How to recognize your ego vs. your soul.
Just as you need your fear for basic human survival, you also need your ego to provide you with the fundamental outlines of selfhood - to help you proclaim your individuality, define your desires, understand your preferences, and defend your borders. Your ego is what makes you who you are. Without one, you’re nothing but an amorphous blob.
But do not let your ego totally run the show, or it will shut the show down. Your ego is a wonderful servant, but it makes a terrible master, because the only thing your ego ever wants is reward, reward, and more reward. And since there’s never enough reward to satisfy it, your ego will always be disappointed. Left unmanaged, that kind of disappointment will rot you from the inside out. An unchecked ego is what Buddhists call “a hungry ghost,” forever famished, eternally howling with need and greed. We all have that lunatic presence, living deep within out guts, that refuses to ever be satisfied with anything.
Here is your saving grace, though: you are not only an ego; you are also a soul. Your soul doesn’t care about reward or failure. It is not guided by dreams of praise or fears of criticism. Your soul, when you tend to it, is a far more expansive and fascinating source of guidance that your ego will ever be, because your soul desires only one thing: wonder.
So learn to recognize your ego when dissatisfaction emerges: “Oh, there’s my ego! There you are, old friend!” Say the same thing to yourself when you’re being criticized and you notice yourself reacting with outrage, heartache, or defensiveness. Watch your heated emotions carefully, but try not to take them too seriously, because it’s merely your ego that has been wounded - never your soul. It’s merely your ego that wants revenge, or to win the argument or the prize, or to be righteously indignant because you didn’t get the outcome you wanted.
At such times, ask your soul, “And what is it that you want, dear one?”
The answer is always the same: “More wonder, please.”
~ adapted from Elizabeth Gilbert
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