Anātman - Egolessness

Anatman (Sanskrit), Anatta (Pali)

Nonself, non-essentiality; one of the three marks of everything existing (trilakshana).  The anatman doctrine is one of the central teachings of Buddhism; it says that no self exists in the sense of a permanent, eternal, integral, and independent substance within an individual existent.  Thus the ego in Buddhism is no more than a transitory and changeable--and therefore a suffering-prone--empirical personality put together from the five aggregates (skandha). 

In Hinayana, this analysis is limited to the personality; in Mahayana, it is applied to all conditionally arising dharmas (pratitya-samutapada).  This freedom from self-nature (svabhava) is called in the Mahayana shunyata (emptiness).

In Buddhism, the personality, which according to its view arises out of the five skandhas--themselves impermanent--is not regarded as an eternal self but rather as the conventional ego of everyday experience.  Buddha himself, in answer to the question whether a self exists or not, never put forward a definite position so as not to cause new concepts to arise that would be irrelevant and obstructive for spiritual practice.  Thus the teaching of no self is to be understood more as a fruitful pedagogical device than as a philosophical doctrine.  Nevertheless in the course of the development of the Buddhist system of thought, this came more and more to be an unequivocal denial of the existence of a self.  Only the Vatsiputriya school affirmed the concept of a self.  This view was considered false by the other schools.

In Buddhism the methods for the attainment of liberation concentrate on doing away with the belief in an ego as the essential obstacle to the realization of nirvana.  Clinging to the concept of an ego is the primary cause of all passions and must be completely overcome.  If one does not apprehend the impersonality of existence, does not recognize existence as a flux of arising and passing away of physical and mental phenomena in which there is no constant self, then one is unable to grasp the four noble truths in their real significance and is unable to attain the insight that is essential for release.
From: The Shambhala Dictionary of Buddhism and Zen

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Egolessness:  In psychology, egolessness is an emotional state where one feels no ego (or self); of having no distinct being apart from the world around oneself. From the view of Western psychoanalysis and therapy, the state of "oneness" can be either positive or negative depending on the patient, and in the context in which these feelings occur in each patient.

The described feeling of oneness (of being inextricably woven to the fabric of one's surroundings or environment) is thought to be akin to egolessness. Lifestyles of communal ownership (no individual property) and the "vow of poverty" in many monastic traditions may also be intended to make selflessness easier to maintain; that its practitioners may continuously remain in a meditative state of mind.

In some forms of meditation in Asian religions, egolessness is a mental state that is sought after. While at the basic levels, meditation is geared toward relaxation, the practice of advanced meditators may be aimed toward the purpose of dividing one from their awareness of "self," to a certain degree, and for a certain time. The ritual and religious treatment of meditation functions so that the individual learns to take the practice with seriousness; learning to gradually control their degree of relaxation such that undesired and harmful schisms do not occur to the psyche.
From: wikipedia.org