Recently a woman asked me a question which I would like to write to you about: “I know that I have a lot of ego. I realize this again and again. I am proud of what I am doing and what I have done and actually of myself. My Guru’s teachings say that you need to reduce your ego but I just don’t know how?”
I answered that the fact that she asks this question already showed that it cannot be too bad with her ego. The main point is that people with a lot of ego would never think that they might have too much ego.
In a bit more serious consideration I told her however that there is a thin line in between healthy pride and too much ego. Everybody needs some ego and everybody should be proud of himself. Without ego or pride you cannot survive. You cannot exist without ego because you need your ego to identify yourself.
I always find it interesting to hear stories about Gurus who tell their disciples to leave their entire ego behind. This kind of advice is usually accompanied by a sentence like ‘Trust on me, your guru, and follow my words’. Don’t think yourself, don’t do what you think is good but do what your guru says. Don’t be proud, in the consequence, of what you did but of what your guru said and did.
If you look at the gurus though, you will notice that they are among the most egoistic people whom you have ever met. It is a very practical concept for the guru, don’t you think? You are supposed to diminish your complete ego and pride while he can glow in self-approval and his whole glory. The idea that you should not have ego is based on the thought that you are not better than anybody else. Those gurus however act directly against this thought because they always are higher than their disciples! In religions, scriptures and from gurus you will always hear that you should not have ego. It is good for them, for their posts and for their work that disciples don’t have ego or even self-confidence because it strengthens their ego.
I actually told only recently in one of my lectures that you should increase your ego instead! Increase it until you say ‘I am God’. This is the highest amount of ego that you can reach, right? And there you are again: I am that. You are that source that you come from, you are that! Tat Tvam Asi, the Vedanta Philosophy, has a lot to do with the idea of ego, too. You can increase your ego until this point and at the same time see that everyone around you is God, too.
Related posts
कृपया ग्लानि न करें यदि किसी की कल्पना करके आपका खड़ा अथवा गीली हो जाए
Bitte haben Sie kein schlechtes Gewissen, wenn Sie eine Erektion bekommen oder nass werden, weil Sie sich jemanden vorstellen
Please don’t feel guilty if you get erection or wet by imagining someone
Meine Beziehung zu meinem Vater
My relationship with my father
पिता के साथ मेरा सम्बन्ध
Neues Kapitel im Leben, Herausforderungen und Lektionen
New chapter in life, challenges and lessons
I agree with every word here, and I think that with the knowledge of self-identity with Spirit that you talk about, there arises more love of others, as one knows that all are of the same Spirit. Gurus often want to encourage disciples to think that they are far from such self-knowledge, because if the student already has that self-knowledge, what would they need the guru for? I remember I once went to see a very famous guru on a hot summer day in a church. The church was not air conditioned, so disciples arranged two giant fans on the stage aimed full blast at the guru. There were no other fans there, so everyone in the audience was hot and uncomfortable. I know that even though I may be far from Buddhahood, even if I was just there as a lecturer, my natural tendency would be to share the comfort of the fans with everyone, not hoard it all for myself. That told me that while the guru was a skilled speaker, he could not be very enlightened, because if he knew himself as Spirit, his love would lead him to share the comfort with others, not divide himself off as superior and therefore deserving of all the comfort. If Spirit is love in essence, those with self-knowledge as Spirit would naturally shine out this love to others around them, it seems to me. It also made me wonder how transcendent of the body this guru could really be, if he couldn’t even stand to deal with a little heat while speaking to the audience that day.
What would a person be who has no ego at all? It would mean ‘I’ doesn’t exist. That person would never talk of himself and never even think of himself. As you said, it would be impossible to survive because without ego you would only feed others, never yourself. You would only clothe others, never yourself.I, my, me, that all would be banned from that person’s vocabulary.
Impossible and not healthy!
Of course it is good to be humble – but only with others who are humble, too! You have to meet the other one on his level. If he is high, make yourself stand high, too. If he is low, you can go low, too. Just never go higher or lower than others. This is my way of living and it has worked nicely for me up to this date.Thank you Swami Ji for writing about the ego in another way than I have read before.
I had to laugh at your example. That is so funny behaviour, isn’t it? You might think that an enlightened soul would not have the need anymore to be in so many ways higher, better, more valued. The fact that they do show that they have not at all got rid of their ego themselves… funny world in which people have the need for belonging to such personalities.
Right and through this, ego just becomes a normal part of all of us which we can accept as it is. A healthy part of us 🙂
I think it is never good to be over-humble, to show yourself like crawling by the feet of someone. You need your self-respect, too. You can have respect for someone but always need to keep respect for yourself, too.Thank you Steve for commenting!
Ramona, Maybe the saddest part of the story is that most there would not at all get the humor and absurdity of this, and it makes perfect sense to them to aim two giant fans on the stage going full blast at the guru, while everyone else in the audience sits there sweating. I’m grateful to be blessed with the common sense and powers of observation to be able to see through that and also to be able to laugh about it with you.
True, there are people who think this is just how it should be 🙂
These are such good points.I do find it weird and unatural to think of leaving your entire ego behind, and to put your trust completely in someone else, especially if you barely know them. I think what we need to do is learn the ways of our ego and personality so we can understand why we act the way we do, and then be able to change something if this is what we want.
It’s very true… many gurus have the biggest egos of all! They may have a lot of spiritual knowledge or awareness, but it doesn’t make them any “better” than their followers. Everyone offers a unique contribution to the universe, no matter what level of consciousness they are at.
That is one thing that is very impressive about Swami Ji! He realizes that he is just a human like everyone else. He desires to share his love and knowledge with others as a friend, not a master. This is very admirable, Swami Ji. I hope other gurus can learn from you!