The other day I received several lovely posts on Facebook that were kind and complimentary. Oh my gosh, that felt so good! I wanted to go back and read them over and over again. I had such a smile on my face that day. And then a little voice inside me whispered, “careful, sister”.
If you’ve ever worked with, lived with, or spent a significant amount of time with someone who has wild mood swings, you know how it feels to be waiting for the next breakdown.
The good times feel so good. When they are happy, you want to just bask in that sunshine. But when they turn the corner and walk into the dark, you want to run and hide.
This is how it feels to live with our egos. The ego is like a crack addict. And the crack it craves is evidence that we are awesome (that we are good, we are worthy, we are right, etc…). Give the ego its crack and the ego is happy. It feels good, even great! So we feel great!
But when all the ego finds is evidence of how we are failing to be awesome, it can be brutal. Even downright abusive. The ego runs around looking for its crack in every nook and cranny of our lives. When it can’t find it, that’s evidence enough that we must be failures. And then, we feel awful.
When you begin to develop awareness of who you are as separate from the ego, you might start to be wary of the ego’s “good times”. Because they are temporary. There could be another dark moment around any corner. Ego might be happy now when you are getting compliments, but it can turn on a dime if you make a mistake.
Take that person in your life with the mood swings. We can’t change them. So we have to learn to maintain our own stable mood while they do their crazy. Similarly if you can maintain some detachment from the ego, you’ll be able to weather the ups and downs without riding the roller coaster.
The only way to combat your ego is to detach from it. EVEN when we are being showered with praise. Sounds nuts, huh? And the less attached to it we are, the easier it is to weather the rough seas.
Besides, who is the ego to decide whether we are awesome or not? If we know it (and I promise you there is nothing but a brilliant and beautiful light at your core), then there are no mood swings to ride. No roller coaster. Just peace and calm and contentment while we watch our hilarious ego do its crazy.