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Overcoming Ego
by Wayne Dyer
In The Fire from
Within, Carlos Castaneda hears these words from his sorcerer teacher:
“Self-importance is man’s greatest enemy. What weakens him is feeling
offended by the deeds and misdeeds of his fellow man. Self-importance
requires that one spend most of one’s life offended by something or
someone.” This is a major impediment to connecting to intention; you can
all too easily create a no match here.
Basically, your feelings
of self-importance are what make you feel special, so let’s deal with
this concept of being special. It’s essential that you have a strong
self-concept and that you feel unique. The problem is when you
misidentify who you truly are by identifying yourself as your body, your
achievements and your possessions. Then you identify people who have
accomplished less as inferior and your self-important superiority causes
you to be constantly offended in one way or another. This
misidentification is the source of most of your problems, as well as
most of the problems of humankind. Feeling special leads us to our
self-importance. Castaneda writes later in his life, many years after
his initial emergence into the world of sorcery, about the futility of
self-importance. “The more I thought about it, and the more I talked to
and observed myself and my fellow men, the more intense the conviction
that something was rendering us incapable of any activity or any
interaction or any thought that didn’t have the self as its focal
point.”
With the self as a focal
point, you sustain the illusion that you are your body, which is a
completely separate entity from all others. This sense of separateness
leads you to compete rather than cooperate with everyone else.
Ultimately, it’s a no match with Spirit and becomes a huge obstacle to
your connection to the power of intention. In order to relinquish your
self-importance, you’ll have to become aware of how entrenched it is in
your life. Ego is simply an idea of who you are that you carry around
with you. As such, it can’t be surgically removed by having an egoectomy!
This idea of who you think you are will persistently erode any
possibility you have of connecting to intention.
Seven Steps for overcoming
ego’s hold on you
Here are seven suggestions to help you transcend ingrained ideas of
self-importance. All of these are designed to help prevent you from
falsely identifying with the self-important ego.
1. Stop being offended.
The behavior of others isn’t a reason to be immobilized. That which
offends you only weakens you. If you’re looking for occasions to be
offended, you’ll find them at every turn. This is your ego at work
convincing you that the world shouldn’t be the way it is. But you can
become an appreciator of life and match up with the universal Spirit of
Creation. You can’t reach the power of intention by being offended. By
all means, act to eradicate the horrors of the world, which emanate from
massive ego identification, but stay in peace. As A Course In Miracles
reminds us: “Peace is of God, you who are part of God are not at home
except in his peace.” Being offended creates the same destructive energy
that offended you in the first place and leads to attack, counterattack
and war.
2. Let go of your need
to win. Ego loves to divide us up into winners and losers. The
pursuit of winning is a surefire means to avoid conscious contact with
intention. Why? Because ultimately, winning is impossible all of the
time. Someone out there will be faster, luckier, younger, stronger and
smarter and back you’ll go to feeling worthless and insignificant.
You’re not your winnings
or your victories. You may enjoy competing and have fun in a world where
winning is everything, but you don’t have to be there in your thoughts.
There are no losers in a world where we all share the same energy
source. All you can say on a given day is that you performed at a
certain level in comparison to the levels of others on that day. But
today is another day, with other competitors and new circumstances to
consider. You’re still the infinite presence in a body that’s another
day (or decade) older. Let go of needing to win by not agreeing that the
opposite of winning is losing. That’s ego’s fear. If your body isn’t
performing in a winning fashion on this day, it simply doesn’t matter
when you aren’t identifying exclusively with your ego. Be the observer,
noticing and enjoying it all without needing to win a trophy. Be at
peace and match up with the energy of intention. And ironically,
although you’ll hardly notice it, more of those victories will show up
in your life as you pursue them less.
3. Let go of your need
to be right. Ego is the source of a lot of conflict and dissention
because it pushes you in the direction of making other people wrong.
When you’re hostile, you’ve disconnected from the power of intention.
The creative Spirit is kind, loving and receptive; and free of anger,
resentment or bitterness. Letting go of your need to be right in your
discussions and relationships is like saying to ego, “I’m not a slave to
you. I want to embrace kindness and I reject your need to be right. In
fact, I’m going to offer this person a chance to feel better by saying
that she’s right and thank her for pointing me in the direction of
truth.”
When you let go of the
need to be right, you’re able to strengthen your connection to the power
of intention. But keep in mind that ego is a determined combatant. I’ve
seen people willing to die rather than let go of being right. I’ve seen
people end otherwise beautiful relationships by sticking to their need
to be right. I urge you to let go of being right. I urge you to let go
of this ego-driven need to be right by stopping yourself in the middle
of an argument and asking yourself, “Do I want to be right or be happy?”
When you choose the happy, loving, spiritual mode, your connection to
intention is strengthened. These moments ultimatley expand your new
connection to the power of intention. The universal Source will begin to
collaborate with you in creating the life you were intended to live.
4. Let go of your need
to be superior. True nobility isn’t about being better than someone
else. It’s about being better than you used to be. Stay focused on your
growth, with a constant awareness that no one on this planet is any
better than anyone else. We all emanate from the same creative life
force. We all have a mission to realize our intended essence; all that
we need to fulfill our destiny is available to us. None of this is
possible when you see yourself as superior to others. It’s an old saw,
but nonetheless true: We are all equal in the eyes of God. Let go of
your need to feel superior by seeing the unfolding of God in everyone.
Don’t asses others on the basis of their appearance, achievements,
possessions and other indices of ego. When you project feelings of
superiority, that’s what you get back, leading to resentments and
ultimately hostile feelings. These feelings become the vehicle that
takes you farther away from intention. A Course In Miracles addresses
this need to be special and superior: Specialness always makes
comparisons. It is established by a lack seen in another, and maintained
by searching for and keeping clear in sight, all lacks it can perceive.
5. Let go of your need
to have more. The mantra of the ego is more. It’s never satisfied.
no matter how much you achieve or acquire, your ego will insist that it
isn’t enough. You’ll find yourself in a perpetual state of striving and
eliminate the possibility of ever arriving. Yet in reality, you’ve
already arrived and how you choose to use this present moment of your
life is your voice. Ironically, when you stop needing more, more of what
you desire seems to arrive in your life. Since you’re detached from the
need for it, you find it easier to pass it along to others, because you
realize how little you need in order to be satisfied and at peace.
The universal Source is
content with itself, constantly expanding and creating new life, never
trying to hold on to its creations for its own selfish means. It creates
and lets go. As you let go of ego’s need to have more, you unify with
that Source. You create, attract to yourself and let it go, never
demanding that more come your way. As an appreciator of all that shows
up, you learn the powerful lesson St. Francis of Assisi taught: “ ... it
is in giving that we receive.” By allowing abundance to flow to and
through you, you match up with your Source and guarantee that this
energy will continue to flow.
6. Let go of
identifying yourself on the basis of your achievements. This may be
a difficult concept if you think you are your achievements. God writes
all the music, God sings all the songs, God builds all the buildings,
God is the source of all your achievements. I can hear your ego loudly
protesting. Nevertheless, stay tuned to this idea. All emanates from
Source. You and that Source are one. You’re not this body and its
accomplishments. You are the observer. Notice it all; and be grateful
for the abilities you’ve been given, the motivation to achieve and the
stuff you’ve accumulated. But give all the credit to the power of
intention, which brought you into existence and which you’re a
materialized part of. The less you need to take credit for your
achievements and the more connected you stay to the seven faces of
intention, the more you’re free to achieve and the more will show up for
you. It’s when you attach yourself to those achievements and believe
that you alone are doing all of those things that you leave the peace
and the gratitude of your Source.
7. Let go of your
reputation. Your reputation is not located in you. It resides in the
minds of others. Therefore, you have no control over it at all. If you
speak to 30 people, you will have 30 reputations. Connecting to
intention means listening to your heart and conducting yourself based on
what your inner voice tells you is your purpose here. If you’re overly
concerned with how you’re going to be perceived by everyone, then you’ve
disconnected yourself from intention and allowed the opinions of others
to guide you. This is your ego at work. It’s an illusion that stands
between you and the power of intention. There’s nothing you can’t do,
unless you disconnect from the power source and become convinced that
your purpose is to prove to others how masterful and superior you are
and spend your energy attempting to win a giant reputation among other
egos. Do what you do because your inner voice – always connected to and
grateful to your Source – so directs you. Stay on purpose, detach from
outcome and take responsibility for what does reside in you: your
character. Leave your reputation for others to debate; it has nothing to
do with you. Or as a book title says: What You think of me Is None of My
Business!
Excerpted from The
Power of Intention: Learning to Co-create Your World Your Way
Dr. Wayne W. Dyer is the renowned
bestselling author of 15 books of nonfiction and three textbooks and has
a doctorate in counseling psychology. He lectures across the country and
appears regularly on radio and television.
http://www.drwaynedyer.com/home/
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