“If
anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily
and follow me.” – Luke 9:23
The Ego's Unraveling
There is a sacred ache in every soul—a yearning not just to
know God, but to become one with the Divine. This journey isn’t an intellectual
pursuit or a moral checklist; it is a radical surrender. The path from
separation to union involves shedding who we believed we were.
This is the ego’s unraveling. The ego isn’t evil; it’s a
survival mechanism—an identity formed from memory, conditioning, and fear. It
defines us in the world: our name, our story, our role. Yet the soul remembers
something deeper: I am not my story. I am the silence beneath it.
The Invitation to Surrender
When Jesus said, “Deny yourself,” he invited us to release
the false self—the one that clings to control, approval, and security. To “take
up your cross” is to allow the dismantling of illusions, letting love break the
shell so the light can pour through.
I once navigated a challenging season where everything I
clung to was stripped away—success, relationships, identity. Initially, I
resisted. The ego panicked. Yet, in the silence that followed the storm,
something unexpected emerged: peace. Not a piece of resolution, but of
Presence. I was still here, yet changed. The “I” I had fiercely protected
dissolved into something vast and nameless.
Union as Intimacy
Union is not escape; it is intimacy. It invites God into
our prayers and our pain, realizing there is no place where God ends and we
begin.
Mystics from various traditions refer to this union as the
“death before death.” St. Paul expressed it well: “It is no longer I who live,
but Christ lives in me.” It is what the Sufis dance for, what Buddhists
identify as no-self, and what the Upanishads whisper: “Tat Tvam Asi”—You are
That.
So how do we practice this? We begin by noticing. When
fear, judgment, or the need to control arises—pause. Breathe. Ask, “Who is
speaking here? The ego or the Presence?” Every moment offers a doorway.
The Shift from Striving to Surrender
We shift from striving to surrender, from performing to
abiding. Ego urges, “Become something.” Spirit beckons, “Be still and know.”
This is not a one-time awakening; it is a daily, sometimes
hourly, process of dying and rising. It requires letting the river carry you
instead of swimming upstream. In that act of letting go, the boundaries between
you and God begin to dissolve—not because you’ve become divine, but because you
realize you always were.
Expanded Reflection Practice:
Find a quiet space and sit comfortably. Close your eyes.
Begin to notice your thoughts, one by one, as if watching clouds pass. Ask
gently, “Who am I without this thought?” Let each answer fall away. Rest in the
awareness that remains—silent, still, ungraspable. This is the Presence behind
the persona.
“You do not have to become divine. You have
only to stop pretending you are not.” – The Inner Voice
🌊 Have
you experienced a moment of ego surrender? Share your story or join others reflecting on their journey from separation to
union.
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