The conscious Ego between the body and the spirit

The awakening of the conscious Ego in the organism

In the initial period of human life, that process of formation and development of the conscious Ego begins, which in the title of this paragraph I preferred to call awakening to take into account also those cases in which the Ego, since its early childhood, preserves and manifests memories related to the life of another person, who died some time before. Normally, however, the Ego has no memory of lives lived by other organisms, and its personal identity is progressively formed, in relation to the experiences determined by the interactions between its current infant organism and the environment, and by the autonomous activity of its own mind. In any case, as I have repeatedly observed, these are experiences of a psychic nature, in the sense that any event in which the organism to which the Ego is connected is involved, determines – through the brain activity – a series of mental reactions (sensory, emotional, of representation, memorization and elaboration) of which the Ego, through its consciousness, is the sensitive recipient. It should be noted that the phenomenon of the formation and development of the conscious Ego connected to the events of the life of each human organism has a complexity that can only be partially expressed in terms of language, especially taking into account the enormous number of human organisms that currently live or have lived in the past, and of all the variables that contribute to determining the mental events that shape the formative process of the Ego and condition its development.

Despite being the subject that experiences all the psychic events determined by the mental activity in which it is involved through consciousness, the Ego – in the first years of the organism's development – is not aware of its existence and does not ask itself questions about its origin, but almost always completely identifies with the psychic effects of which it becomes conscious, and with the information and programs it receives from the environment, through the mental interactions with others. The psychic dynamics stimulated by the organism's interactions with the environment and with other human organisms, or determined by spontaneous mental activity, are recorded and remembered as the memory function is consolidated, and thus that personal history takes form that offers a basis of continuity for the subsequent development of the Ego. Although the Ego always has to deal with the psychic events of which it becomes conscious, the true origin of these events remains unknown to it, while what it learns about them are the representations and narratives that are culturally transmitted to it, or that its mind autonomously elaborates. It is a very complex process that begins in the first years of life and then goes on, passing through various stages, often until the end of the human adventure. From the beginning, since each new organism is usually reared within a pre-existing social system, much of the psychic processes are determined by the cultural programs that are transmitted to the new member of that social system, or by the autonomous mental reactions stimulated by such programs. Although already in its childhood the Ego can make decisions and take choices regarding the behavior and actions of its own organism, these choices are made – with rare exceptions – on the basis of the psychic dynamics with which the Ego identifies at that moment, and not in the light of a profound knowledge of its own true essence and the function of consciousness.

In its role as experimenter of the psychic events that involve it, the conscious Ego also performs a function of sensor and evaluator/processor: the interactions between the organism and the environment and the functioning of the same organism are translated into signals processed by the neural circuits that involve a range of more or less intense positive or negative sensations and emotions for the Ego. The function of the Ego seems to be that of evaluating these sensations, elaborating – on the basis of its own previous experiences – those programs of action and behavior that seem to it most appropriate to obtain positive sensations and avoid negative ones. As a matter of fact, however, the complexity and bipolarity of the human psyche, the large number of living and interacting human organisms, and the wide range of cultural programs that are transmitted to the mental circuits of the organism to which the Ego is connected, cause that the sensations experienced by the Ego are often nuanced and ambiguous, that the evaluations of the Ego are not adequate to the complexity of reality and that the elaboration of the strategies necessary to obtain the results that the Ego desires do not have the expected success. Thus occurs that strange condition for which the very fact of being able to avoid negative experiences turns into a positive experience, making the gradation of the range of emotions and sensations very relative. In these circumstances, the Ego may soon find itself having to endure all sorts of negative effects determined by the dynamics of the human psyche, or resorting to misleading or violent strategies, based on deception and abuse, to obtain what it believes can give it satisfaction, not caring about the negative effects its actions may have on others, or even feeling gratified by the success of these hostile strategies.

The Ego and the relationships with others

The difficulties of life are largely influenced by the complexity of the relationships with other human beings, also in relation to the role that is attributed to us or that we conquer within a more or less wide social system. Every human being is a center of consciousness, with a more or less intense inner life through which the Ego experiences the psychic dynamics that involve it and deals with them. For our conscious Ego, however, the others are essentially organisms whose actions and behaviors we can perceive, interpret and know. The information on their inner life and on the psychic events experienced by their conscious Ego, and in particular on their emotional state of happiness or unhappiness, derives from our interpretation of these behaviors and from the communications that they themselves or others provide us: in fact we are not able to know directly what the conscious Ego of another person is experiencing, and this is a precise limit that is imposed on us by our human condition. The plurality of human organisms – each distinct and separate from the others, and endowed with its own peculiar features – actually determines an inevitable form of egocentrism in which each conscious Ego experiences its own range of psychic events, but can only imagine or try to intuit the psychic dynamics experienced by another conscious Ego, or even can arbitrarily attribute to the other thoughts, desires, emotions and intentions that are very different from the real ones. Given the difficulties that the conscious Ego has to face when (and if) it tries to confront its own psychic dynamics, it is disconcerting how easily it lets itself be deceived when its mind processes information about the psychic events that involve others, or makes hasty and superficial judgments on the ways in which the other's Ego is entangled and deceived by the psychic dynamics that involve it: however, it is certainly true that we often manage to clearly evaluate the condition of subjugation of the Ego of another person to the psychic dynamics that involve it, while we find it much more difficult to recognize that our conscious Ego is often in the same condition.

Precisely the difficulty of being able to correctly perceive what the Ego of another person feels, causes that the inevitable egocentrism determined by the plurality of the bodies can easily be transformed into selfishness, that is insensitivity and indifference towards what the other's Ego may feel as a result of our behavior and our actions towards it. Directly or indirectly obtaining what is perceived as our own benefit from circumstances and actions that cause damage and suffering to someone else, has always been assumed as natural in human interactions, based on what are considered the needs of the human organism. Nature itself, in fact, shows and teaches us the insensitivity towards the fate of each individual organism, promoting as the engine of the evolutionary process – at least in the interpretation given by us – the survival capacity and the reproductive success of the fittest. The cultural programs that are transmitted to the Ego are founded also (and, often, above all) on the natural needs of the human organism, considered under its individual aspect and as a member of the social group to which it belongs. In principle, they can be divided into two large groups: on the one hand those of coercive conditioning, which seek to train the Ego to resist to attractive and seductive psychic tensions, in the name of a discipline that makes the individual capable of dealing with the difficulties of life, especially for the benefit of the group to which it belongs; on the other those based on indulgence towards the psychic dynamics that determine what – in the various forms in which it is felt – can be defined the pleasure of living, so making the Ego particularly vulnerable and weak to the desires and whims of the psyche. Especially in the past, a cultural orientation inspired by the virile spirit of sacrifice was attributed to the programs of the first type, while the indulgence of those of the second type was considered as typically maternal or female. Today things are much more complex and the two types of cultural programs are often mixed together in a sneaky way, in order for the economic system to get sufficiently satisfied human workers to be managed without too many problems.

In both cases, the Ego can find itself in a difficult condition to endure: the coercions imposed on it by other people, relying on the needs and vulnerability of its organism, can determine negative psychic reactions of rebellion and dejection, which it must reckon with if he does not want to be tormented by them; an excessive indulgence towards its own gratifying psychic dynamics can lead to selfish behavior of self-affirmation also through prevarication on others, or to deleterious processes for the organism (as in the case of those who become drug addicts) that cause suffering both in those who have to be treated, and in those who feel affection for them. Another particular case, unfortunately not infrequent, is that in which the Ego has to face negative psychic reactions – for itself, but also for others – generated by the abuses perpetrated by other people (often its parents) during its childhood. These psychic dynamics can be endowed with an energetic charge able to overwhelm the defenses and management resources available to the Ego – which, especially in childhood and adolescence, are not yet enough consolidated – and can transform into a dangerous psychopath a person who, under different circumstances, would have developed a much more normal personality. All these variables, generated by the bipolar character of the human psyche (as well as by the characteristics of the organism and the circumstances in which it develops), exert an effect on the process of formation and evolution of the conscious Ego, who, having to deal with those particular aspects of the human psyche activated by the personal history that destiny has reserved for it, may feel stimulated to deepen its self-knowledge in order to better understand its role in relation to this organic life, and to develop the most suitable strategies to cope with the psyche's oddities.

In interpreting the behaviors and communications of other people, the conscious Ego must resort to what its psyche suggests, and in most cases this process sees the Ego in an almost entirely passive and uncritical role, ensnared and charmed as it is by the power of persuasion and conviction of its own psyche. When two or more people interact with each other through their organisms – that is, through behavior, actions and verbal communications – the psychic dynamics with which the Ego of each of them identifies can produce disturbing effects, the consequences of which may sometimes affect their life for a long time. These psychic reactions somewhat resemble certain more or less spontaneous chemical reactions that escape the control of those who have accidentally or knowingly triggered them, but while today we have culturally acquired a good knowledge of chemistry, our knowledge and ability to control the dynamics of psychic energy are still at a primitive level. We can observe that all interpersonal conflicts, generated by organic and psychic interactions between two or more people, exert their effects on two levels: the first affects the safeguard of the efficiency and well-being of the organism, in relation to the effects and consequences that the decisions and choices of the Ego can have in this regard, while the second concerns the short and long-term effects that the psychic dynamics that are activated in a person, as a reaction to the behaviors and communications of another human organism, have for that person's Ego. All that we consider the good and the evil of life is determined by the organic condition and the psychic involvement. If we could eliminate the link that binds the existence of the conscious Ego to that of its organism, most of the problems of this life would instantly vanish.

The triviality of the observation of the strong bond through which the Ego is normally conditioned by the psychophysical state of its own organism must not make us forget that in some cases the conscious Ego can support psychic demands that seriously jeopardize the safety and the same life of the organism: this can happen when the Ego decides to undertake risky feats, or when it prefers to rebel and eventually die rather than submit to conditions of servitude imposed on it by others. In these cases the Ego almost always experiences an inner conflict between the psychic dynamics that involve it: for example, the affections towards loved ones push it not to put the life of its organism at risk, while the loyalty to an ideal can persuade it to fight let's say for freedom, thus risking death or suffering. Therefore, not all the psychic dynamics that the Ego experiences are determined by the needs of its organism, even if – from the point of view of the conscious Ego – the events and circumstances of the organic life anyhow translate into pleasant, neutral or painful psychic experiences, which in their bipolarity drive it in one direction or another. In any case, the Ego sooner or later also has to face the psychic dynamics deriving from the decline of the conditions of its organism and from the prospect of the approaching death: at that point it must choose whether to continue to identify itself with the psychic instances of organic origin, or try to explore others of a different nature. For this purpose it may be advisable to limit to the bare minimum those interactions with other people, which often involve an uncontrolled and automatic circulation of cultural programs, forms of conditioning and habits that can determine unpleasant, useless and counterproductive psychic reactions.

The Ego and the feeling of the spirit

With the term spirit we can mean the possibility for the conscious Ego to experience psychic attunements that are not dependent on its connection with the organism, and therefore no longer human. Thus, as long as the Ego experiences the attunements of the human psyche through the functioning of its brain, the spirit remains something alien and mysterious, the existence of which is even denied by those who are convinced that there is no possibility of existence for the Ego after the death of its organism. However, not infrequently the Ego, even if conditioned by the demands imposed by organic life and by the cultural programs prevalent in the social system of which its organism is a part, feels the more or less confused call of something that stimulates it in search of a path of evolution that can go beyond the mere needs of the organic life. As we have already observed, all the creative aspects of human intelligence not only transform the natural environment of this world in a way that has become even alarming today, but in some cases go beyond the vital needs of the organism to generate forms of enjoyment and aesthetic enchantment of a purely mental, not to say spiritual, order, as it happens for music, for dance, and in general for all artistic manifestations. The same desire for knowledge, while stimulated by the need to cope with the difficulties related to the life of the organism, arises from the feeling of alienation (and ignorance) that arises from the way in which the conscious Ego experiences the functioning of that organism, to which it discovers it is so closely linked. Intuitively and naively, the Ego would be led to deal with the events of this physical world and with the very functioning of its organism, relying on its own will through techniques that we could define as spiritual magic, and it is only because of the scarce success of these techniques – which, evidently, are not very effective in this dimension – that it is forced to engage in acquiring more adequate forms of knowledge.

It is evident that the experiences that the conscious Ego undergoes during the life of its organism are determined mainly, if not exclusively, by the human psyche: the spirit cannot manifest itself in this dimension with sufficient clarity, and the Ego can become aware of its own spiritual origin only with considerable commitment, and if destiny allows it. It is equally clear that the life of mankind is destined to continue over time and in the physical dimension of this world even when the conscious Ego linked to a dead organism has definitively separated from it, to possibly continue its adventure by experiencing the psychic attunements of another dimension. In this sense we can conceive the existence of the conscious Ego as a spirit entity, free from the bonds that link it to an organism: however this form of spiritual existence is way different from the organic one, and – according to the many testimonies of those who have had an NDE – is undoubtedly much more in harmony with the very essence of the conscious Ego, which recognizes itself as spirit with a mind rather than as an organism with a brain. The fact remains, however, that – again in the light of the accounts of many NDEs – there is no discontinuity in the self-perception of the conscious Ego in the transition from the organic dimension to that of the spirit, if not for the fact of feeling freed from the discomfort (and the sufferings) of having a physical body, and the consequent limitations: although the psychic experiences of this new dimension show very different aspects from those experienced as an organism, the Ego retains the feeling of its own identity and also many of the memories relating to its human life, which is not infrequently revisited – even in the details of forgotten experiences – during the life review process.

All the NDE accounts are interrupted, of course, when the conscious Ego is again connected to its own organism and experiences the physical reality through the brain: we therefore do not have sufficient information on the further development of the Ego's adventure in its new spiritual condition. As we have observed, the transition from the organic to the spiritual condition usually occurs without a break in the Ego's sense of identity. At the beginning of the human adventure, however, the Ego experiences a rather hazy state of formation, based almost exclusively on the sensations and psychic reactions determined by the brain functioning: there is no identity continuity with a phase of spiritual existence that precedes, so to speak, the beginning of the life linked to a human organism, and consequently the Ego, in the period of its formation and development, identifies itself with the psychic experiences determined by the history of its organism. Even in those rare instances of identification with lives previously lived by other human organisms, which are often interpreted as evidence to support the theory of reincarnation, the Ego appears to have intensely assimilated the memories of another person's life with which it identifies – especially in the first phase of its new life – but it does not show that it remembers with the same clarity the experiences of its existence in the Spirit dimension. A hypothesis commonly proposed by those who maintain a continuity of the existence of the conscious Ego in the spiritual dimension, interspersed with various experiences of organic life in this or other worlds of the physical universe, is that of a complete amnesia determined by the fact that the memory of its own spiritual existence would prevent the conscious Ego from enduring the discomforts and sufferings caused by its new condition of dependence on an organism. However, NDEs do not validate this interpretation: although those who have experienced a positive NDE do not usually like the prospect of having to return to their body, they are then able to continue experiencing the human condition while retaining the memory of their experiences in the Spirit dimension.

Although I can only refer directly to my own personal experience, based on what I can deduce from other people's communications most humans – not to say almost all of them – do not have an intense and precise memory of a spiritual existence of their conscious Ego preceding the experiences deriving from the development of the organism to which it is connected: nothing, as a matter of fact, that can be compared to the clarity and persistence of the memories of those who have experienced the Spirit dimension during an NDE. Some form of spiritual existence can be imagined, or more or less confusedly guessed, in the event that a person becomes convinced of the possibility of this hypothesis, a bit like it happens for the alleged previous lives, but psychic suggestions of this kind completely lack the certainty offered by the sharp and permanent memory of an experience lived as absolutely real, as it happens for many NDEs. As a consequence of these experiences, the return of the conscious Ego to its usual organic existence after having experienced the spiritual dimension is usually accompanied by the certainty of being able to return to that dimension once the life of the organism is definitely over: this certainty infuses the conscious Ego with a new energy that also gives meaning and value to human life, felt as a temporary commitment that the Ego accepts to return then to the condition to which it aspires. But what could be the meaning of a return to human life – or to some other form of organic life – with a new and different organism, if the conscious Ego had already definitively reached the Spirit dimension? And why in this new organic life should the conscious Ego start all over again the process of its formation, development and evolution, having been erased all memory of its previous spiritual existence?

Some of those who have experienced the Spirit dimension report having received clear and exhaustive answers to all their questions: in that dimension everything can be immediately and perfectly understood, but unfortunately the explanations received, intuited or otherwise known, are inevitably forgotten upon returning to this organic life. There are therefore laws that limit our human capacity to know and to understand, laws that are – so to speak – imposed from above (not unlike physical laws such as the gravitational force), and although for us humans the ability to correctly reasoning and asking ourselves legitimate questions – as determined by the human experiences in which the conscious Ego is involved – should be considered as a precious resource, evidently we are not allowed in this life to know or remember everything we would like. At this point we can only reasonably and patiently wait for the end of our human life, so that the conscious Ego can experience what will happen to it, but only for mere speculative exercise we can try to ask ourselves what can induce the conscious Ego to abandon the Spirit dimension to experience a form of organic life, with all the limitations that this life entails and the risks and sufferings it will have to face, knowing that every memory relating to its spiritual existence will be erased. First of all we can ask ourselves if this decision derives from a free choice by the Ego, or is imposed on it as a necessity that it accepts or suffers. Some concrete aspects relating to this question are found in those testimonies of NDEs in which the Ego, having had the luck to be able to experience the Spirit dimension, is then invited to return to organic life despite its intense desire to stay in that dimension: if in some cases it is persuaded to accept this fate, with arguments based on a commitment to be fulfilled and on the help to be offered to other human beings, in other cases it is suddenly sent back into its body without many compliments and against its will (it would be tempting to say, kicked in its ass!).

It may therefore be that the Ego, in its spiritual condition, willingly decides – by spirit of adventure, to broaden its knowledge, or by conscious adhesion to a mysterious program managed by higher entities – to experience anew a form of organic existence on this planet or some other world of this physical universe, even knowing that it will have to start practically from scratch in the process of acquiring its own identity and of evolutionary development of its consciousness and intellectual resources: it is plausible in fact that the phase of spiritual existence has a regenerating and restorative energetic effect, like when – after a good night's sleep – we feel well rested and ready to face the difficulties of a new day, even if the evening before we felt very tired and fatigued. Just as it may be that the Ego be in some way obliged – by what could be defined as the order of things in the Spirit dimension – through forms of persuasion or through a sense of duty and spirit of service, to accept the commitment to experience an organic life form again – with all the limitations and the difficulties previously exposed – because this is what is required of it by the spiritual system of which it is a part, just as the social system of which we are part as humans requires us to educate ourselves and to participate in the keeping and advancement of our society through our work and commitment. If in the latter case the Ego could be forced to move into an organism even against its will, if it is free to do so voluntarily it could also decide to remain in the Spirit dimension for a long or an indefinite time. As can easily be seen from the speculative and almost imaginative character of the previous considerations – albeit always based on the NDEs accounts and on the theories about to the so-called reincarnation – the conscious Ego is in any event inserted at a certain level of a hierarchical organization, so to speak, beyond which it absolutely cannot go, both as a possibility of knowledge, and – least of all – as imposition of its own will.

According to the accounts of some of those who have experienced the Spirit dimension, the attraction that the conscious Ego feels towards the latter is so intense that the desires of the Ego coincide with those of the Spirit, to a greater extent the more the Ego perceives the energy that the Spirit radiates as an absolute and unconditional love: the Ego itself therefore feels that it is part of the Spirit, thus recognizing its own authentic essence. An aspect that seems important to me, for us who still live in the human condition, connected to an organism and involved in the psychic dynamics that characterize our state, is the recognition of the presence of an inner spiritual guide who tries to help the Ego in its search of a path of evolution that leads it to consciously feel the call of the Spirit. The signals that our spirit guide sends us from the spiritual dimension, while it follows the human events of our life, often reach the conscious Ego in a confused and uncertain way, disturbed as they are by the much more powerful and direct signals transmitted by the various attunements of the human psyche determined by the organic life, in which the Ego is involved and with which it is naturally led to identify itself. In this respect, the NDEs represent a significant amplifier for the call of the Spirit, since the accounts of those experiences come directly from our dimension and therefore help to clarify the communication channel that allows the Ego to receive the signals of its spirit guide. This is especially true for those who have been able to experience an NDE directly, but it also occurs to many of us who have only heard of NDEs, as Kenneth Ring – one of the most intent scholars of these phenomena – rightly pointed out in his book Lessons from the Light (2006).

The fact remains that – once the Spirit dimension has been experienced or in any case the possibility of accessing that dimension has been recognized – the conscious Ego can feel a certain discomfort in having to deal daily with the needs and limitations imposed by the organic life, but above all in conforming to the dogmatism of the dominant cultural programs in our social systems, mainly centered on the Ego's submission to the needs of its organism and to the collective dynamics of the human psyche, promoted as values – often in conflict with each other – by one or the other social group. In particular the conscious Ego, once free from these conditionings, can no longer recognize the life of its organism as an absolute value or, as they say, the supreme good, but only as a vehicle to be protected, treated and used in the best possible way. in relation to what it will be able to experience in the spiritual dimension: in fact, many NDEs show in a surprising way how the values of those who have experienced them have substantially changed – once they have returned to organic life – compared to those assimilated through the cultural programs, according to which they had set up and organized their previous life. Obviously, it would be naive to believe that the complex organizational and logistical problems presented by the billions of human organisms currently living on our planet – in the context of very different and often opposing cultures and social organizations – could be magically solved by resorting to a spiritual approach, also because it is not clear with what tools the Spirit, understood as universal love, can replace the natural dynamics of the human psyche in our organic dimension: but those who believe that the conscious Ego can continue to exist in a spiritual condition, free from the constraints and sufferings that the organic life imposes on it, accept death with serenity, and even can desire it, willingly ready to free the planet from the cumbersome presence of their own organism and its needs. Which is almost the opposite of what the dominant cultural programs are based on.

The development of the spiritual Ego and the near future of mankind

The experience of love and bliss that radiates in the Spirit dimension is so intense and involving, that those who have had the luck of being able to try it and then return to live in this dimension feel the need to transmit to others at least that feeling of unconditional love by which they have been pervaded, in the hope of being able to bring a spark of that light to this world too. In our age we can see – at least in certain cultural environments – the symptoms of a spiritual awakening that is probably destined to spread in the near future: it would however be naive to think that this revival of the spirit could in itself transform our planet into a better world – not to say an Eden – overcoming the resistances imposed by the bipolar energy field of the human psyche. Even if history never repeats itself in the same way, it has already happened in the past that the spread of religious myths based on love has produced notable changes in the collective organizational structures, without however being able to bring into this world the concord, harmony and cohesion necessary for a positive evolution of the social life of humans. On the other hand, it is not casual that the conscious Ego can experience the Spirit dimension only once it has separated – for some time or permanently – from its own organism: it is a real change of dimension, which determines the perception of a very different reality from that to which the Ego had become accustomed for the entire duration of its human life, and therefore alien to the organic life, even if the Ego can feel and interpret it as a homecoming.

For some mysterious reason that we do not know, but on which we can only speculate, the Ego becomes aware of its existence in the realm of the physical reality, by experiencing the psychic dynamics determined by the organic life, with all the distortions, the oddities, the joys and the pains that this condition – complex and often chaotic, due to the environmental conditions and the psychic differences among the multitude of living human organisms – entails. It is trivial to highlight the substantial difference between the average human condition through which the Ego experiences the dynamics of its own psyche, with their lights but also their many shadows, and the state of bliss and unconditional and definitely otherworldly love by which the Ego feels pervaded once welcomed in the Spirit dimension, as we are told – with words inadequate to express the intensity of their experience – by many of those who have had an NDE. Yet the same testimonies of those who have returned to this organic life to tell us about their experiences in the Spirit dimension refer to a mission or a task that the Ego is committed (or is forced) to cope with, temporarily renouncing the advantages of its spiritual existence to return to the physical dimension, after being reconnected to its own organism. What exactly this mission consists of, often precisely those who have had the NDEs are the first to ask themselves: in general they feel the need to communicate to others in the better possible way what they have experienced, and to live coherently with the state of grace and love by which they were pervaded the relationships with other human beings, who have not been allowed a direct experience of the Spirit. The mission could therefore consist in spreading in this rather troubled life a testimony of hope and comfort, deriving from having experienced the reality of the divine Light.

However, it is evident that if the light of the Spirit were sufficient to positively transform the dynamics under which mankind as a whole functions, this world would have since long been a much better place than it is: in every age, including the current one, there are people who concretely manifest, with their thought and behavior, love and compassion for others, and who actively commit themselves – in one field or another – to improve the living conditions of humans, and especially of those who suffer the most. But in the face of these behaviors, which in the context of the dynamics of the human psyche are generically interpreted as the good, there are other orientations and behaviors – based on competition, violence and deception, and ultimately on the search for an individual or group advantage at the expense of others – also well rooted in the human psyche, and with which the good must still deal, even if we want to label and interpret them as manifestations of the evil. Although this bipolarity disappears once the Ego has managed to access the Spirit dimension, we are unable to know if the intent of the Spirit is really to transform the conditions of this world, and if it has the necessary resources: not infrequently those who have experienced an NDE have to face difficulties in readjusting to the conditions imposed by human life once reconnected to their organism, because what works so well in the Spirit dimension does not work as well in the organic life, taking into account the dynamics of the human psyche. The conscious Ego currently has reached a certain level of intelligence – or at least, this applies to those in whom a smart consciousness has been sufficiently developed – which, in the light of what human history shows, does not allow it to be able to naively and uncritically believe that a spirit incarnates individually in order to colonize or conquer this or other worlds, thus accomplishing a mission that has been assigned to it by the divine Spirit.

There is certainly in the conscious Ego, however engaged and involved in the organic life, a reflection of the spirit, or at least the perception of the signals – sometimes intense, sometimes extremely weak – transmitted by the spirit guides. However, the most plausible reason why the Ego is formed, develops and evolves as a result of the life of its organism and of the experiences determined by the psyche seems to be to explore and know some aspects of human life through direct experience, to then move into the Spirit dimension bringing with it the legacy of what it was able to experience during its human adventure. The evaluation of this heritage takes place in the Spirit dimension, probably during that life review process that we are told about in a good number of NDEs (about one third of the total). Obviously, according to this interpretation, our human life acquires a meaning and a purpose as a vehicle that allows the Ego to access the Spirit dimension, or to return to it if it had already experienced a form of conscious spiritual existence: however, the meaning that is attributed to this process by the divine Spirit itself remains beyond the comprehension capacity of our intellect, since it is a phenomenon of whose existence we can only become conscious, just as we are conscious of the existence of the stars and other phenomena of the universe, without being able to know – at least in this life – what their purpose and meaning are. We cannot therefore know if the process that leads to the formation and growth of the conscious Ego, and to the eventual experimentation by the latter of the Spirit dimension after the death of the organism, is under the control and guidance of the Spirit itself, or whether it should be subject to other cosmic laws, which place precise limits on the interference of spiritual entities in the dimension of the organic life.

Since the transfer into the Spirit dimension also marks, for the conscious Ego, the end of the possibility of directly intervening in human life (with the exception of those cases in which the Ego can decide to reconnect to its own organism, or is forced to do so), the temporary duration of this life makes the Ego – becoming aware of the existence of the spiritual dimension – wonder what connection there may be between its current experiences of the organic life – based on the dynamics of the human psyche – and the spiritual existence to which it feels attracted, in which the perception of time is very different from our human one. The first and most obvious answer that can be given to this question is that our human life represents, so to speak, the uterus in which the Ego is formed, developed and perfected, so as to be able to reach a degree of evolution that allows it to consciously abandon the organic form, to continue its experiences in the Spirit dimension (or possibly in other dimensions). But since, evidently, this process of growth and spiritual evolution of the Ego in the course of its human life is not always successful – due to random events that can interrupt the life of the organism, or because the development of the Ego is inhibited by the imperfections, diseases, disabilities and traumas to which its organism is subject, or because the Ego is unable to free itself from the assimilated conditioning programs, remaining entangled in the dynamics of the human psyche that involve it, and with which it continues to identify – it is possible that what we could define as the Ego's spiritual seed is somehow recovered and regenerated in the Spirit dimension, to be connected with a new organism. If, on the other hand, the Ego has reached a sufficient, even if not perfect, level of growth, it can access the spiritual dimension while maintaining its identity as a conscious entity and, at least in part, the memories relating to its organic life.

The renewed interest of the Ego for the spiritual dimension, which already manifests itself during the organic life, makes the importance of the latter relative, due to the fact that it can be considered as a prelude (or an interlude) to the existence of the Ego as spirit. It is in fact evident that the commitment of energies and intellectual resources that has characterized the industrial and technological progress of a large part of mankind in the last two centuries has been made possible by cultural programs centered on the almost absolute importance of the organic life as a privileged (if not unique) source of experience for the conscious Ego. According to this perspective, the human organism must be protected and maintained in conditions of efficiency, and opportunities for movement, exploration and experimentation must be offered to it, in order to allow the conscious Ego to take full advantage of the experiences determined by the human psyche in accordance with the brain functioning, almost giving for granted that the end of the organic life also marks, for the Ego, the end of any experiential adventure. But it is clear that if the Ego can re-evaluate the possibility of experiencing other psychic attunements – felt as particularly congenial to its own essence – once organic life has ended, the time factor plays in favor of the spiritual life, above all when the residual time of organic life is gradually reduced, making so that the Ego's attention and resources are directed more to the need to live in accordance with the spirit rather than to try to get what is promoted by the dominant cultural programs, such as temporary emotions given by the satisfaction of desires, or positions of power or popularity. This, at least, is the orientation of many of those who have experienced an NDE, getting from it the certainty of the continuity of the existence of the conscious Ego at the end of organic life.

In this historical age the future of mankind is very uncertain, and the current awakening of interest in the spirit can be attributed to this too. Since the end of the Second World War, the population of the planet has more than tripled, and enormous differences can be found in the way life is lived, in relation to the geographical area and the culture to which people belong. The rapid circulation of information and the often superficial, and sometimes deceptive, interpretation given to it, cause that large sections of the world population – who still live in precarious conditions – aspire to improve the quality of their life in a short time, resorting more and more frequently to migratory displacements in the economically more advanced and already intensely populated areas. On the other hand, precisely the economic development determined by our industrial and technological culture requires an intensive exploitation of the planet's natural resources and energy sources, and the extension of this development to that large part of the world population that does not currently benefit from it, but that desires it and – at least to a certain extent – demands it, creates the conditions for a subversion of the processes of formation and renewal of the natural resources, which will certainly modify the planet balance in an unfavorable way to human prosperity. Since humanity is still distributed within numerically very different sovereign national states, some of which have a remarkable military and economic power, it is not excluded that in the near future the competition for resources could intensify to the point of leading to armed conflicts. Although we can have the hope that the spiritual evolution of a part of this somewhat confused and suffering humanity could lead to a greater harmony, a spirit of collaboration and a renunciation of competition, at least in its conflicting aspects, it would be naive to expect from this orientation a miraculous solution to the problems of our organic and psychic life. In every age, including ours, people of good will and of high spiritual level have committed all their energies into achieving some improvement in the conditions of human life, in the mutual understanding and collaboration among nations, in the promotion of a human civilization founded on the defense of rights, with the results that are visible to everybody: most likely without their commitment this would be a worse world, but it certainly cannot be said that it has become a perfect world.

It is more plausible that the prospect of a future spiritual existence, validated by the testimonies of the NDEs, supports the conscious Ego in its confrontation with the difficulties and hardship of this life, also offering it the resources to face the death of its organism as a significant but also normal event, or at least natural, when not even desirable, as happens for some of those who – having experienced a particularly pleasurable NDE – can't wait to be able to return to the Spirit dimension. In some respects it seems that we are in a condition similar to that of the Christian communities of almost two millennia ago, when even the prospect of death seemed preferable to that of a life to be lived in disagreement with one's own most true spiritual essence: fortunately, at least at present, our culture does not entail persecutions against those who wish to live in harmony with their own aspirations for a spiritual evolution, but already now other cultures do not prove to be as tolerant, placing an alleged ideal of collective social progress, essentially based on the needs of the organism, before any freedom of spiritual research. All that remains is to hope that in the near future the confrontation between cultures will not turn into open conflict, as it has not infrequently happened in the past, forcing even those who want to live in harmony with their spirit, either to fight – in a form or another – to defend their freedom, or to give up bringing their organic life to its natural end, preferring a decent death to submitting to a state of coercion.

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