One afternoon three decades ago, when I was in college, I set off on a drive through the back roads of Connecticut. This was before GPS, even before cell phones. I had a map with me, but it wasn't very good. The roads were not well marked, and I was unfamiliar with the area. The upshot is that I got hopelessly lost and, as the day wore on, I became increasingly frustrated. Finally I started raging in the car, cursing out the lousy map and the poor signage and the impenetrable maze of streets.
But while I was raging, I was also aware of another part of myself, curiously detached and nonjudgmental, that said very coolly, in a matter-of-fact way, "He's really losing it, isn't he?" (Or something to that effect.)
This may have been my first conscious apprehension of the witness – the part of us that watches, takes note, and learns, but doesn't react or condemn.
When I calmed down, I thought about that strange feeling of bifurcation – of watching myself from outside myself. Later I learned that psychologists call it dissociation. But affixing a label to something doesn't explain it, and I was left wondering what it was. A defense mechanism, as psychology maintains? Or something more?
These days I think the witness is the closest most of us come, at least in our normal waking life, to our higher self. It's an egoless state – that's why there is no judging or reacting, merely calm appraisal. We access the witness when our normal ego defenses are down – either because we have entered an altered state of consciousness through meditation or reverie, or, conversely, because we are so worked up about something that our habitual methods of self-control start to break down.
I've noticed another thing about this mysterious witness. As I grow older, I find that my response to events is increasingly coming in line with that of the witness. In other words, I overreact less often, and I stand back and observe the situation with detachment more often. I'm not saying I never overreact – I know I do, and there are specific issues that will predictably press my buttons – but, I think, I don't overreact quite as frequently as I used to.
Studies have shown that most people grow happier as they get older, and that septuagenarians and octogenarians are the happiest age groups. This runs counter to the worship of all things youthful that defines our culture, yet it makes a certain amount of sense. With age comes (in many cases, though not always) a retreat of the ego; and the space it leaves behind seems to make room for the witness. And the witness is stoic, accepting, uncritical, peaceful. A person who self-identifies with the ego is bound to find life tempestuous and rough – "life's fitful fever," as Shakespeare put it; a person who self-identifies with the witness will find life easier to take.
Furthermore, I suspect that in most cases the "self" that continues after death is essentially the witness, with the ego minimized or sloughed off altogether. People who self-identify with the ego so strongly that they have drowned out the voice of the witness entirely may find the ego persisting for a while, and perhaps some of them are what spiritualists call earthbound spirits, stuck (for a time) at a low level of development. But for people of even modest spiritual attainments, people who haven’t shut out the witness altogether – in other words, for most people – the transition to an afterlife state probably involves discarding most or all ego-based thinking, and becoming one with the witness. Possibly this does not happen instantly, which is why it is not consistently reported by near-death experiencers; it seems to happen as a result of the life review, the encounter with a Being of Light (which may be an exteriorized perception of the witness), and perhaps a prolonged state of restful healing.
If this speculation is in any way correct, then achieving a high degree of self-identification with the witness is the best way to bring us close to "heaven on earth," and should smooth the transition to the next life. Perhaps this is why sages and spiritual masters of all traditions have emphasized the need to minimize the ego and enlarge the witness' s sphere of influence.
It's interesting to interpret some Christian teachings in this light. "The Kingdom of God is within you" – because the witness is within you. Union with the witness is "the pearl of great price." Atonement – in the sense of "at-one-ment" – means oneness with the witness. The wheat (nourishing kernel) of the witness will be separated from the chaff (indigestible roughage) of the ego.
Maybe it's the voice of the witness that we hear in other sayings attributed to Jesus (and to his mentor, John). This one, for instance, seems to derive straight from the witness:
Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. [Matthew 11:29-30]