What is ego strength?

[jarrodgötze]

Hi John, thanks so much again for the reply to my last question. It helped massively and I have since had three interviews with separate companies and am on the cusp of getting a job. I owe a lot of that to you. I eventually surrendered to the panic and fear of being rejected in the days leading up to each one which eventually caused me to not care as much if I was judged harshly. I actually found that being vulnerable and transparent in an interview setting, letting them see that I was nervous, actually made them respect me and they may have even found it endearing!

I notice you mention 'ego strength' quite a lot in your books, especially in your new one, and how it is desirable. I am just wondering if you can clarify what exactly it means. Relating it back to me for a second, would ego strength mean to have confidence in ones abilities and maintaining a personal identity, but still accepting negative emotions as separate entities? I would really appreciate a description of what it means to have ego strength, during meditation and also throughout the day.

Also a new thought popped into my mind whilst I was typing this, my mindset has transformed drastically since keeping 'self-' acceptance' at the forefront since digesting your last reply to me, and I already feel a new passion for life that I have never felt, but sometimes I think 'hold on, I am accepting a part of myself that isn't directly a feeling or emotion, such as a personal quality, physical feature, external opinion' etc. Is this allowed in EC work? The reason I ask is I have found it to be a truly beautiful experience when I combine my acceptance of my feelings with my acceptance of the fact that I may sometimes be judged harshly due to personal qualities and physical features. Do you advocate for this? Does this correlate to having an ego strength? It seemed to help me when I surrendered to the fact that my interviewer might not like me for who I am whilst accepting feelings of inadequacy at the same time.

Thanks for everything John,

Jarrod

[John Ruskan]

Glad the job search is paying off. You seem to have the right ideas here.

Ego strength for me equates to strength of character: will-power, determination, the ability to make a goal and pursue it, being able to maintain personal values in the face of opposition, strong sense of identity and integrity, etc. If you have no ego strength, you are easily pushed around by others, you are weak-willed, a 'sheepie' as we might say in the terms of contemporary society.

Don't get confused by the subtleties of self-acceptance. For our work, it mainly applies to accepting feelings and emotions as they are. Extending acceptance to things like physical features and outside conditions is desirable, but can start to get tricky. Suppose you hate some physical feature about yourself. Hate is a feeling that should be taken through the process. If you try to force yourself to 'accept' something outside or about yourself that you honestly dislike you are being dishonest with yourself. I mention somewhere in the books that the best strategy is to always go to the core feelings. If there's hate or dislike, then you accept and process that, and don't try to force yourself into accepting or liking something that you don't.

But then accepting feelings and emotions as they are can carry over to conditions outside yourself or personal physical features. If you accept your feelings about something external, then in a way you are accepting the external while at the same time disliking or preferring that the external be different.  'When I combine my acceptance of my feelings with my acceptance of the fact that I may sometimes be judged harshly due to personal qualities and physical features.' This sounds good, and maybe illustrates the point I'm trying to make. Your primary acceptance of yourself carries over to secondary acceptance of the external experience.

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[jarrodgötze]

Thank you John, that makes sense. I think I was struggling to strike a balance between maintaining ego strength and allowing for feelings of weakness in the power/significance chakras. But from what I’m hearing, that’s exactly what I need to do.

Again, that all makes perfect sense. So prioritising acceptance of feelings does not mean you have to reject everything else! Thank god for that! I think I need to release more trapped energy in certain chakras before I can truly think about accepting external things.

Thanks a lot, John.