The ego must go. Die, surrender, you sorry miscreation. Does that sound like love-based awareness? Okay, maybe I exaggerate, but perhaps not all that much according to some things I have heard or read over the years. Focus on the ego as something bad and undesirable does seem to be a common theme encountered along the spiritual path. As with many “truths”, this one is often presented with its share of dogma. Rooting out the nefarious ego has been a long-standing theme of various religions, as well as an interpretation sometimes offered of more contemporary teachings, channeled or otherwise. Enough already with the bad rap given to the ego, I would like to offer another viewpoint.
The ego does not have to surrender. That’s a concept born of duality and imaged through a resulting militaristic consciousness. It’s an example of polarity at its finest. In polarity we name things right and wrong. Then we make the right things good and the wrong things bad. We establish that our ego interferes with our spirituality, so we make spirituality right and good and make ego wrong and bad.
There is nothing out of place, only continual change. The ego has played its part in an evolution of consciousness directed by a profound intention of creation. That intention was to individuate aspects of itself, creating material density while exploring an infinite variety of expressions, and then re-merge the individuated consciousnesses in a self-aware matter form that would then begin a new cycle of creation. Yes, we can have the discussion that there is only a oneness, a wholeness, and that there is no separation in truth. I agree with you, but part of the paradox of how we hold our knowing of the universe is that it is simultaneously individuated and whole. The intention of this article is to bring some focus to the experience of the individuated aspects, and that leads us back to our marvelous companion, the ego.
The ego is a magnificent creation. It is the means by which the individuations could experience their uniqueness and grow and evolve without awareness of the greater reality. For evolutionary purposes these many parts have experienced themselves as separate. Evolution has included experiences within a dualistic consciousness as a means to increase the density of materialization. Duality is now dissolving, but that’s another topic. And why do we find it so necessary to judge what simply is? The ego has been our identity, it has been our sense of who we are, and now we’re supposed to simply discard this great part of ourselves that we have spent eons growing?
I suspect that most everyone reading this article has done much healing work. In healing work we are recovering separated aspects of self and returning to a sense of wholeness. I am not aware of any healing process that is effective without the presence of love. Love knows the way. Love IS the way. To invite an aspect of self to re-merge or transform is to bring to consciousness and release trauma patterns or belief systems that created the sense of separation. So I ask, where’s the love in approaching the ego as if it is something that must be destroyed? Is it any wonder that the ego powerfully seeks to continue its existence when faced with a belief that it must be annihilated? We are all undergoing profound transformation. So is the ego. It is not helpful to this evolution for people to continue to hold a belief that we are trying to get rid of our individuation. That’s precisely what creates the fear that leads to further attachment to the dying structures. It’s a viewpoint that only creates more pain. The ego has alone and vulnerable for a long time, and it has constructed many protections for itself. If what you resist persists, then attempts to push the ego away or call it into submission will only increase its opposition. Love offers another way.
We are not losing our individuation. We are becoming conscious of ourselves as unique aspects of a whole. Some things that have been part of our experience are not going to be taken forward into the new creation, not because they are bad or wrong, but because they’re no longer needed in the same way. This great recycler of a universe has a way of reforming itself in an energetically efficient manner, and the transformation of the ego is a significant part of our story. It is not the elimination of the ego, but is instead a creation of a most profound order. Our individuated self is being asked to participate in this grand story by awakening to the truth that it does not have to carry the burden of feeling alone and solely responsible for everything else. We are being asked to understand that we have the support of the universe, and that our uniqueness is not being ended but rather is being called forth into ever greater forms of expression.
We are grand being(s) experiencing a grand adventure of many chapters. The story never ends and neither do we. Bring your sense of self into the all. Hold it in a place of honor and appreciate all it has maintained for you. Open your heart with gratitude and surround that self with love. Inform that “ego” that it is not alone, nor separate. Hold it peacefully in that field of love. Allow fear to release and grant that self the freedom of choice to experience itself anew. Like other aspects of our individuated being, the ego can release what is no longer needed and become transformed. At some point there is a moment, a moment when you see with new awareness and recognize that myself and thyself have simply become the same.
