Losing ego or what
If losing ego is what is happening with me now, it is a painful thing. If ego loss is the pain I am feeling, my entire identity must be tied up in ego. If it is true that my ego is diminishing, then I am feeling diminished along with my ego. I don't know where to find myself, or even if I am any longer. Loss of ego doesn't seem to be what it is cracked up to be. Even imagined loss of ego isn't a picnic.
There was a Heavenletter™ that stated firmly that we do not exist, and it was such a wonderful Heavenletter and such a wonderful idea not to exist that I was taken with it. How delightful to not exist. I took my non-existence to be synonymous to being without ego.
Then how come I am feeling lost without ego or with less of it, or what I presume is less of it? Even though I can't seem to locate myself anywhere, enough of my ego must exist to be hanging on to me. How would I feel loss and a vague sort of heartache unless my ego were still alive and kicking?
What is ego anyway? It seems to be a sensitivity. It is like hay fever. Hay fever isn't just sneezing. Hay fever does a number on your whole system. One sneeze, more or less, isn't the whole story.
Then I have to wonder. Is there such a thing as a little ego? Can one only be ego or egoless? Is it all or nothing? Is it possible to get rid of ego cold-turkey, or have I kidded myself that I can ever exist without ego? Have I convinced myself that I am nothing without my ego? Is ego hanging on to me, or am I hanging on to it?
I begin to wonder if I'm really just being swept up into the rising of a new world and I can't grasp what's happening. I only think I'm in the vortex of a tornado. Maybe I'm just experiencing a change in altitude, and I have to get used to it. Maybe I am just flying high and missing the boundaries, as if they, the boundaries, kept me high.
***
After I had written the above with ego proudly at my side, Jack made a post on the Heavenletter Spiritual Community Forum that made me want to throw my essay on ego out the window. After reading Jack's comment, I could only conclude that ego, my ego, wrote my essay above.
On December 15, in response to Heavenletter #3673, The Beat of God's Heart, Jack wrote a comment he entitled Love. Love is what Jack, our friend from Down Under, is about. Jack lives love every day, morning, noon, and night:
Dearest Emilia, Kill Ego?? no I think love Ego same as you love everything else God gives you. LOVING will put ego in a corner and There Ego is forgotten. With love Ego has no job to do and Ego will become love. I do not know if I put this right But That is how I work nowadays. The more Love you give the more you receive and ego is on the dole with nothing to do so it will turn into love as well and consequently regardless of governments I live in paradise surrounded by love Love is the Key to everything keep loving. Love you All, Jack
Beloved Jack, I'm going to take a page from your book from now on. Thank you.
Comments
Gloria, it seems to me that ego is a necessary part to surviving this mess we find ourselves in. But the crucial question becomes, just who is in charge? Yes, ego needs to stand in the corner from time to time, but ego also needs to eat and go for walks and smell the occasional flower along the way. Somewhere in there is a call for balance, not to be confused with equal rights.
Remember that kid you fed sweets to who turned into a demanding, if charming, little monster? Maybe that's a picture of ego unbound and only just started growing.
Beloved Charles, you are wise. Perhaps more wise than you even know. You have given me the perfect way to live with ego. I adored that darling little boy even though I meant nothing to him! He will be my picture of ego from now on, and maybe, just maybe, I can enjoy my ego and not be out of sorts with it. Love first.
For those who may not have read the blog about the little boy, it's called The Little Boy at the Sufi Concert.
Thank you, and God bless you, Charles.
Hey Gloria, Please do not put me on a pedestal. Even if God says ,I am Perfect, I feel far from it. I do get angree at stupidty, but am able to shrug it of and tell myself "DO NOT JUDGE and let go and most of the time I will see something beautiful, just after, THANK YOU GOD. Love to All. JACK
don't worry gloria....you haven't lost you ego.....love..a.....
I've been wondering whether ego is the same as personality. I think it's not possible to live in this world without a personality. I realized this when I lost myself completely after I moved to a foreign country as a young girl, losing all that made up my frame of reference. First I let others create another personality for me, but that was not me! Then I created a personality that I like, though it doesn't quite fit into the society I live in. But in the background, through all this, there's always been pure consciousness, an awareness, what they call 'the observer'. Just like you, Gloria, were the observer of all this chatter and turmoil going on in you.
I heard somewhere about a technique for putting ego to sleep: Just imagine that it is a program open on your computer and reduce it to an ikon, telling it to shut up for a while. It seems to work!
This is very interesting and helpful, cara Paula. Personality = ego, hmm. Makes me think. Thanks for the suggestion.
In The Lord of the Rings, trilogy, after Gandalf comes back, his friends who recognize him call him by the name, Gandalf. He looks confused for a moment. He stops, thinks and then eventually says, "...yes, I used to be called that."
Wow, what comments and writing on this blog. Food for the soul.
The best thing to do when things get turbulent is to listen for God's eternal song. The song helps the mind disassociate with the turbulence.
The comments here are dessert for the soul! Such a healthy dessert. We can live on it.
Dear Gloria, if you are not sure yet if you want to keep your ego or not, ask Santhan to make a backup file of it on Heavenletters.org server.
You're a genius, Normand!
Can't read this wonderful piece often enough. But I wonder, dear Gloria, whether or not you intended it to be funny. I find myself laughing every time, half-afraid it may be totally inappropriate.
Jack's comment is wonderful too. I only hope no one starts trying to love with the i n t e n t i o n to put ego in a corner that way.
Beloved Jochen, what is there to do but laugh!!!
Here is delicious quote from HL #165
"You cannot be solely that anemic creature who pastes color on her face and wanders around aimlessly looking for more make-up and passion in the world. You seek for what you call adventure, but that call is a lure to you to escalate your ego and therefore your departure from the truth of life.
You have a purpose here in the world, and it is not what you have thought. Your purpose is not to get through the world unscathed. Your purpose is to scathe your ego and be done with it and capture My vision. I have work for you to do, and your ego prevents you."
http://www.heavenletters.org/capture-gods-vision.html
And I have to add this piece from the same HL:
"You have been afraid to stray from ego because you mistakenly thought it identified you and that it held you up. It holds up only a tiny per cent of an imagined caricature of you."
Yup.
I am going to add my 2 cents here for what it's worth. Here is how I have come to see ego. Ego is the human part of us is that, in order to protect us, wants to run the show. Ego is basically running on fear and its program wants to keep us safe from everything that might "get us dead" or cause us harm. So ego is the control freak. We have been letting ego run the show for way too long and now it's time to let our spirit, our soul, our Love, God, whatever term suits the individual, do that.
Spirit provides the guidance and we have to teach our ego that they are not out of a job, in fact, their new job is to listen and make Spirit's guidance happen. Ego is the new workhorse while Spirit provides the direction. Someone has to do the work and I've appointed Ego to be the one lol. Ego has gotten me into a whole lot of troublesome situations over the years. Ego tended to tell others how wrong they were and it was much better to do things my way. Ego tried and tried to control my life and everyone in it, and it was not working at all.
And now that I have made a different choice as to who is leading, life is much easier! I ask myself, am I reacting out of fear or the need to control, or is this true guidance? If it is the former, I ask Ego to step aside. And you can always tell by the way you feel inside, tense and turmoil gives notice that Ego is putting itself in the mix while calm and peace and love lets you know that God is guiding.
So, there's my book on it lol. Not sure if I made any sense to others, but I have read and pondered and did a lot of work on myself and this one was a biggie for me. Ego is not allowed to run my show anymore but she sure can help me get to where I have been guided to go!
Hugs,
Dorothy
Beloved Dorothy, wow, you really have handled this little rascal so well! Accolades to you!