The Ego gets a lot of flack. People love to hate on it. It’s got more contracts out on it then Joey from the neighborhood. Everyone wants to kill their Ego and everyone wants to be Enlightened, because that’s apparently what happens when you finally put the bullet between the eyes of the Ego. It dies and you’re enlightened.
Hmmm… maybe, maybe not. In her new book The E Word, Ego, Enlightenment & Other Essentials, Cate Montana breaks the Ego/No Ego conundrum down in a way that helps us realize we can holster our weapon, stop the shoot-out, and train our Ego to work with us, and not against us. This way we can hopefully attain the “happy place”—that place of peace, fulfillment, and abundance that we erroneously believe Enlightenment will deliver.
Life is good—all of it. Knowing how to be fully human is the trick. And it’s actually not that hard to do.
According to Montana, this process starts with a conversation with your “self.” Who are you? Are you Betsy or Cate, Harry or Joe? Black, white, brown, Buddhist, Baptist, democrat, man, woman, spiritual/ not spiritual? No! That’s your ego! That’s your “story.” And that story—the Cate or Betsy story—can never become Enlightened. What lies beneath those things? That’s the question and the quest.
When enlightenment occurs, sadly you won’t be around to enjoy it. Why? Because enlightenment is the absence of any sense of personal self. As Cate says in The E Word, “Bliss happens without “ME”. There is no one home to BE enlightened. No one home to declare victory. No one home to be liberated. You can’t be enlightened with an Ego. But without our dearly departed Ego, where would “WE” be in this world?
Don’t fret, you can still be happy, filled with love and light and joy, because you can learn to manage your Ego and have a totally awesome, aware life, taking the middle road. Cate and her book will show you the path.
Check out my interview with Cate Montana
Betsy Chasse is an award winning filmmaker (What The Bleep Do We Know?!, Song of the New Earth, Pregnant In America) and best selling author (Tipping Sacred Cows, It Came Out of My Vagina, Now What?! – A book on Conscious Parenting) You can learn more about her at www.betsychasse.net