Featured Exquisite Mind webpage: self/no-self

For thousands of years, philosophers have talked about the nature of the self. More recently in the last 100 years or so since the science of psychology emerged, the self has been subjected to scientific study. Even more recently, neuroscience has tried to find the self in the brain. Descartes (in the 17th Century) believed the mind and body were connected by the pineal gland in the brain, but he was wrong. Modern neuroscience can find no center of the self, no core self. What then is the self? Ultimately, the self is the concept we hold about ourselves, and this concept is supported and reinforced by thinking -- telling ourselves the stories of our lives over and over again. When people devote themselves to a deep meditation practice, they find this concept of the self is a moving and flimsy target. That sense of "me" changes and is fluid and spacious. Read more ...