Ego VS Self ~ Who's Driving? ~Serenity Wellness Podcast E76

Hi there,

Welcome to episode 76 ego versus self.

Happy to have you here with me and I hope that you're enjoying some of the reflection time on the life roles that you've taken on.

In developing the categories with your environmental,

Situational,

And personal aspects that led to the life roles that you have,

You might have noticed certain feelings or emotions come up.

It's quite common that when people start to tune in to awareness there and try to write down and own their things,

The aspects of their life that have created maybe difficulty or pain,

They will at times discount it.

They'll almost convince themselves not to put it on the list,

Telling themselves that other people have it worse or maybe it wasn't so bad.

And they'll even do that for things like trauma or socioeconomic status We have a lot of differences in our educational and socioeconomic status and what it leads to in terms of opportunity for people.

And sometimes people will have a hard time identifying how much that impacts them.

In the process,

You might have also noticed some of the feelings that come along with reflection and in that even how it feels in your body.

The body sensations can feel different depending on the emotion or the person.

It can feel like pain,

Stagnation or numbing.

It might even feel like a bit of tingling sensation or warmth or coolness.

The more we tune in,

The more we can feel.

But in the process,

Just noticing,

Becoming aware of not only what you wrote down,

But also how you feel emotionally and in your body.

Today I'm going to talk with you a little bit more about this.

We're gonna look more at those theaters and what does it have to do with our ego versus ourself?

The theaters.

Home,

Community,

School and workplace.

Within these,

There's even theaters within the theaters.

So our home,

We might have certain costumes or masks we wear depending on the person that we're around or the circumstance or situation.

We might have a certain relationship and communication with our partners or loved ones that make us not feel safe in talking about how we feel.

Or we might have hesitation even in sharing emotions with our children.

So often people will explain to me how their children have never seen them cry or work through frustration or that when they were a child,

They never saw their parents cry or work through emotion or show affection,

Like even holding a hand or hug.

So we might put on all these different masks and all these different costumes and flip them around.

Even within the theater,

There are theaters.

If you look at these and just imagine for a moment all the different theaters within the theaters in your own life.

In the community,

People will flip-flop to who they really are.

Become that chameleon in the workplace and for those in school as well.

So the theaters and who we become,

Is it ourselves or do we start to step outside of ourself?

These are just some aspects of ego versus self.

It would take me a series of several,

Several hours of your time to really dive into everything.

But I think that this,

And I'm going to break these down for you,

Will give you a general but enough beyond general so that you can have reflection and awareness of self.

The more we move into that self,

The more abundance we find in our life,

The more gratitude we have for every day and the less we get into almost like a battlefield,

A control aspect of everything in our lives and around our lives.

The first two,

Outward recognition versus inward appreciation.

When we're doing outward recognition,

It's where we will often try to look for that acknowledgement from others.

Or we need to have others tell us that what we have done meets this,

That or the other.

Like that genuine,

I cannot find the word that I'm looking for that starts with an A.

It's not acknowledgement,

Although that's a part of it.

It's a little bit more than that.

It's like we will look outside ourselves as a check-in to see if we're doing okay.

Sometimes people will get into surveying,

For example.

They'll want to make a decision or they'll have completed a project or something they're working on and they'll survey out.

They'll ask a bunch of people how they did or what they think instead of this inward appreciation and the inward seeking of approval.

Approval,

There's the word I was looking for.

So the outward recognition,

Seeking approval from others outside of ourselves.

And again,

Sometimes we can get into surveying as like five or six different people.

And it will even be a decision about something like what color they want to paint their walls.

The walls in the home that they are living in every day,

That maybe these other five people,

Who knows if they'll ever even step inside of there.

But they'll seek outside surveying to figure out even a decision such as that.

We can also do this when we have again completed a project or really worked hard on something.

And it's where we will get into that mental filter almost or perfectionist thinking,

Where we might get four feedbacks that are really positive,

One that's maybe not as positive,

And we'll focus just on that one.

Because we're so outward seeking,

We are looking for that approval from something outside of ourselves.

Versus the inward appreciation,

We're noticing our own strength,

We're noticing our own capability,

And we have self-approval.

We recognize that not everyone who we come across in our life is going to even like us.

And that's okay.

As long as we're living our life in a way of genuineness with no intention or ill will of harm towards anyone,

Sometimes energy and personalities just don't mesh.

There's no right or wrong about it.

But when we're outward seeking approval,

We lose sight of ourselves.

We'll try to become something outside of ourselves because we don't appreciate the core of who we are.

We will try to blend and mold so that others will appreciate us,

And then maybe we can start appreciating self.

And you can see if you think about that,

What a drastic difference.

Every day if we're in that ego category,

We're not even sure how we're going to feel about ourselves each day.

Because we have to first see how everyone else feels about us.

Exhausting.

And not based off truth.

Everyone else's interpretation is on their beliefs and their perceptions.

They only know a crumb of who you are.

Another difference is competition versus oneness.

When we're in the ego mindset,

We see ourselves as separate than others.

We compare ourselves and we compete.

Try to one up the next person.

Try to almost,

It's,

I'm trying to give some examples.

Like someone will tell their story to you.

Maybe they're sharing their story.

To you,

Maybe they're sharing something and we'll have the one upper.

You know,

We'll have the next story too that is a little bit more of a suffering or a little bit more of a this.

Just so that we have the upper hand.

And you can think about competition in,

I mean,

Pretty much every category of life.

People can slide into this ego with competition.

Versus oneness,

We recognize the connectedness of everything.

That it's not a competition because it's all connected.

As everything I do impacts everything and everyone else,

Even if I don't know them.

Everything you do impacts everyone and everything else.

We're all connected so it's not a competition.

It's about our own uniqueness.

What we're doing in self and what we're putting out there to the energy of the connection of all.

Versus let me try to be on a hierarchy above someone else.

Because when we're doing that,

The nature of hierarchy is we have to push someone else down.

So that's,

You know,

Not really in alignment with oneness.

If we are in competition,

We're trying to make someone else less than us.

And that kind of glides into those next ones.

The looking outside self versus looking inside self.

Which I kind of mentioned about that outward recognition versus inward appreciation.

The surveying is when we're looking outside self.

We are trying to connect with anything we can outside ourselves to manage our emotion.

To find happiness.

To have something beyond what we have.

It's like a lack of satisfaction.

It's a constant seeking.

It's like,

But I need more,

But I need more.

And what can I find outside of me that will maybe help fill whatever that void is?

And it won't.

I mean,

We can get all the materialistic things that we want in our life.

We can have the billions of dollars that some people have.

But if we're outside seeking and it's ego centered,

We're not going to ever really land in self.

We can't buy ourselves.

So it's looking outside ourself versus looking inside ourself.

Recognizing that even in hardship,

We can have an abundance of love within self.

That we can have the future ahead.

That we desire.

That it might require extra work.

It might require many obstacles.

Oftentimes people will set a goal out there for themselves,

But they'll also have such a stronghold on how they're supposed to get to that goal.

And they lose sight of often it's that true trust and surrender where noticing and noting that along the path sometimes it's challenging.

It's not just giving up.

It's making the movement and recognizing we're going towards something greater.

We might not know when we're going to land there.

We might not know what exactly it's even going to feel like or look like.

But we can still look inside self to find the strength and notice that even if we haven't landed on the thing,

The goal that we're seeking yet,

We can still stay tuned in.

We can still notice all we have each day that can still allow us to have gratitude and this,

The abundance mindset.

When we're in ego,

We have a lack mindset.

It's where greed comes in.

It's where competition comes in.

It's as though we think that there's only so much potential out there and we have to try to grab everything we can from everyone else because otherwise it's going to run out.

Versus the abundance mindset allows us to move more into ease and grace,

To trust and surrender,

To recognizing that even in hardship and pain,

It doesn't mean that there's still not an abundance of love and grace within us.

Another mortal versus eternal ego mindset is about finality,

Seeking to gain something because we're moving towards an ending.

And in self,

It's more of an eternal,

Ever-evolving aspect of soul that is beyond the ego.

It's the mortal human shell that we are in.

This next one has to do with how we connect.

A little larger,

I'm going to try to hit a bit on it the best I can to make it clear,

Not too confusing,

But also not go down a whole rabbit hole.

When we are in ego,

Our energy is more of a lust energy,

Which is like the serpent energy.

The lust energy is connection or what can you do for me?

What can I get from you?

And the energy that is put out is,

It's a very sexual energy.

It's a sexual vibration that is put out to try to gain something from the other person.

And it's not even necessarily sex that you're trying to gain.

It's about using that energy to gain a sense of control and domination.

The serpent is in even certain spiritual biblical teachings.

Medusa,

You know the story of Medusa.

She's like that serpent energy that pulled in with this lust energy and then turned people to stone.

I know that the story of Medusa is much larger than that.

I'm just trying to pull out that little thing there to help you understand this.

So the lust serpent energy in ego is about using that lust energy to get something from someone.

It could be anything.

It does not have to be sex.

It's about control,

Domination,

And getting people to do things for you.

It's the best little summary there without going too much on a tangent.

Versus when we're in self,

It is a love energy.

It is true.

It is of genuineness.

It is authentic,

Non-attachment,

No agenda,

Giving freely without expectation of something back.

That sacred reciprocity,

You know,

It's a giving without needing or expecting something in exchange.

It's sharing that energy for its truest form that has to do with that oneness.

We're all in our truest form,

The energy of love.

And when we are in alignment with self,

We are vibrating out that energy because we are connected with the river of love running through our own being.

So it's abundant.

It's a never-ending abundance of love energy as we are all in our foundation love.

And then lastly,

Ego versus self is the me versus the we.

Me mindset versus we mindset.

I would like to also note that within this,

It's not about not having self-care.

Self-care is the number one most important thing.

Taking care of balance and wellness is the only way we can truly be in unison in our authentic self with others.

Anytime we're depleted,

We're showing up that way and it could vary what that looks like per person.

But self-care is not in that ego category.

Self-care is about noticing,

Recognizing who we are,

What our needs are for balance,

Our ability to say no when we mean no instead of yes when we mean no,

The people pleasing.

People pleasing is actually about some in that ego category,

That outward recognition,

The looking outside our self.

So when we are people pleasing,

We're not in alignment with self.

Saying no is not selfish.

Self-care is not selfish and ego centered.

So I want to clarify that and make sure everyone sees the difference there.

Instead of an actual tool for the following week ahead,

I actually am going to pose you with two different types of reflection questions.

Hopefully you started a notebook if you've been along the way with me or even if this is your first.

Then a notebook is a great way to keep track of things.

It gives us a good reflection point to look back on and it would be a place that you can notate these answers if you would like.

The first one is who do you tell yourself you are?

When you think of this answer,

One of the real big things you want to be on the lookout for is identity more.

These are things like I am and then your job title.

We are so much beyond just a role that we play,

But when we get highly attached to an identification marker,

Then it creates a lot of emotion attachment to that specific thing.

Another example,

I have,

Being a therapist for over 20 years,

Worked with many individuals through these years who are getting out of toxic and sometimes very abusive partnerships.

And at times,

People have told me it was really hard for them to work on dissolving the connection and moving into even safety in some of these abusive situations because they had so many memories within their home and felt like their home was an identity marker for them.

So much so that it was making it hard for them to choose safety and wellness.

But just to help you understand,

Identity markers can really create a strong hold on us.

When we use them to indicate who we are,

As I have noted there,

It will actually increase your fear.

It brings a lot of resistance to changes and challenges that we have in our life.

So who you tell yourself you are impacts how we feel,

How we move through life,

And sometimes imaginary obligations we stay connected to and hold strong to.

The second reflection is when are you in your truest form?

When can you be yourself?

All bits of yourself,

Completely and authentically raw.

Not having to put on masks,

Put on costumes,

Think about how should I be,

How should I talk,

How should I act,

Where you can genuinely even answer that question,

How are you?

How often when someone asks,

How are you?

I'm fine,

I'm great.

I mean it's usually a one or two word answer we give and it's not even in alignment with actually how we're doing.

Sure,

Sometimes it's not the right circumstance,

Maybe the right person,

Situation,

Whatever you want to call it,

For us to lay out our whole story about how we're really feeling or how we're really doing.

But when and where can you genuinely answer this question?

When you're in your truest form,

What are you doing?

What actions are you doing?

Who are you with?

What are you thinking even?

But what does it feel like when you're here?

How do you feel when you have those moments,

Those opportunities to truly be you?

Those are some things just to allow you a bit more reflection.

The more we think these things through,

The more awareness we have.

The more awareness we have,

The more we start writing our own story.

We can start to move and shift those roles that we have been living if they're not really the roles that align with us.

We're growing,

We're learning,

There's opportunities in each day.

If you find yourself dreading every day,

Think about what opportunities are ahead.

Who do you desire to be?

Who do you desire to be?

And is that based on your ego or on your soul?

Thanks so much and I will see you soon my friends.