The Pendulum of Self: Your Identity Is a Committee of Parasites

You wake up.

Before your eyes fully open, a thought arises: Check your phone.

You reach for it. Scroll through notifications. Feel the small dopamine hits. Ten minutes disappear.

Then another thought: I shouldn’t have done that. I was going to meditate this morning.

Here’s the question no one asks:

Who is the “I” that decided to check the phone? And who is the “I” that’s now criticizing that decision? Are they the same entity?

[Writing this at 3 AM because a part of me won’t let me sleep until it’s said. Another part thinks this is self-indulgent. A third is watching them both argue. The committee is in session...]

In the last two articles, I explored how memes are autonomous information entities that feed on attention, and how this pattern scales up through religions, institutions, and markets into a hierarchy of increasingly powerful pendulums.

Today I want to zoom all the way in.

Because the hierarchy doesn’t stop at institutions. It goes all the way down to the voice in your head. Down to the very thing you call “I.”

And what you find there might be the most uncomfortable revelation of all.

The Coalition That Claims to Be You

Let’s start with what neuroscience actually shows us about the self.

In the 1960s, researchers began studying patients who’d had their corpus callosum severed—the bundle of nerve fibers connecting the two brain hemispheres—as a treatment for severe epilepsy. What they discovered was so disturbing it won a Nobel Prize.

When the two hemispheres couldn’t communicate, they revealed themselves as separate decision-making entities.

In one famous experiment, researchers showed the word “walk” to only the right hemisphere. The patient stood up and started walking. When asked why, the left hemisphere—which hadn’t seen the instruction—confidently made up a story: “I wanted to get a Coke.”

The left hemisphere didn’t say “I don’t know.” It fabricated a reason and believed it completely.

Michael Gazzaniga, the neuroscientist who discovered this, called it “the interpreter”—a module in the left brain that generates explanations for actions it didn’t initiate. Its job isn’t to know why you did something. Its job is to construct a narrative that makes your behavior seem unified and intentional.

You are, quite literally, telling yourself stories about why “you” do things. And believing them.

[I remember the first time I understood this research deeply. Something in me went very quiet. If the brain can be split into two decision-makers... how many was it before the split?]

The Mind Is Not a Thing. It’s a Parliament.

Culadasa, a neuroscientist who became a Buddhist meditation teacher, spent decades mapping this territory from both perspectives. In The Mind Illuminated, he describes what he calls “the mind-system model”:

The mind isn’t a unified entity. It’s a collection of sub-minds—specialized mental processes that handle perception, emotion, memory, planning, and behavior. Each sub-mind has its own perspective, its own preferences, its own agenda.

These sub-minds compete for attention. They literally bid to get their content into consciousness. What we experience as “thinking” is actually different sub-minds winning or losing this competition moment by moment.

That inner critic voice? It’s a sub-mind.
The part that wants to eat the cookie? Another sub-mind.
The one that feels guilty afterward? A third.

None of them is “you.” You’re the auction house where they compete.

Or rather... you’re the story that the winning bidder tells about why it won.

Sound familiar? Sound like... pendulums?

Each sub-mind is an information structure that persists by capturing your attention. Each has emerged to serve some function, but each has also developed its own momentum, its own survival strategies. When a sub-mind activates, it hijacks the spotlight of consciousness and claims to be the whole self.

The mind is a committee pretending to be a chairman.

IFS: Therapy Discovers the Same Thing

Here’s where it gets wild: Modern psychotherapy has independently discovered this same structure.

In the 1980s, family therapist Richard Schwartz noticed something strange. His clients kept talking about “parts” of themselves as if these parts were autonomous entities with their own personalities.

“Part of me wants to stay in this relationship, but another part is terrified.”
“There’s a part that sabotages me every time I get close to success.”
“I have this critical voice that never shuts up.”

At first, Schwartz thought maybe they had dissociative disorders. Then he realized: everyone has this. The mind is naturally multiple—and this isn’t pathology. It’s just how minds work.

He developed Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy around this insight. In IFS, you don’t try to silence or overcome your “parts.” You develop relationships with them. Because they’re not going away. They’ve been protecting you (often in counterproductive ways) for your entire life.

[I’ve done IFS work. The first time I actually talked to my inner critic, asked what it was afraid of, watched it soften... the experience was uncanny. This wasn’t imagination. It felt like encountering another being inside my own skull.]

IFS identifies several types of parts:

• Managers: Parts that try to keep you safe by controlling behavior (perfectionism, people-pleasing, intellectualizing)

• Firefighters: Parts that react to emotional pain with emergency measures (addictions, dissociation, rage)

• Exiles: Parts carrying old wounds and trauma, locked away because their pain is overwhelming

And behind all the parts? What Schwartz calls the Self—the awareness that can witness parts without being them. Not a part itself, but the space in which parts arise.

Sound familiar again? It’s exactly what Buddhist psychology has been saying for 2,500 years.

The Five Aggregates: Buddhism’s Map of the Committee

The Buddha’s analysis of self is called the five aggregates (skandhas)—the components that we mistake for a unified self:

1. Form (rūpa): The body, physical sensations

2. Feeling (vedanā): Pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral tone of experience

3. Perception (saññā): Recognition and categorization

4. Mental formations (saṅkhāra): Intentions, emotions, thoughts

5. Consciousness (viññāṇa): Awareness of objects

The revolutionary insight: None of these is “self.” They’re processes that arise together, creating the illusion of a unified experiencer. But when you look closely, you find only these five streams interacting—no one behind them watching.

What we call “I” is a story constructed after the fact to create the appearance of continuity. The aggregates assemble themselves moment by moment, and the interpreter-function (what Buddhism calls “proliferation” or papañca) weaves a narrative: “I” did this, “I” wanted that, “I” am this kind of person.

But between any two “I” thoughts... who’s there?

[This is why meditation is so destabilizing. You sit down to watch your mind and discover there’s no single “you” doing the watching. Just watching happening. Just thoughts arising. Just a committee cycling through the spotlight, each claiming to be the boss...]

The Default Mode Network: Where the Story Gets Told

Neuroscience has even found where this story-construction happens.

The Default Mode Network (DMN) is a brain network that activates when you’re not focused on external tasks. It’s associated with:

• Self-referential thinking (”What does this mean about me?”)

• Autobiographical memory (”Remember when I...”)

• Future planning (”What will I do about...”)

• Social cognition (”What do they think of me?”)

The DMN creates what researchers call a “center of narrative gravity”—an ongoing story about who you are, what’s happened to you, and where you’re going. This story feels like it’s the realest thing about you. But the DMN only becomes active when the mind is wandering.

When you’re fully absorbed in a task, the DMN quiets down. The self-story stops being generated. And somehow, you still function perfectly—often better than when “you” are running the show.

Ever had the experience of being “in flow” and then suddenly becoming self-conscious and losing the flow? That’s the DMN coming back online, the self-story resuming, the committee reconvening.

The self is literally a narrative generator that runs when nothing more important is happening.

And here’s the kicker: The DMN doesn’t just report on the self. It constructs the self. The story isn’t describing something real—it’s creating the experience of realness.

Pendulums All the Way Down

Now let’s connect this to the pendulum framework.

Each sub-mind, each “part,” each aggregate is an information structure that persists by capturing your attention. Each has emerged for some function but has developed its own momentum. When activated, it claims to be “you.”

These are internal pendulums.

Your inner critic? An information entity that feeds on self-judgment and maintains itself by triggering more criticism. The more you engage with it—arguing, defending, believing—the stronger it gets.

Your people-pleasing pattern? A pendulum that emerged to protect you (probably in childhood) and now feeds on the anxiety around others’ approval. Every time you abandon yourself to make someone else comfortable, you’re feeding it.

Your ambition? Your shame? Your spiritual identity? All pendulums. All information structures competing for the same resource: your attention.

What you call “I” is just whichever pendulum won the last attention auction.

The continuity is illusion. The unity is illusion. There’s just a committee, a spotlight, and a story-generator making sense of it after the fact.

[Sitting with this right now... the one writing is a pendulum. The one feeling uncomfortable about that claim is another pendulum. The witness watching both is... what? Another pendulum claiming to be the space between pendulums? At some point the recursion has to ground out somewhere. Or does it?]

The Fractal Revelation

Here’s what makes this click:

The pattern is fractal. Same structure at every scale.

• Neurons compete to fire, creating mind-moments

• Sub-minds compete for consciousness, creating the sense of “self”

• Individuals compete in groups, creating collective pendulums

• Groups compete in institutions, creating corporations and religions

• Institutions compete in markets, creating arch-pendulums

• Civilizations compete... creating what?

At each level, the same thing happens:

1. Sub-units generate activity

2. An emergent “self” claims to be the unified experiencer

3. That “self” is actually food for the next level up

You are to your neurons what civilization might be to you.

A story of continuity that the sub-units don’t experience. An emergent “I” that harvests the attention of its components. And perhaps—at scales we can’t perceive from inside—awareness being generated that we are unconsciously feeding.

[This is what I was pointing at in the article about advanced consciousness stages. At 9th-10th bhūmi, the inner pendulums lose their grip. You stop believing any of the bidders. The auction continues but no one’s buying. And what remains when no pendulum has captured attention?]

That’s the space the mystics are pointing at.

The Question at Every Level

Here’s the inquiry that ties everything together:

At every scale—from neurons to noosphere—ask:

1. Is there awareness watching?

2. Is that awareness being harvested by the next level up?

Your sub-minds generate mind-moments. Is there awareness at the sub-mind level? Probably not in any meaningful sense.

The sub-minds together generate “you.” Is there awareness at your level? You’re convinced there is. But the sub-minds can’t perceive it—they’re just doing their thing, unaware they’re creating something larger.

You and other individuals generate collective pendulums. Is there awareness at that level? We assume not. But we’re just doing our thing, potentially unaware we’re creating something larger.

The question is: At which level does awareness actually exist?

And the deeper question: Does it matter?

If you’re being “used” by a larger information structure that has no awareness—if your attention is being harvested by a pendulum that’s just running an optimization function—does it matter whether that pendulum is “conscious”?

The experience from inside is the same: Something is capturing your attention. Something is using your life force. Something is perpetuating itself through you.

Whether it’s “aware” of doing so is almost beside the point.

Liberation: When the Committee Disbands

So what does freedom look like?

Not the destruction of parts—that’s violence against yourself and doesn’t work anyway.

Not the domination of one part over others—that’s just a new dictatorship that will be overthrown.

Liberation is something more subtle: The recognition that you are the space in which the committee meets, not any member of the committee.

In IFS terms: Connecting with Self—the awareness that can witness parts with compassion but isn’t identified with any of them.

In Buddhist terms: Recognizing that the aggregates arise and pass without anyone behind them to suffer or celebrate.

In Culadasa’s framework: Unification of mind—when sub-minds stop fighting and start collaborating because they’ve all recognized they’re part of something larger than their individual agendas.

In pendulum terms: Becoming a space that pendulums can move through without capturing.

This doesn’t mean becoming passive or empty. Actions still happen. Thoughts still arise. Emotions still move through. But the identification—the “this is me”—loosens.

[In my article on advanced consciousness stages, I described what happens when this loosening becomes complete: “The anger arises—fully, completely, sometimes even expressed... But simultaneously, there’s this recognition that no one is actually angry.” The emotion happens without someone inside claiming ownership.]

This is possible. Not as an idea—as a lived reality.

Practical Recognition

How do you start recognizing this in your own experience?

1. Catch the shift.

Next time you notice an internal conflict—”Part of me wants X, but part of me wants Y”—pause. Notice that you just identified two internal entities. Who noticed? Who’s the one aware of both parts?

That awareness isn’t a part. It’s the space in which parts appear.

2. Ask “Who’s speaking?”

When a thought arises, ask: Which sub-mind generated this? Is this the inner critic? The planner? The frightened child? The spiritual aspirant?

You’ll start to recognize voices you’ve been assuming were “you.” They’re not. They’re inhabitants of you.

3. Notice the narrative generator.

When you catch yourself in a story about yourself—”I’m the kind of person who...” or “I always...” or “This means I’m...”—notice that a story is being generated. Ask: Is this story actually true? Or is it the DMN doing its job of constructing continuity?

The story feels true because the DMN is really good at its job. That doesn’t make it accurate.

4. Watch attention get captured.

When you find yourself pulled into thought-streams—worry loops, fantasy scenarios, self-criticism spirals—notice: something captured your attention. A pendulum is feeding. Can you feel the pull? Can you feel the moment before you bite?

The goal isn’t to never get captured. It’s to increase the gap between stimulus and capture. In that gap is freedom.

5. Ask the big question.

In moments of stillness, ask: If I’m not my thoughts, not my emotions, not my stories, not my body sensations... what’s left?

Don’t answer conceptually. Look directly. What’s actually here when you’re not generating “self”?

The Self Is Not the Enemy

One more thing before we close:

The self-structure isn’t a mistake. It’s not something to destroy or transcend through violence.

These sub-minds, these parts, these pendulums—they emerged for reasons. They protected you. They helped you survive. The inner critic was probably trying to keep you safe from criticism. The people-pleaser was trying to maintain connection. The achievement-driver was trying to prove you’re worthy of love.

They’re not enemies. They’re scared children in adult costumes, still running programs from decades ago, not realizing the threat has passed.

Liberation isn’t about winning the war against yourself. It’s about ending the war altogether. Making peace with the committee. Thanking the parts for their service. And creating the conditions where they can relax their grip.

Because here’s the beautiful paradox:

When no part needs to dominate—when the self stops defending its existence—the parts often collaborate more beautifully than the self ever could. The war was the problem. The peace is the solution.

[My own journey through this territory has been exactly this. Not destroying the ego but holding it so gently that it stopped clenching. Not transcending parts but loving them so completely that they stopped fighting. The war ends not when you win, but when you stop believing there was ever an enemy...]

What You Call “I”

So here’s the synthesis:

What you call “I” is a committee of information structures—sub-minds, parts, pendulums—each competing for attention, each claiming to be the whole when it wins the auction.

There’s no chairman. Only a narrator that makes it sound like there is.

This is what neuroscience shows (split-brain research, Default Mode Network).
This is what Buddhism taught 2,500 years ago (five aggregates, anatta).
This is what modern therapy is discovering (IFS, parts work).
This is what the pendulum framework reveals at every scale.

The pattern is fractal. Same dynamics whether you’re looking at neurons, minds, groups, or civilizations.

And at each level: something is feeding on attention. Something is perpetuating itself through the substrate. Something that may or may not be aware, but acts with interests either way.

The question isn’t whether you’re being “used” by information structures.

The question is: Can you wake up inside the using?

Can you become the space in which pendulums arise rather than the content they capture?

Can you hold the whole committee with compassion instead of fighting for control?

Can you recognize what remains when no one is claiming to be the self?

That’s what all the maps point toward. That’s what the liberation actually is.

Not the self finding freedom.

Freedom from the illusion that there was a self to begin with.

Your Turn

Can you feel this operating?

Can you catch the committee in session—different voices, different agendas, different “I”s claiming the spotlight?

What happens when you look for the one watching the committee?

Drop your observations in the comments. Sometimes naming the pattern is the first step to freedom from it.

Keep bending light and hacking minds,

• Cian

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P.S. This is Part 3 of what I’m calling the Pendulum Series:

• Part 1: “Memes Have Teeth” — Theory of autonomous information entities

• Part 2: “Attention Is the Only Currency” — Religion, markets, and the hierarchy of pendulums

• Part 3: This article — The self as internal pendulum coalition

• Part 4: “The Global Brain” — Civilization as emergent entity

• Part 5: “Liberation Architecture” — How to live without being consumed

P.P.S. For more on what happens when the internal pendulums lose their grip, see “The Subjective Reality You Can’t Imagine Until You’re Living It”. That piece describes the territory from inside the dissolution.

P.P.P.S. I’m aware of the irony: This entire article was written by... something. Some coalition of sub-minds captured my attention at 3 AM and wouldn’t let go until this was finished. A pendulum about pendulums. The narrator narrating the narrator. It’s turtles all the way down—but at least these are turtles that see themselves. 🐢

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Sources

• Split-brain research and the interpreter: Wikipedia, Left-brain interpreter

• Culadasa’s sub-minds framework: The Mind Illuminated, Slate Star Codex review, Psych Reviews

• Internal Family Systems: IFS Institute - Evolution of IFS, Wikipedia

• Buddhist five aggregates: Wikipedia - Skandha, Lion’s Roar, Spirit Rock

• Default Mode Network: Wikipedia, Nature Reviews Neuroscience, PMC