Leggo Your Ego

I won't say "all", I won't say "most" and I even won't say "many" but "some" (and here I am being generous) act according to the following:

- "I am in 100% control of my destiny"
- "When things go poorly - it's because someone else has done something wrong
- So it's no wonder I am MAD
- So I will disengage from everyone who is different than me
- I know exactly what is wrong with you, society, the world, the universe - just ask me!

This may come as a shock but . . . . You. Are. Not. God. And you know it.

If you are an atheist, you know there is no God so you couldn't be him/her. If you are a believer you by default believe that someone/something else is God so you couldn't be him/her. If you are a believer who ACTUALLY believes you are God - get medication. No. Really. NOW.

1) You are not in 100% control of your life.

2) Sometimes things are going to go poorly.

3) It is a waste of energy to get angry about 1 and 2

4) So Carry On - Slow and Steady

5) You don't need to have an opinion about EVERYTHING. This may come as another shock but most people aren't interested in your opinion anyway (they are just waiting for you to finish so they can express THEIR opinion)

Richard Rhor in his book "Falling Upward" explains that we spend our adolescence trying on different personas. In my elementary school, you were the class clown, the guy who was REALLY good at kickball or the smart kid. In Junior High you were either a nerd, surfer, soch or hesher. In High School it was either jock, soch, smoker or geek. When you go to college, your persona is further solidified by your major of study.

By early / mid-twenties, you begin adding addenda to your persona by way of a spouse , children, cars, house (and by addenda, I mean your are the jock-engineer who is married, has two kids etc).

The trouble is, while these persona constructs are helpful in adolescence and early adulthood (Rhor says they are a survival mechanism) they are ultimately false. You ARE who God MADE you from birth. This is not to discount lessons, experiences and detours along the way but at the very core, you are not this false persona - you are more than conservative or liberal - more than marathoner or couch potato - more than even a father, mother or spouse - you are an incredibly unique creation of God at your very core.

Unfortunately, it usually takes intense suffering to strip away that false persona - that false ego. God help you if your adult career comes with a recognized label such as "Priest", "Doctor", "Professor" etc. The more you identify yourself to others with a label, the more supernatural help you are going to need to wipe that label away (read "suffering"). And that is where I am at.

I am not God. I confess that I have acted like I was from time to time and occasionally I forget that I am not God still; but more and more I am remembering:

That Figures

We Shall See

Keep Calm and Rock On

Slow and Steady

I Don't Feel Strongly About That

I am trying to leggo my ego.

More opinionated folks may argue that I am quitting - throwing in the towel - despairing out of exhaustion. From where I sit, it is the exact opposite. YES I am exhausted but I am exhausted from pointlessly kicking against goads.

When you go through a period of intense suffering, when you are forced into survival mode for an extended period of time, there is a mental, spiritual and emotional pruning that happens. You find yourself in a sinking ship and you are continually throwing things overboard so that in the end you are left with only that which is truly important to you.

And the truly important to me is not politics, religion or money. For me, the truly important is God (as I understand him) my daughter, my wife, my friends and family and regular old human beings that I randomly encounter every day (as CS Lewis said, "You have never met a mere mortal"). I no longer want lesser things to stand in the way of more important things.

This is not to say that I don't have ANY opinions or that I don't enjoy a good and vigorous debate. It's just that in the increasingly rare moments that I do debate, I am more interested in you proving me wrong than in me proving you wrong.

"As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another" - Proverbs 27:17

Things are going to go wrong today. I am not in 100% control to stop it. So I am learning to Keep Calm, Rock On, Slow and Steady and I don't have the time or energy to have an opinion about every last detail of life.

I am not God. And that's okay.

I don't want to suggest that I have reached some sorta zen-like Buddha calm (do Buddha and zen go together?) because most days I feel more like Michael Douglas in "Falling Down" than Buddha, Jesus or Mother Theresa . . .

But rather than falling down, I am trying to "Fall Up" as Richard Rhor terms it.

I am trying to leggo my ego (and believe me, it's A LOT to let go of).