Ego: edging God out

I have listened to the realm of the Spirit. I have heard my own soul’s voice, and I have remembered that love is the complete and unifying thread of existence.
  —Mary Casey

Who or what is behind your voice today? Is the voice of your gut, your HP, or of your dis-eased ego trying to make you miserable?

These days I am struggling with listening to my ego, who says I should not have quit work; you need the money; you won’t be able to do the things you are used to doing and etc. My dis-ease is trying to make me miserable enough, so that I will either start a fight with my husband, beat the heck out of myself with my imaginary 2×4 or make me more depressed then I already am. I wrote most of this blog a least 10 days ago, but I haven’t been able find the ambition to finish it. In addition, to not working anymore and being semi retired, I have Mononucleosis. The first one is truly a blessing and other not so much. So that is my truth tonight.

Since being sober and having a few 24 hours under my belt, I am now more fully aware of myself and what I am feeling for the most part. I know the difference between voice of  my Higher Power and that of my dis-eased ego. When I was drinking, and probably even in some areas of my sobriety, I used to live in that constant state of dis-ease. Reacting from one situation to the next, never really able to focus and make decisions with planning and forethought. I am thankful today that I am aware of how my ego uses shame to try to make miserable and keep me isolated from others. My ego tells me stories and tall tales to get me to rely on myself and not my God. That is a scary thought and not a good place for to be for this recovering alcoholic.

Being able to be quiet each day has helped me to listen and be more aware of that quiet and subtle voice of my HP; I can only hear if I stop listening to all the world’s distracting, almost constant chatter. As a highly sensitive person, I need the quiet to be able to collect my thoughts and process what is going on in me and around me. Today being present for my life allows me to work Step 10, on a regular basis, “Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.” For many years I was so disconnected from myself that I couldn’t look at how I was reacting to life, let alone see that I had a choice of taking action instead of reacting. However, it is truly like the ‘old timers’ told me “you continue to peel the layers of the onion.” That is so true for me, today more then ever.

Today because I have worked Step 3, “Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him.” I have the awareness of my actions and attitude. I remember when my counselor, Mary, told me that I was finally integrating parts of my life; therefore, I no longer kept parts of me under lock and key so to speak. Another counselor, Maggie, told me that I had to learn how to control my emotions and that I needed to learn how to stop the “ghosts of my past” from ambushing me, making me extremely reactive to life.

Learning to listen to myself, let a lone others, is something I have had to learn and work on. Especially being able to be present for my life and the people I love. My ego has always made me feel good by having me believe that I could fix others; it didn’t matter that I was the one that needed fixing, I always knew I was broke; I just didn’t know how to be fixed. Reading all of those self-help books gave me knowledge, but not the ability to put it into action until I got sober and learned about how sobriety works and that there was a guide for becoming a fully present person, living in the moment, not reliving yesterday or projecting into tomorrow. I have done much counseling with several different professionals, always believing I was being honest, but it wasn’t until I gave up drinking, that I have really been able to be honest with myself and examine my behaviors and dis-ease with my life.

Today I have the tools to be present and to be able to listen to that still small voice inside me that my God of my understanding speaks through. And, I have the courage to challenge my ego and my false interpretations to life.

Pocketful of Miracles, July 20 Seed Thought: Once we have lightened the hold of the ego over us, the intention to fulfil our life’s purpose becomes less a matter of personal identity and more a strong commitment to make the world a better place. Viktor Frankl, a psychiatrist who survived four Nazi death camps, wrote that “a man should not, indeed cannot, struggle for identity in a direct way; he rather finds identity in the extent to which he commits himself to something beyond himself, to a cause greater than himself.”