How well do you know your ego?

"Awareness and ego cannot coexist"

-Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth

I was recently in a conversation with a friend over the phone that didn't feel happy or chummy, but instead felt distant and disconnected. I couldn't tell in the moment where our wires were crossing or if something had happened prior to our call together.  What I did know is that when I hung up the phone, I didn't feel okay. I took my feelings home with me that evening and as I was standing around the counter with my husband and daughter I started to describe what I was going through mentally and emotionally, in that instance. 

“Something happened on the phone today,” I said. “Something happened and I don't know what but I'm trying to figure out what this emotion is I'm feeling. I can't tell if I'm in a shame storm or if my ego is trying to fight with me right now.” Immediately my husband wanted to know the details but they really weren't important, I was certain, and instead of going into those with him, I expressed that what I was coming to the table with wasn't about what happened with my friend, it was about what was happening in me. 

I began to re-tell the the story of the call from my perspective, simultaneously looking for the “ding," at the same time - the moments where what I was saying and what I was feeling were making a connection. The loudest ding, the biggest hit I discovered, was the moment when I was able to identify where the story started to spiral. The moment when, I heard very softly, “it's because you're not worthy of this from me.” Something my friend never said. Something she didn't even imply.  The truth was, I could've had that conversation all by myself. 

The ego is an impressive entity.  With it comes a lifelong relationship we have with our identity, our shame, our doubt and our judgement. This sneaky little sucker is like the epitome of the worst party crasher. It shows up uninvited, never bringing anything, only taking. But the truth is working with the ego is so similar to working with shame. The moment you start to realize its presence, the moment you start to dig into it, it nearly vanishes, leaving nothing but its favor bag behind. “The central core of all your mind activity consists of certain repetitive and persistent thoughts, emotions, and reactive patterns that you identify with most strongly. This entity is the ego itself," Eckart Tolle. 

The second I felt the connection between my thought and my emotion was the second I identified my ego was at play. Doing this allowed me to move beyond the hurt I was holding onto and the ick that'd been with me since we ended the call earlier. But had I not identified how much my ego was involved in my mental spiral that evening, well, I shudder to think about the person I would've shown up to be to my family that night, or frankly, to myself. 

“Who am I” in identity, story, contribution to this, whatever this is. These are the questions and thought-processes that consume us when our ego is at play. They are powerful, and they take us far away from our truths, our core self and the connection we want and crave with other people. It could be the thing getting in between you and your relationship with your spouse, your child, your friend. It could also be the thing getting in the way of your true self. 

“by far the greater part of violence that humans have inflicted on each other is not the work of criminals or the mentally deranged, but of normal, respectable citizens in the service of the collective ego.”

— ECKHART TOLLE, A NEW EARTH