Today I met my ego, and it wasn’t a pretty sight. I knew it wouldn’t be and I wasn’t surprised,
but it was very interesting and hopefully a step towards healing it and
teaching it its place in my life.
Ego is something we all have. Even the great spiritual leaders who people
claim have no ego have one. The
difference is, theirs is in its rightful place.
It has taken me some time to understand what ego is for and
now I realised it can be seen as being like a pet dog. If it is untrained it will take charge and
rule the roost, but if put into its correct place and trained it will become a
loyal protector.
Just like the mind is for analysis and understanding, but
not for compassion and heart led situations, our ego is to show is that we have
an equal standing in society. It helps
us set boundaries, marking out what is reasonable and what is not. When those boundaries are crossed, like a
guard dog, our ego steps forward assertively defending us.
The problem is, when we are young so is our ego, it is like
a puppy looking to the elder dogs around it for guidance; the elder dogs being
the egos of the people around us while we are growing up. If that puppy is nurtured and shown how to be
it will become our loyal friend; but sadly so many of those elder dogs teach
the wrong lessons just like they were taught when they were growing.
Of course this is all a metaphor, but you can see how it
applies to the world around us. As we
grow up we learn how to use our ego from the situations we find ourselves
in. We may learn from the way our
parents treat others as well as how they treat us. Maybe we are taught that the best way to
survive is to be quiet and submissive to those who have stronger wills than
us. Maybe we learned that if we throw our
weight around we can get what we want.
Whatever we are taught we often move out into the world with an ego that
is already badly taught and is often in charge of our reactions to the world
around us.
Moving from young childhood our world expands and we meet up
with other people who have badly trained egos.
We learn we can either manipulate those that are submissive or we have
to back down to those that are stronger than us. Those of us who are weak may also learn to
hide the weakness and pretend to be braver or stronger. There may also come a time when we become
sick of being trampled on and lash out to assert ourselves. Unfortunately, by this point we have no real
idea how to do this so we make bad choices; just like a dog that has been
kicked too many times our ego causes us to “bite” anyone who comes near us.
By the time we are adults our ego is so confused we can end
up lost in choices that we simply don’t understand. We have no set boundaries and we allow some
to cross them and hurt us and we keep others at arms reach. While we are in control of our lives we can
fool ourselves into thinking our egos are fine, but as soon as we come across
someone that challenges our view of ourselves we can react badly.
Many of us continue with this for the rest of our
lives. For those that have powerful egos
life may appear easy on the surface.
They may get what they want by force, but deep down I wonder how happy
they are.
For those that have learned to hide or submit to stronger
egos it can be hard to find their way through the world. A part of them, deep down, tells them they
are worth more than they could wish for, but the greater life teachings say
that they are worthless and must accept their position.
At this stage I see my ego for what it is and I am simply
learning to accept it. Accept its
perfection as part of who I am and a result of the life I have lived. In time I hope to start teaching this old dog
new tricks in the hope that between us we can find our rightful place in the
scheme of things. It is likely to be a
slow process of understanding, compassion and facing fear and guilt, but in
time I am certain it will be worth it.
Visit my website to learn about my healing practice
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