Love and Ego

Every path or every yoga demands the entire annihilation of egoism.

– Swami Sivananda

Love and consciousness are one and the same thing. So that as you get into a higher state of consciousness you come closer to being in love. That doesn't mean interpersonal love. It means being - love.

-    Ram Dass

We are so deeply conditioned by this thing we call ego that it is hard to imagine ourselves beyond it.  We live our lives imbedded in a false reality.  When our true self, i.e. love, comes knocking we run for cover.  We are attached to our assumed limitations and one of our greatest defenses is the concept of unworthiness.  More than simply being attached to our bodies, these organic sheaths that we express in and through, we become attached to the narrative of our unique shame, abandonment, loss and suffering.  Another great defense against opening to love is resentment.

Rest assured that as long as we wield these twin defenses we are safe from love’s onslaughts.  Ego, or the identification with a false sense of self, arises out of a basic and equally false sense of separation from our authentic being.  At its most extreme it might be expressed in the saying “Every man for himself.”  Of course, this could also be “Every woman . . .” Attachment and aversion are the primary mechanisms of ego.  We attach to that which gives us comfort and pleasure, we resist that which is painful.  However, in our convoluted strategies we often find comfort in our special sense of pain and suffering.  It all becomes confused.  From a spiritual perspective, it is all suffering because it keeps us separate from the loving awareness at the core of our beings.

As adults we are each responsible for ourselves.  We need to make rational decisions, manage finances, and carefully consider who we allow into our lives.  There is a healthy side to this ego thing!  It is important to have healthy boundaries on the spiritual path.  Too often we surrender to something other than our higher self whether it is a substance, career, games, abusive relationships, ideology, porn, politics or consumerism.  Don’t let your ego be annihilated by a false god.  Life is really just a passing show.  On a deeper, soul level we are simply passing through.  We do our best but we can’t hold onto anything.  As the saying goes, “You can’t take it with you.”  You can, of course, enjoy it for the moment.

Ego, this sense of individualized self-being, is annihilated when we encounter our authentic, transpersonal, Kosmocentric Self.  However there is nothing lost except a false belief.  In truth, we still are unique expressions of that One Mind and Intelligence.  It is the same intelligence which informs the universe and it expresses itself as the evolving creature which is you.  We are creatures of evolving Love-Consciousness-Energy.