“In trouble with self‑ing” is exactly the friction that arises when second‑order principle (conditioned patterning, karmic propulsion, unawareness of self‑adherence) tries to run life without the stabilising clarity of first‑order principle (awareness, purity, non-dual ground).
The concise takeaway: Self‑ing is not a real self — it is a hoodwink, a delusional pattern installed before consciousness is fully matured. (Or using a fully matured system in order to arise that fruition or ripening). When second‑order principle is empowered first, the human becomes enslaved to its own conditioning. When first‑order awareness is empowered first, second‑order becomes a compassionate tool.
What “self‑ing” actually is
Self‑ing is the activity of the five contaminated aggregates producing a centre that feels solid, threatened, reactive, and narrow. It is:
- Self-adherence — grasping at a me‑centre
- Conceptual fixation — freezing fluid phenomena into rigid identity
- Dualistic perception — splitting reality into me/not‑me
- Karmic propulsion — being pushed by old patterns rather than guided by awareness
This is why selfishness is actually delusion, a hoodwinking. It is not a moral flaw — it is a misperception.
Why second‑order principle creates trouble when used to govern mind, atop of mind that is unaware
Second‑order principle is functional reality: roles, tasks, systems, habits, consumer triggers, social conditioning. But when it is empowered first, it is:
- Narrow
- Reactive
- Aggressive
- Subconsciously propelled
- A “wave policeman” not knowing it is the ocean
This happens because second‑order principle is built from unripened patterning, installed before consciousness is fully developed. It is not wrong — it is simply incomplete.
Without first‑order awareness, second‑order functionality feels like:
- Life is “being done to me”
- Systems are oppressive
- The ego is under threat
- The mind is enslaved by its own habits
This is the trouble with self‑ing.
Why first‑order principle dissolves self‑ing
First‑order principle is awareness electricity — the universal shared ground. When awareness is generated in the mindstream:
- Functional reality becomes a tool, not a tyrant
- Negativity is viewed, not reified
- Compassion arises as the natural antidote
- Phenomena are recognised as empty yet appearing
- The mind stops creating an inner aggressor
- The wave recognises/ remembers it is the ocean
This is the union of:
- Skilful means (masculine principle)
- Wisdom emptiness (feminine principle)
Their indivisibility is the Middle Way.
How the two truths resolve the trouble
When relative truth and ultimate truth are understood together:
- Relative systems operate compassionately
- Ultimate emptiness dissolves fixation
- The ego functions but is not believed
- Samsara and nirvana are recognised as inseparable
- Suffering is treated as a shared feature of the universe
- Intelligence is used to release suffering, not reinforce it
This is the two truths teaching applied to daily life.
Why humans suffer without first‑order education
This is a global problem (epidemic) that adversely affects all life that shares the planet and the earth itself (all is comprised of the elements for example). Unaware action affects natural systems, weather etc, affecting all:
Humans are not schooled in the science of phenomenal reality — the fact that everything experienced by mind is dependent origination, a dynamic interplay of causes, conditions, and effects.
Without this education:
- The ego becomes iron‑clad
- Consumer appetite triggers/ masks over first humanness shared ground seeing engagement
- Functional systems, without inner awareness enslave rather than liberate
- Suffering is perpetuated unconsciously (internalise the enslaver subconsciously)
- Awareness is not recognised as the first order principle, (first purity)
***This is why daily awareness recognition — the “bike of inner awareness,” educated is required. In order to empower awareness of mind; awakening it to interdependent relationships of all phenomena
The pivot out of self‑ing
The trouble with self‑ing is not a failure. It is a signal that second‑order principle is trying to run life without first‑order awareness.
The pivot is simple and profound:
- Generate awareness first
- Bring all phenomena onto the path of inner awareness seeing. This is cultivated by generating the awakening mind of bodhicitta in the mindstream (mental continuum)
- View negativity in awareness (not attaching to it through dualistic self adherence but through proactive compassionate skilful means method learning to release it in recognition of its true non-dual awareness nature.
- Rehabiting to treating all phenomena (appearances to the mind with compassion), this enables skilful means practice and natural awareness empowerment to transform obstacles on the path of mind’s awakening of awareness to the true nature of that awareness (which is the compassionate skilful means realising wisdom emptiness or the emptiness of the appearances to the mind (all phenomena have ultimate nature). Pure potentiality in the universe arises appearances; just like a rainbow in the sky, appears but is empty, empty but appears.
- Recognise emptiness in appearances
- Use functional systems from awareness, so mind remains free in recognising its own wisdom awareness nature, is not captured by fixated concepts of duality of mistaken reification of self-adherence.
- Let skilful means and wisdom operate together. Using this awareness recognition on the inner path of practice to liberate mind from suffering, ultimately indivisible.
This is how the wave realises/ remembers it is the ocean.