The End of Samsara

Opening Note: This was all written in one go. It is in no way perfect, and a multitude of ideas remain underdeveloped and simply proposed with no epistemological or logical proof, based on assumptions that I have made through observation, taken to be true for the sake of furthering the argument. Please be brutal in your feedback and discussion of the ideas proposed in this paper (if you can even call it that). Any and all feedback is appreciated. With that said, enjoy!

The death of a good man.

We try to strive towards desirable character, whether it be desirable to us or towards society as a whole.

Axiom 1: Character exists.

People have character. Character is defined as the way someone thinks, feels, and behaves : someone’s personality. If a person exists, they think, feel and behave. Other things might do so as well, but that is irrelevant to us in the context of this discussion. People exist, and they think, feel and behave - thus their character exists.

Axiom 2: Everybody has character.

If a person is alive, they must perform actions, even if that action is simply existing. Even for someone without the ability to control their body, for them to be alive requires thought. In certain extreme cases this thought and behaviour might be restrained to the fulfilment of base needs such as excretion and consumption of food. Regardless, there exists a character due to the existence of behaviour.

We have now established that everyone has character. These two axioms are the only ones I was able to establish concretely on short notice, and thus these will be the only truths we take for granted for the sake of this argument.

Character is shaped both by internal and external influence. The extent to which either of these factors affect the development of character is not of our concern. We shall assume that at some point in an individual’s lifetime, they gain the desire and willful ability to modify certain aspects of their character for a set of goals, whatever they may be. There might be certain aspects of their character that is immutable, but surface level characteristics are mutable to an extent. Let us call the period of time between birth and the development of the desire to change one’s character the Seed stage. The development of a desire to change one’s character does not always imply the ability to do so - it simply implies a shift from unconscious reactionary behaviour to conscious behaviour, whether it be reactionary or not.

For example, take a 2-year old learning how to play the piano. Their character in its initial state, I₁, is a result of their initial mental development, and further refinement and progress over the course of their lifetime, however limited it may be. They may initially be motivated to play the piano due to reward systems such as parental praise or personal enjoyment, due to which they continue performing the activity, resulting in a character shift from someone who does not play the piano to someone who does. Note that this shift occurs through action - the action is what prompts the change in character, not the other way around. This will be important later on. Furthermore, this change is also reactionary - the toddler does not deliberately invest mental capital into performing this action, they simply do it because they like doing it, or the rewards brought about by it. There are no obstructions to action, and it is effortless.

At some point in their practice they may begin to recognise the fact that they want their parents to approve of them, or that playing the piano brings them enjoyment, due to which they grow a desire to play the piano. This introduces an extra step into the process - now they do not simply play piano, they play piano because of a desire to do so. This is a very, very important distinction, because it marks the beginning of what is a long series of cause-and-effect reactions that result in the void of purpose and listless nature of the lives of most people. This marks the end of the Seed stage and the transition to a conscious reactionary state where actions are performed due to a desire to do so, not simply done.

The next significant event is the emergence of obstacles in the path of this desire. The now older individual might begin to find that he no longer has as much of a passion for the instrument - perhaps the reward mechanism of his parent’s approval is no longer sufficient to justify the amount of inputted effort, or he loses his passion for the instrument, or as in most cases, life gets in the way. He either gets overwhelmed by alternate responsibilities and is forced to make a sacrifice, or finds something more alluring to chase rather than practicing an instrument that lends him greater joy or immediate pleasure, either in doing the activity itself or the rewards dispensed by it.

One of two things can happen now - 1. The individual continues to live in a cycle of continuous development and abandonment of desires, trapped in a state of developing desires to modify their character due to external factors and having their character change in a response to this desire, but unable to gain the ability to wilfully modify their character or to set self-ordained goals for the modification of their character. 2. In addition to developing the desire to change their character, they also develop the ability to wilfully set goals to work towards and change their character accordingly.

However, things are only this clear cut in an ideal situation. In reality, desires are rarely so singular. The most likely outcome is the development of conflicting desires - one part of the individual wishes to pursue their original goal, while the other wishes to pursue other things. Oftentimes there exists a silent voice advocating for the performance of “hard work” or activities that the psyche knows is beneficial in the long run, either due to introspection or beliefs, and there exists another that desires to maximise pleasure in the short term.

An unfortunate coincidence is that parallel to the development of this conflict and an individual’s growing awareness of it, there also occurs a development and cognisance of the self. The concept of “I” and “me” become established, and now the individual has the ability to attribute these desires and conflicts to an entity, which is their representation of themselves. This ability to attribute qualities to an entity and use it as an explanation for events that happen to the individual now results in the development of an individual’s “character” - a set of attributes and qualities that they think they “are” - smart, lazy, hardworking, dumb and so on and so forth.

An individual is now aware that there exists a conflict between two separate desires. To simplify matters, let us not concern ourselves with the nature of this conflict or the specific details of the two desires. Let us define two desires D₁ and D₂, and a desired outcome. The individual tends towards action D₁, and has to work through further obstacles in order to perform action D₂. Further development can take place as follows:

1. D₁ and the desired outcome are aligned, in which case the individual performs the activity without much excess effort, ;
   

   1. attributing positive qualities to their character,

   2. attributing negative qualities to their character,

   3. or leaving their character unchanged.
      

2. D₂ and the desired outcome are aligned and;
   

   1. The individual performs D₂ with the investment of extra effort and achieves the desired outcome;
      

      1. attributing positive qualities to their character,

      2. attributing negative qualities to their character,

      3. or leaving their character unchanged.
         

   2. The individual fails to perform D₂ (they fail to overcome the difficulty in investing the required effort, and they default towards performing D₁), failing to achieve the desired outcome;
      

      1. attributing positive qualities to their character,

      2. attributing negative qualities to their character,

      3. or leaving their character unchanged.

         
         

Even in an extremely simplified scenario, the decision tree for the attribution of qualities to one’s character on the basis of achievement of desires results in 9 distinct possible outcomes. In real life, there are often hundreds of conflicting desires that coexist within the human psyche, of which about 10–15 we are actually aware of. The decision tree skyrockets in complexity with an increase in the number of desires, and the existence of conditional desires and the ability for forward thinking results in a “weighting system” for desires - all desires are not equal. Furthermore, determining a desired outcome also becomes extremely complicated when desires are weighted similarly to each other, resulting in further confusion.

It is worthwhile to note that this entire decision tree can be avoided if one simply never develops conflicting desires - they are content with developing desires as they come and do not develop attachments to any particular goal, taking life as it comes. Perception of people in this paradigm can vary greatly. Such desires can be developed in response to both intrinsic and extrinsic motivations.

If an extrinsically motivated individual in this paradigm exists in an extremely competitive environment where extrinsic motivation prompts activities typically seen by society as “desirable” and “productive”, they tend to end up as “high-performers” or “do well in life”. If the same individual was instead brought up around a peer group that engaged in crime and drug trafficking, there is an extremely high likelihood that they will develop a desire to do the same things in response to extrinsic motivations and end up in a life of crime as well.

Intrinsically motivated individuals in this paradigm differ similarly - if their internal goals align with society’s views of power and high performance or result in them fulfilling the criteria to be viewed as powerful and high-performing in pursuit of their true goals, society rewards them. However, if their internal goals involve progress not visible externally, such as spiritual progress or working on one’s passion when the passion is not societally valuable, society does not reward them, and in extreme cases actively brings them down.

The primary difference between these two divisions in the paradigm is that of control - extrinsically motivated individuals in this paradigm have the capacity to do great things because they are not plagued by the same conflict experienced by others, but this outcome results largely on their environment. On the other hand, intrinsically motivated individuals in this paradigm, once having established their goals sufficiently well, can excel at achieving their purpose regardless of the environment.

A common trait between both divisions is fulfilment - the absence of conflict results in wholehearted pursuit of desire, and results in satisfaction.

For the sake of referring to this situation as something more than a paradigm, let us call it “Purity of Desire”. Such cases are extremely rare - either the result of an extremely unique developmental period (mostly during one’s youth or during times of extreme emotional or mental stress) that results in truly remarkable individuals, or the result of intense effort in understanding and reshaping the self. If there ever existed a true superpower, this is it. The complete lack of internal conflict and the ability to follow through on next to anything with laser focus is priceless, and when paired with intrinsic motivation can result in the development of Legends.

Coming back to existence of conflict of desires. Oftentimes people associate value judgements of their character based on the achievement of desires - typically if you achieve your desired outcome, you attribute positive qualities to your character (you are “hard-working”, “disciplined, “motivated” etc.), and if you do not achieve your desired outcome, you attribute negative qualities to your character (you are “lazy”, “unmotivated”, “dumb” etc.)

In certain cases the call-and-response can be different. For example, someone with extremely low self-esteem and self-belief tends to repeatedly attribute negative qualities to their character regardless of the achievement of their desires - they tend to explain it away or credit it to happenstance. In contrast, self-obsessed individuals tend to attribute positive qualities to their character regardless of the achievement of their desires - even if they fail, they find some way to hoist the blame onto someone else or justify their failure, succeeding in preserving their sense of superiority and self-satisfaction.

Alright. Now we have an extremely reduced view of the dynamics of character, and a surface level familiarity with the terminology. How does this help us?

Let me show you.

Please note that the following steps require the ability to analyse and evaluate the self accurately, and a desire to do so as well. More specifically, this requires clarity of the mind and the ability for advanced self-perception, both of which can be achieved through meditation.

For the sake of this demonstration we will assume that you are a self-aware individual with extremely low self-esteem who wants to do great things. The why does not matter, because talking about purpose would make this paper twice as long as it already is. Self-awareness matters because otherwise you wouldn’t even be reading this paper, and if you never realise that you want to change, you never will.

Also note that you will actually want to do great things for all four of htese steps to work. If doing great work is not a desire of yours, that’s perfectly fine! Society’s views can go to hell, because true fulfilment doesn’t always have to come from some a purpose that is greater than you. Regardless of your desire to do great work, you will hopefully benefit from the first few sections regardless.

Step 1: Sort out your character.

The first step is to address your reaction to the achievement or failure of your desires. Our goal is to ensure that you are unaffected by external factors, and your character can exist in a state of well-being regardless of external occurrences.

Establish that you have intrinsic worth. Hold on to that belief. Tell yourself that you are worth loving, and that you do have worth. With that established, try to decouple yourself from the outcome of your actions. Regardless of failure or achievement of your goals, your character should be stable.

This is equivalent to the third reaction in our decision tree - every occurrence leaves your character unchanged. The attribution of value judgements is not necessary for the progress of the material of your character.

You have now learned how to deal with failure in a healthy manner. If your only goal is to be at peace/happy/good with yourself, you can stop here.

However, if your ambitions stretch farther than that, read on.

Step 2: Learn how to prioritise goals and suppress desires that do not align with your desired outcome.

I do not have a guide to this just yet, so you will have to embark on a journey of intense self-understanding and knowledge-acquisition to truly achieve the goals that this stage lays out.

Figure out a desire-prioritisation system that works for you. You can do this through intensive reading -the concepts of flow, urge surfing, and a huge swathe of other self-help books deal with this.

Step 3: Learn how to be consistent with your goal prioritisation.

It’s easy to prioritise goals when times are easy. The ability to consistently prioritise goals are what set the extraordinary apart from the ordinary, regardless of internal urges or external occurrences.

This only occurs with time, practice and discipline.

If you’ve successfully reached this stage, you should be in a very good place in life. You know yourself well enough to take care of yourself and ensure sanctity of character, and you also know enough to do things that align with your desires regardless of what stands in your way.

For perspective, if you reach this stage and your goal involves making a lot of money, you should be a multi-millionaire at this stage. Perhaps even a billionaire with enough time.

The next step can vary: it can involve honing the ability to suppress desires and combat urges to an ungodly extent and taking complete control over your mind, brute-forcing your way to self discipline.

Or,

Step 4: Learn how to acquire Purity of Desire.

I am not sure if this is even possible for everybody. To be in a state where one is constantly in flow, with only a singular desire existing in the mind at all times, where action is effortless and things fall into place, it requires an ungodly understanding of the self, to an extent where the self itself falls away for good.

This is the Illusion of Character. It is a return to the unconscious reactionary state of the toddler, except you now have the potential to react to internal goals instead of external ones. You perform actions, not harbour the desire to do actions, and you rid yourself of the conflict of desire. Purity of Desire taken to its extremes should theoretically allow you to solely perform action without even thinking about doing it. You work backwards towards the very beginning, coming full circle.

You went from being a purely reactionary being reacting to external influences, to developing desires, to developing conflicting desires, be they internal or external, to associating value judgements of your character with the achievement of your conflicting desires, back to removing the value judgements, to slowly removing the conflict of desire, to getting rid of the conflict entirely, achieving Purity of Desire, and finally, when taking Purity of Desire to its purest state, abolishing desire itself and simply acting in reaction to your internal goals.

Perhaps this is Nirvana. Moksha. Rebirth. Salvation. Self-Realization. The Path to Elysium. Heaven. The Field of Reeds.

The End Of Samsara.

Your self falls away, and you exist purely once again.

The death of a good man.

Ending note: I had no intention of stumbling upon the same conclusion arrived at by Gautama Buddha thousands of years of ago. I find it absolutely fascinating how two people with radically different goals (to unravel the reason of the world’s miseries (Buddha) and to maximise human potential and productivity (me)) arrived at the same conclusion using completely different basic axioms and systems of logical reasoning.

I’ve heard people say that all true paths lead to the same destination — and I didn’t quite buy it. But now that I have concrete logical proof in front of me, I’m beginning to wonder what implications this might have on my perception of civilisation-wide belief systems and religion as a whole.