN) will lie.  What many researchers have found is that this lying is different from the lying that Good Householders sometimes lapse into.  Good Householders have some capacity to self correct.  When they recognize they have lied, they regret it, self correct, and return back to their integrity.  There are also pressures that tempt a Good Householder to lie, like lying on an application to get a job that they feel that they need to get food on the table to feed their children and pay their bills.  In other words, the lying arises from a conflict of values that is always energizing the Good Householder to act.  When they get less confused about the value conflict, they will self correct and clarify the confusion, and become even more solid citizens of whatever society they are in.

The CN will lie as part of their way of functioning.  They may seem to tell the truth in that their mask self must present a story close enough to social truth to be believable to the Good Householders around them.  They will look and see if you are "buying their story" and they will make up a cover story for what they are doing from their core which is sizing people up to see if they are exploitable.  The lying is often "gratuitous" in that the lie often seems completely unnecessary.  It is "unnecessary" in the sense that a Good Householder, when under certain pressure and certain temptation can understand why it might be tempting to lie, will feel it is unnecessary.  In other words, GHs, when trying to understand others, will refer to their own bank of experiences and try to make sense of why a person might lie and want to lie, and will not find any reason which makes the CN lying even remotely necessary.  This is often the initial lies of the CN fall below the radar of a GH and are believed because they automatically believe the mask self is who the CN really is.

The lies of CN are not consistent.  The pressure of the two selves makes it almost impossible to be consistent.  GHs will find the contradictions confusing and when they point out the confusion, the CN will DARVO the GH.  They will Deny, Attack the GH, and Reverse the roles of Victim and Offender.  They will plead Victim and try to make the GH feel guilty and can very often get the GH to apologize, with the GH often confused about he or she has done wrong.

The goal of the lying is "power over" the GH so that they can control and manipulate him or her.  The goal of power over is to secure "narcissistic supply", which can be as tangible as getting money or getting praise, or as weird as "getting negative attention in terms of people getting upset or worried around them when they feel they are "under the thumb" of a CN.  Because a CN does not have an internal feeling of self worth in their core, they rely on getting this from the outside, by feeling superior to others by being the one in control and dominant, or by getting people to believe their mask and getting praise for what they present.  They like to feel people squirm under their grip, because it validates that they are superior and they are the ones who are really in control.  If they feel that they can kill a person and get away with it, then they must be superior to the people that they can kill.

I want to go deeper into the CN in a later writeup and this one is only an introduction.  The Hasnamuss is mentioned by G in the context of the three other types, because they, too, do not have a realistic chance to really use the Work to evolve themselves into a Higher Mature Being.  Theoretically, everyone does, including the CN.  But it takes a lot of time and energy, and G also felt that the ordinary suffering of normal life can help break down the crystallized attitudes of the CN, the Tramp, and the Fanatic, but that it takes more suffering than usual for this to happen and it takes a very special kind of help to also be present as well.  This is way beyond the capacity of the usual GHs that are involved in the Work.

What makes the CN more dangerous is that the other types are not pretending to be other than what they are.  Most Fanatics know that they are Fanatics, they just believe that they are Fanatics for the Right Cause and everyone else is wrong.  They have the wrongly formed values that they are fixated on and this fixation takes a lot of energy to break down.  It takes a lot of suffering under the right conditions to break free of this fixation.

In a similar way, the Tramp can suffer in such a way that they come to a place where they must "value their life" and "step up" to take care of themselves.  This value, being energized inside themselves, can become a nucleus to develop the "pearl of enlightenment" around.

But the CN can form a mask and present themselves as a GH or even an advanced individual in the Work.  They are good enough liars to fool people and know how to punish and banish people who figure out their lie.  They are, in short, dangerous to the Work and actively like hunting people in the Work as a kind of food that they can feed off of.  Therefore groups need to learn how to filter out this type in order to "make progress in the Work".  They also need to filter out this type from their life, because they are not merely harmful for people in the Work, but can even destroy an entire society or cause one country to invade another country, or to wipe out people of another race or religion.  They know how to condition people to a kind of hatred and anger, and how to direct this anger in others to hurt other people.

To be able to filter out these people, it is important to understand this type very thoroughly so that one can see through the mask.  And when the person is "unmasked", they will attack your awareness until you do not see what you saw or impair you so that no one will believe you.  There is something demonic about this type and sometimes these people are "possessed entities" or "oppressed by entities" or may even be an entity itself who has found its way into a human birth.

How Strange Fear Is (through Tenabah c2018)

Attention on any object.
Then shuttling between eye
that sees and what is seen.
Then falling into the seeing.
Seer nowhere found.

Spaciousness without center,
like a fertile field,
abundantly growing
a rich variety of plants,
noticing everything that is arising,
never looking
from one plant to another.

[note: "never looking from one plant to another" = not entering into subject-verb-object mental structuring of what is seen, but staying in unitary awareness]

Going beyond,
the narrow world
of dualistic struggle.

Soaring high above
every battlefield.

Going higher
than any bird,
yet being intangible
like a wind
that cannot be held.

Turbulent wind,
chanting and howling
through trees,
no struggle,
just the whole forest

making a symphony.

[note: the interdependent co-arising with its tapestry of creative forces shaping each moment and not really polarizing into the struggle of isolated selves]

How strange fear is,
wanting to run away
from everything,
and sometimes
even succeeding,
until the bush
rustles again.

When fear is fixated,
its constant attention
on what is feared,
makes sure the specter
that makes it shiver
is never far away.

Waiting in anxious anticipation,
it makes the next moment
like the last,
the waiting worse
than the coming of doom,
after imagination rules
the real king
seems very ordinary.

It is possible to end
fear's dark trance,
and no longer walk
in its shadow,
rising high into the Sun
through love and devotion,
the dark shadows
of the distant valley
are forgotten.

What fears dying,
already knows
that it will die.
Accepting this,
it is possible
to rise from its ashes,

and be forever free.