Ego

Martin Buber (1878-1965)

The great trick of living in mindfulness with compassion is wrestling with ego without becoming obsessed with the struggle. I was stirred by Martin Buber's Ich Und Du (I and Thou) when I was a college student, struggling through a very difficult coming out and separation from a dysfunctional family situation. Martin Buber's I-Thou relationship, the ultimate bonding in Love, juxtaposed to the I-It relationships of daily reality without Love, struck a deep chord within me. If there was anything resembling what others called God, it was, I agreed with Buber, rooted in this I-Thou experience.

So much of appreciating the beauty of life entails getting out of your own line of vision. Getting out of you own way.

The baggage of ego is heavy. It takes years of packing and unpacking to accumulate the junk of ego in its cumbersome steamer trunk, slung over shoulders, stooped by its weight. The older the person, the larger the trunk. That is, unless you travel light. Traveling light is one of the keys to mindfulness. Letting go of high school trophies, hard-earned pay-grades, honorific titles. Being, instead of being who you are supposed to be. Ego's weight lies in who you are supposed to be and what you deserve, in your own mind.

Loving in each moment is hard work. Loving yourself at 6 AM with arthritic pains in winter darkness does not come easily without practice. Loving yourself after you have hurt another in anger does not come easily without practice. Loving another who has turned you into an object of scorn or hatred does not come easily without practice. Barricading yourself behind your ego comes quite easily without practice.

I believe that much of what makes up my humanist practice is my struggle with my ego in relationship with the world. My ego may see a mission to change the world. But, my true human nature understands that I may only turn my own mental focus and actions to compassion in each moment with practice. If my own practice is worthy, perhaps, by living it mindfully in each moment, the world may benefit from it.