Awareness of Ego and a Re-Frame
Hello dear reader,
For a local paper here in the Monadnock region of Southern New Hampshire, I wrote a monthly Interfaith Soul Food column for about a year—this was the column published on November 15, 2016 (thank you to Facebook memories for reminding me of it again.) If you cannot read the text in the picture, you can read it in a bigger font here.
I still practice keeping aware of my ego, but I recently read the below from Jennifer O Conghalaigh, Shamanic Healer, Writer, and Passionate Sacred Feminine Advocate, which offers a reframe on ego, more in keeping with this era of the Rising of the Divine Feminine. (The bolding is from me.)
Ego from a Goddess Lens of Reality
…So if you're a woman and you're aligning yourself with the concept of ego as being a fundamental truth of human nature, I'd say look deep within yourself to see if you truly resonate with this concept borne from a patriarchal lens.
We have forgotten other ways based in the indigenous Dreamtime cultures. We have forgotten other realms of being, other realms of seeing.
From a Celtic druidess perspective there does not exist such a troublesome identification with the self or the ego. Because it was truly known that the self is like a tree. It's solitary yet connected to everything. It's rooted yet seeking above.
…In truth, there is no such thing as ego. It wasn't a concept handed down on high that we all must bow down to.
It's simply a human tool for understanding ones self in the last era of time, and like many things from the last era of time, it is no longer relevant to our current state of evolution. [This is me, Camilla, writing between the brackets: Don’t you love how everywhere you look, you read something about how we’re living in a different era now?! And you know which era I’m going to say it is 😉 the RDF.]
Ego could be interpreted to mean the self which believes it is separate, or the self which believes dark and light aren't one. But there is a paradox to embody here. The greatest paradox is that the dark ultimately serves the light, that duality only ever serves our cosmic alchemy into unity. [Me again: I so appreciate the fact that we’re all born out of the darkness of the womb, similar to how a seed germinates in the darkness of Mother Earth before it sprouts up towards the light. “And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”―Anais Nin. All this to say we need both the darkness and the light; the yin and the yang; the masculine and the feminine; and may we create more sacred partnerships and make more aware choices to utilize whatever may work in different times and places.]
All wisdom comes from embodying paradox. That's why the notion that a great intellect is one that can hold two opposing ideas simultaneously. It's why the Sphinx speaks in riddles.
Because ironically, it's only when we are fully devoted to expanding the self that we can serve others. It serves no one to play small. Quite the opposite.
...I want the female shamanic consciousness returned because I love this earth, and because it's the wisdom from behind the veil that is needed now. Some people can see this and some are completely blind to it, and there's not a damn thing you can do, but you CAN drop old concepts for yourself.
The concept of ego is from the mind. To place concepts from the mind onto the soul is like trying to tame that which doesn't need to be tamed, and it stifles the flowering.
So drop the old. Create new concepts that reflect our expanded new reality. This era of time is about making the great journey from the mind to the heart. [Me again: AND we need BOTH our minds and our hearts!]
***Next time you feel compelled to judge yourself or another as being in "ego", ask yourself if you are looking from the eyes of the heart and soul, or from the eyes of the mind.***
The soul sees through the eyes of love. It is all love, because love is the highest miracle of creation and where we all return to.
Perhaps time and place also play a role… perhaps we get to choose which paradigm will work in different situations: the dominant hierarchical paradigm of the past 4,000 years of Power Over which involves strong ego-identification, versus the more circular paradigm of Power With which involves cooperation and collaboration—which has always existed in indigenous spiritual traditions, but which has been suppressed for far too long. Perhaps we need BOTH paradigms, and we get to choose which may be best in each different circumstance. But first we need to honor what has been repressed and suppressed, before we make our own species extinct.
~
English born teacher of the practice of cultivating the Mythic Imagination and author Sharon Blackie, PhD wrote, If Women Rose Rooted: A Life-Changing Journey to Authenticity and Belonging (September Publishing, UK, 2019) which became a bestseller by word of mouth.
Sharon Blackie writes about the Eco-Heroine’s Journey in contrast to the well-known Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey:
The Eco-Heroine’s Journey which we’ve followed in this book is a path to understanding how deeply enmeshed we are in the web of life on this planet. In many ways, it is an antidote to the swashbuckling action-adventure that is the Hero’s Journey: it is a woman’s journey, based on a woman’s way of being in the world.
This path forces us first to examine ourselves and the world we live in, to face up to all that is broken and dysfunctional in it and in our own lives. Then it calls us to change – first ourselves, and then the world around us. It leads us back to our own sense of grounded belonging to this Earth, and asks us what we have to offer to the places and communities in which we live. Finally, it requires us to step into our own power and take back our ancient, native role as its guardians and protectors. To rise up rooted, like trees.