Taming Ego

Rule 2: The path to the Truth is a labour of the heart, not of the head. Make your heart your primary guide! Not your mind. Meet, challenge and ultimately prevail over your nafs (ego) with your heart. Knowing your ego will lead you to the knowledge of God.
When I read this rule, I realized that I have never thought about the meaning of ‘Truth’ or how it can be related to the ‘heart’ and more amazingly ‘ego’. I, kind of, assumed that everybody lives in their own reality and that for him/her is the truth. However, this rule compelled me to delve deeper. What is the truth? Is it an incident that happened? A fact? Law of nature? Rational conclusion or conscious reasoning?
In the religious world ‘truth’ has several facets. In Hinduism, it is one supreme reality which is ‘SatChitanand’, meaning it is eternal, all-conscious and blissful. To attain this one reality or ‘truth’ we have to follow the path of ‘Dharma’. ‘Dharma’ or the cosmic laws are for people who want to experience the supreme reality or Truth. In Buddhism ‘Dhamma’ or cosmic law and order has four ‘truths’: dukkham, samudayo, nirodho, magga (unsatisfactory nature, source of suffering, cessation of suffering and path to liberation or Enlightenment of the ultimate truth or reality). These truths pave a way of life to experience supreme truth and thus bringing enlightenment. Christianity says however that the ‘the truth will prevail’: it is the standard by which we all will be judged on the judgement day and those deserving it will go to heaven. Islam says ‘That it is because of Allah, He is the Truth”.  In short, each religion prescribes their way of life or path to the Truth. However, each religion also encourages people to introspect to reach that path.

The believers feel a strange connection between these cosmic laws to live life in the society and attaining insight, awareness and experience of the supreme truth. The supreme surrender to these social and religious laws can either make you a complete fanatic, full of ego and perceived righteousness or a complete humanist. Complete fanatics are those who take pride in their own following of the rules as they know it. What they are doing is right as per their (strict) religious beliefs and laws which makes their ego swell. Their knowledge and their efforts are all towards attaining the truth but they turn into fanatics because instead of feeling everything, instead of introspecting, internalizing and experiencing awareness they only focus on meeting the religious standards outwardly. People who look inwards, however, attain insight. Rational thoughts bring knowledge but a change of heart brings awareness.
Shamz advises to make the heart your primary guide to the path of truth because with your rational mind you can get knowledge and perception but the real awareness of the Truth, deep insights and real happiness comes from experiencing something at a different level. Knowledge of God and his ways are not same as experiencing God. Knowledge of love is not loving.
To truly love one has to completely surrender the self which can be quite something because after all what are we made of but our ‘ego’. This sense of personal identity, this shadow of self, makes a person feel important and hence entitled. Ego distorts and blocks learning and enhancing. Note that Shamz is not saying to destroy it. He is only asking you to prevail over it. Prevailing ego can be tricky because selfless love can be mistaken for fear and cowardliness and then this very ego will start raising its hood for acknowledgement and attention. One of the ways to prevail over ego is to listen to your heart. Your intuition will make you act with complete sincerity and honesty. To get that awareness and change of consciousness from perceived to the Real, one has to prevail over the ego and experience reality from a different place. This shift or transformation in consciousness can only be brought by love, kindness, and compassion in the heart. Meditation and prayers can make you more intuitive and more compassionate.  Slowly insight and awareness of our own being make us to not only know the Truth but also experience it.
I always thought of myself as humble and hence an ‘ego-free’ person. The awareness of me having an enormous ego came very slowly. Slowly I realized how much of ego I had because of my identifying myself with humility and compassion. I also realized that most of my decisions are influenced by my ego. And, although I am quite knowledgeable, the awareness of self, the insight, the intuition was missing. One of the major incidents that brought the change in consciousness has been when I experienced love. It taught me how to prevail over my ego so that the other can feel happy. It also taught me complete surrender. I realized that complete surrender brings complete liberation. You are free from ‘self’ and free from all the negative emotions like greed, blame and jealousy. This shift also made me realize how my ego was not letting me experience and be on the path of the Truth although I had all the theoretical knowledge about it.
Another thing, which has made me act with more sincerity and less ego, is meditation. I feel calm and more grounded after meditation. However, as our sense of identity is closely related to our body, ego will always be there as long as we live. To prevail over it requires constant and conscious efforts. My efforts are not enough but I know that small shifts in my consciousness take place from time to time, making me more calm and happy. Maybe this shift in my consciousness is bringing me closer to the path to the Truth……


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