On the Way:  Remember

Don’t let ego scare you with old stories.

Most nonsense happens unconsciously – since ego is a construct that rewrites our thinking and our behaviour to hide our own inner truth from us, to ‘spare us pain’.

Remember not to cave in to the inner bully, and not listen to inner heckling.

- to stop resorting to deals

- to let yourself be guided by the moment; not to set up defences, or strategies, but remain open-minded, trusting your feelings to keep you safe

- not to go into an inner huddle with yourself (i.e. with your ego) or an outer one with others, to mutter darkly about people’s behaviour; not to dwell in an alienated way on tricky situations

- to notice the warning signs – the coloured flags – that tell us ‘Get out of here!’ ‘Bad smell!’ ‘Untrustworthy motives’ – ‘no chance of satisfaction here’.

Once we become aware of our own inner alarm system, bullying or manipulative people see themselves out.

Remember that ego is always on the lookout for a likely ‘in’. Any hurt we feel, any sense of injury, attracts ego. When we feel put out by someone’s insensitivity or other behaviour, we must be particularly on guard for any mischievous, ego-inspired nonsense in our own minds, offering to ‘be our champion’ or ‘help us out’.

At first, while we are learning to dismantle our ego constructs, we can’t help feeling hurt by, or reacting to others’ misbehaviour towards us, until the pain and the reactions cease by themselves - which they do eventually, or even soon, if we don’t allow our ego to dwell on them.

What we feel at these times of injury is the true cost of destructive, ego-ruled behaviour, be it malicious or (more often) oblivious.

We need to remember that ego will do what it can to inflate the bill - amplify our sense of injury, our inner distress.

But by standing firm and footing the bill for another’s self-betrayal, by registering its true cost (without ego extras) in our own bodies*, and not passing it on to someone else to pay, we free ourselves from ego’s control of our lives.

Once this 'feeling bill' has been paid – i.e. once we’ve felt it, and let it go - we can walk out of the Misery Diner, knowing, in our bodies, not to walk back in.

*We feel things in our bodies – our bodies and our minds work together, and are inseparable.

As we learn not to entertain ego, in others or in ourselves, other people’s ego-tinged nonsense comes to bother us less, and thus to cost us less – until we barely notice it, just step instinctively away and turn to something else.

Remember to pack up the Punch and Judy - and the pulpit.

When inner arguments start, when we start imagining scenarios where we say this, and so-and-so has to listen, etc. – this is ego having a fling. It’s as if we have a puppet theatre in our minds, where ego likes to replay scenes that have bugged us, stirring us up and drawing us away from our Heartland.

Don’t let ego chew on it.

Refrain – disengage – step away, return to neutral. Remember to ask for help with this. We don’t have to do it unaided – help is available. Once we are calm again, clarity can come, and our next step can emerge, naturally - free of ego heroics and strategy.

Do what feels easy, what calls you – what raises your energy, your enjoyment levels. Follow your joy.

Don’t do what feels futile and frustrating, what brings you down or drains your energy – don’t do what feels like pushing against resistance.

Follow the counsels of ease and enjoyment, rather than of self-perfection, of ‘virtue’ and ‘righteousness’.

Remember: it is in myself that anything that troubles me originates. When I think someone else is bugging me, I need to look closer, and notice ego’s involvement in my thoughts. I need to spot and stop this.

artist: Karen Chivero

When things feel difficult or tricky, I need to make sure I stay on my own side. The dynamics of self-betrayal are subtle. I may accept a will-weakening longing for false comforts – for stones to throw, for a sense of righteous injury, or I may give way to old fears and self-doubt.

When I catch myself giving in to such ego-sponsored impulses, I need to not beat myself up but just spot and stop it – with the natural amusement that comes with catching myself – or my ego - in the act.

All I need to do is go on, gently – not arousing fears, not scaring myself; not trying to hasten things along or fend things off – just taking each next step as it comes.