Leggo My Ego

Last week I drafted a post about my ongoing battle with ego.

What began as a dissertation ended up as a diatribe. Surprising? At first, yes. On reflection, I should have seen it coming. Any time my ego is involved, it gets messy. It gets loud. It gets argumentative and angry and defiantly positional. By the end of the piece, ego was firmly at the wheel, driving at breakneck speed for the cliff’s edge and utterly heedless of the damage awaiting it once it hurtled into open space.

Ego works like that. It believes in hurting itself first to save it from being hurt anon. Conversely, it believes in hurting others before they can hurt it. What kind of nonsensical beast is this thing? And why do we give it so much power?

I wish I had the answer. All I have is a theory and a lab experiment with myself as the white rat.

The general consensus among philosophers is that the human condition can be divided into three separate components: body, mind, and spirit. “Body” is fairly obvious, being subject to hard-copy things like biology, environment, pathology, chemicals, and the physical manifestations of mental and emotional stress. “Mind” is the disk operating system which houses both the instinct for survival and the intellect. From what I understand, ego resides in “mind”. “Spirit” is the infinite essence that cannot be seen, but is probably the most important part of our makeup because it’s the one thing we take with us when the compostable container reaches its expiry date. “Spirit” is the life force, the truly eternal part of us that has been and remains the mystery of ages. Many people have devoted lifetimes to its study, trying to pin it down and give it substance and better yet, to figure out where it goes when we die.

Where it goes is less important to me than what it learns while it’s here.

 

One of the bookcases in our house is loaded with the works of Deepak Chopra, Wayne Dyer, Eckhart Tolle and Bruce Weiss (among others), but I let Ter do the heavy lifting. She reads the books, then gives me the highlights. We discuss, and if what I hear makes sense to me, I apply the principle du jour and see what happens. One of the goodies of late has been the subject of ego.

 

I’ve always known that ego is ridiculously fragile. What I never understood was why. How can something so brash and confident and smartypants witty be shattered or enraged by an offhand comment?

I think now that it’s fear.

Ego is always afraid – of loss, of disdain, of criticism, of failure, of disappointment, of poverty, of conflict, of death. Ego is road rage and cyber-bullying. Ego is impatience and intolerance. Ego is excess and extreme, and the misguided notion that the more you have, the more important (therefore the more viable) you are. Ego looks back in anger and forward with anxiety; ego is addiction and frustration, feelings of inadequacy and of superiority. Ego is absolutely the most paradoxical, self-destructive element in the mortal makeup. At its best, it monitors and mobilizes to keep us safe and society running smoothly. At its worst, it will literally kill itself and others merely to make a point.

How do I know all this? I’ve lately been observing my own behaviour. Fortunately, my ego restricts itself pretty much to internal putdowns and shots aimed at my self-esteem. These are designed to keep me static and thus spare my ego the risk of ridicule or a face plant – or success, for that matter. Better to be safe than sorry, right? At least it has never committed wilful acts of violence just to prove a point. I have been known, however, to raise my voice when my point (therefore my ego) is being challenged. I do, occasionally, lash out in reflexive anger at someone who does something I judge to be stupid, dangerous, or just plain inconsiderate. I also, on occasion, take it out on friends and family members, but I usually realize the error of my ways and apologize … though that may have more to do with being Canadian than being enlightened. Oh, and about being enlightened? Ego will proudly announce to the world that “I Am Enlightened” and expect some sort of awestruck adulation from those it deems to be less so. I don’t consider myself to be more enlightened than anyone else. I’m still learning. We are all still learning. I reckon when we’ve learned it all, we’ll be done with this gig and I’m not there yet.

Nowhere near, in fact.

My intention is for Comfortable Rebellion to be a welcoming place of creativity, positive energy, and Ru-mination. It may be argued that ego prompted me to start the blog and that’s fine. It’s not the truth, but I won’t belabour it. We are each free to think and believe as we will, with no undue pressure to accept the opposing view of another. I am more aware of this now than ever – so much so that when considering which photo to match with this post, I remembered the chalked message I had seen and snapped on a morning flânerie some weeks ago:

“FIND FREEDOM”

Freedom from ego, and from the fear that drives it, is a darned good place to start.

With love,