Great insights. Maintaining the identified self does seem to be the agenda in my experience. My self-agenda is so clear and it's so obvious what its purpose is. It outlines my 'self' character so well. As Peter says in the 2nd book, being conscious of the self-agenda is essentially throwing flour on an invisible man. It brings about the "shape" of the core assumptions of our self (perhaps not the ENTIRETY of the 'self', but a very huge part!). When I have gone deep into this self-agenda and really contemplated being free of it, and releasing it completely, I usually get two different reactions. Sometimes, there is a deep sense of freedom, and it reveals my inherent "Completeness". Other times, it brings about fear, because without it, life seems meaningless and that's incredibly threatening to the self. Regarding dropping the self-agenda, I often feel frustrated at Peter's words of "you can just drop it". Perhaps I'm not conscious enough, but the existential power behind it is overwhelming to say the least. Honestly, from my experience, I don't know if there is a SELF tied up with the self ACTIVITY. I don't find a SELF separate from its activity. It's a bit weird to consider that the activity IS the self, without an actual self. There seems to be just the activity.

@Devin Henderson I hear you, communicating these really requires racking the brain lol. It seems like you're saying that there is a "base self" underneath the agenda/activity/methods. I do find there to be a constant "background activity" or "hum" (as Peter calls it) that gives the impression of a consistent and solid "sense of self" that generates the methods/activities/agenda. From my experience, this background hum is simply more agenda, not yet conscious. I feel like when we become conscious of some of our self-agenda, it can create this separation between what is conscious, and what is not (but often felt in the background). This almost constant background activity feels less like an activity, and more like "static" (solid and stable), while on the foreground we see the "radio channel" (coherent activity/distinctions). But if we "tune" in to it, the static seems to be just as dynamic as our agenda (radio channel), rather than being some stable base from which the agenda comes from. In other words, core assumptions drive the activity, yet the core assumptions are also an activity IMO. When you say self NEEDS that activity to exist: yes i agree because it needs the activity to perpetuate the illusion. But, I'd say from my experience, they are the same thing. Like watching a character on a show: we need the show to keep going for the character to persist. There isn't a one "outside" or "beneath", who would "suffer" if the show stopped. But the character and the show/script/story is really one thing. There is just the show.

My own realizations in my contemplative experience regarding this dynamic: I 100% do NOT want to be happy. I agree. There is a core belief of being incomplete and unworthy. Its perpetual goal is to seek for completion via various means. It doesn't matter whether I accomplish those goals or not, the dynamic cannot come to an end. It is like running on a hamster wheel and continuously having a new carrot dangling in front of me. Sometimes I get it, sometimes I don't, but a new carrot is always ready to take its place. I remember reading "Pursuing Consciousness" and Peter said "our self-makeup needs to persist EXACTLY as it is." In my experience, I agree. If I believe myself to be unworthy, then I MUST PERSIST as an "unworthy being". Becoming "worthy" is not the actual goal. The CHASE to become "worthy" is the goal, in other words, to persist as a flawed and broken person who will "one day be complete". Each new carrot is the promise of happiness in the future, but only the pursuit is the goal. The key insight seems to be, there is no conceptual "self" that HAS the characteristic of being "unworthy". The "unworthy" trait IS the "self". Becoming worthy then means the death of this very self. No more unworthiness = no more self. And nothing is more powerful than this primal impulse of survival. That is why it creates this perpetual self-agenda of seeking completion with self-created problems to continuously keep up the illusion of an incomplete self. The self-agenda being fueled by the primal impulse to survive makes this a constant activity. Or as Peter says in his book - "its persistence makes the Terminator look lazy". I do not think that's even a 1% exaggeration in my experience. The constant contemplation/meditation on my true nature has continued to give me glimpses of freedom from this dynamic and has weakened its grasp. It is like stepping off that hamster wheel and realizing the story of unworthiness was just a dream. The carrots were holograms. However, each time I continuously probe into its illusory nature, it often evokes an immensely powerful reaction from the self-mind to re-establish the status quo. It often overpowers my efforts. It's like every time I get close to what seems like the door out of this, "it" brings out the big guns to boot me all the way back.

I can relate, as I also struggled with this a lot, and still do, but it's gotten a lot better. Being conscious of what the real purpose behind my actions are, existentially, is what has helped me loosen this tendency. To me, it can feel like falling into a void as the 'self' no longer manipulates for its needs, but it's simultaneously very freeing. I feel less like an 'object within' in the social world. Thanks for sharing!

My 2 cents for what it's worth: I also find that the incessant thought patterns is tied to our identity, and its persistence and power is tied to the primal impulse of survival, hence making it extremely powerful. I have not found a way to stop the thought patterns from arising, but I have found a way to free myself from suffering them (at least the majority of the time). If Peter's "recognize you're doing it and just stop doing it" isn't graspable, the following is what has worked for me over the years: You have to first get who you are. Whenever I have "unpleasant" thoughts, I can go to "who" I really am, beyond the conceptual separate self, and those distressful thoughts are then rendered powerless. States and experiences don't affect who I really am, it only affects the conceptual self (or simply, it's all mind). When there are thoughts causing distress, instead of sifting through the thought chain, contemplate the question "to whom does this thought arise to?" This was often taught by Ramana Maharshi. If you are experiencing a thought or feeling, then you must not BE that thought or feeling, you must be the one experiencing/perceiving it. Notice that whatever THAT is, it is not affected by the thought or feeling, it's simply just aware of it. To begin, you can contemplate, "if I am aware of these thoughts and feelings, I must not BE these thoughts and feelings. yet I am aware of them. who is this "I" that is aware of them?" if you "find" it, you'll see that it itself is never tainted by experience. To be clear, this is not a suppression or distraction from the thoughts or feelings. It's a dis-identifying from them. An analogy I like is, who you are is like the TV screen. The physical screen. The screen itself doesn't care what is playing on TV, whether it's a scary movie (bad thoughts) or a kids cartoon (good thoughts). It is unaffected by, yet welcomes, any experience (show).

@Robert David Love this book. I'm a sports performance coach, and this is the ONLY book I recommend to people to improve mental game.