What is the ego?
The ego is almost everything we know and consider to be real. It is:
- Me, including everything good and bad about me
- My thoughts, beliefs and mental images
- My personal will, intentions and desires
- My ideas of God, morality, reality and truth
- All emotions
- All perceptions
- The known world and universe of objects
- My relationships with others
- Birth and death and nearly everything in-between
It seems that life without all of this is no life at all. Or at best, it is life in a meaningless void. These words—no life at all, and meaningless void—are a perfect description of the ego’s idea of what exists beyond itself.
It is true that what most humans seek as God, truth, Heaven, Nirvana, etcetera does not exist, but that is because we are currently limited to the ego’s point of view. In order to discover what truth really is, we need to let go of:
- Me, including everything good and bad about me
- My thoughts, beliefs and mental images
- My personal will, intentions and desires
- My ideas of God, morality, reality and truth
- All emotions
- All perceptions
- The known world and universe of objects
- My relationships with others
- Birth and death and everything in-between
Where do we start?
Most of us start with what causes our own suffering. It’s the easiest place to start. When we feel a twinge or stab of pain, we can look at our own ideas in the moment and find a piece of ego waiting to be let go. But eventually we will learn that in order to transcend the self and realize ultimate truth, we must let go of more than our suffering. We need to let go of anything that isn’t true—anything and everything that comes and goes—in order to realize the one eternal reality, which is the only actual truth.
This is well stated in A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 189, paragraph 7:
Simply do this: Be still, and lay aside all thoughts of what you are and what God is; all concepts you have learned about the world; all images you hold about yourself. Empty your mind of everything it thinks is either true or false, or good or bad, of every thought it judges worthy, and all the ideas of which it is ashamed. Hold onto nothing. Do not bring with you one thought the past has taught, nor one belief you ever learned before from anything. Forget this world, forget this course, and come with wholly empty hands unto your God.
I can be free of suffering today
“Be glad today! Be glad!” Gladness is the best way to walk this path. It is also possible to drag one’s feet and cling to the unreal as if it is a prized possession, but that will not change the fact that you are on the journey to truth now. It will only make the journey longer and harder.
Be glad! Choose the easy path of joyously letting go of anything that you recognize as ego. In the words of Peace Pilgrim, make it a “quick relinquishment.”
The faster you let go of something, the easier awakening is. The longer you hold onto something, the more it hurts. In that way, awakening is like a great big game of Hot Potato.
Interestingly, even though awakening can be fairly easy, most people choose to make it hard. That is simply because of the value we put on that which has no value at all.
Meditation Options
