OK, I admit it! I'm trying to get better, and consciously I'll do whatever I can to notice when I'm doing this, so that I can change it, BUT......isn't it so much fun to debate and argue, especially when we can feel that we're being eloquent, and even more especially if we can poke holes in the other person's argument? What does it do for us? Why does the ego love an argument so much?

I try not to post unless I know I want to be helpful, or simply to explain my position. But the ego gets so subtle..... even "being helpful" can be a subtle way of putting someone else down. Sometimes I'll post a long response, and end up erasing the whole thing and walking away, because I realize it's not from love, but from seeing differences. However, I will give myself one little pat on the back. I used to get angry in the middle of debating and I don't don't that anymore. The funniest thing is, years ago I didn't really think I had much of an ego - I just thought I was RIGHT!


Ever catch yourself in an ego moment??

Yes!!! LOL I just love you angeleyes. You are so honest and dare to look at the very smallest lie about yourself. I too erase posts before I post, once I step away and think, wow Vivian ego is getting the best of you. Who are you proving what to? LOL

__________________
May your awareness be perfection

Absolutely! What we have to remember is that the intellectual realm is the realm of the ego, it is that part of our Self that communes with the intellectual sphere. Debate is the playground of the ego and there's nothing wrong with that as long as you realize that is what it is.

Its when you believe that your opinions are your Self, that we become attached to them, and in that attachment we experience joy, pain, love, and hurt. Because the intellectual realm is part of the temporal, it is always changing, so there is always a hole in any argument, which is why the intellect is about beliefs. But beliefs are how we navigate the relative side of things. Even if you experience "non-duality" you still have to integrate that experience back into your temporal experience. When you do that, it gets tranmuted back into "opinion". This is the essence of Plato's Cave analogy, where even someone who has seen the true light of the outside will sound foolish to those of us still in the cave. The shadow watchers have no referrent to what is being described other than what they know, and if the true light is not part of that knowledge, then you have words without true meaning to the shadow watchers. Those who have also seen the true light, however, do have a referent, so the words are not as "meaningless".

-TC

Good post angeleyes... Shows your maturity and growth! Yep all of us struggle with ego.

- Art

__________________
"it benefits us to be thoughtful, not of the glory of our minds, but rather, above all else, of the glory of God."
- Johannes Kepler

But the people who really have a problem with ego never think they are doing anything wrong.

__________________
Grassaf, Eolas

Such great responses! Thanks to everyone - Sometimes I can catch myself right away and it's actually amusing to watch the ego at work. In those moments, it's easy to let go. Other times it's not so easy, like when my daughter wants to argue with me. Some days, I feel like the Buddhist in meditation going "OK I see that judgement, let it go. Whoa, there's another one, and another. OK I"ll let that go, too. I'm a bad person for judging so much. WAIT - that's the ego talking again.... let it go."

Maybe that's why the younger generation loves reality TV so much. They get to run off one ego script after another.

TC, I really love your description of how even the Truth can get mixed up in the domain of the ego:
I'd like to have that on a bumper sticker. Can you imagine people trying to figure that one out while they're driving???

I do the same thing. So apparently this is not a struggle that I face alone. Part of me likes to debate, and part of me recognizes that it is something that I do to show of my intellegence (and sometimes lack of intellegence). I have erased an hours worth of words when I realize that I am looking at things without being open to them, and I have edited posts for the same reason.

Thanks, angeleyes for bringing this up. I don't feel alone anymore.

mostly I just go into ranting. I have typed long rantings, lately I have been erasing the whole thing and then just put a line or two of my thoughts. I'm tryin' to calm down and not answer impusively either. Because I am such a terrible debator. I have been tryin' to learn to do it correctly though. I found some lessons online that are teaching my ignorant self a lot of things I had never even known or even thought of before.

__________________
When a man sleeps in his bed, his soul leaves him to soar above, each soul according to its own way.......
The Zohar

Oh my! We'd really have to pare it down or it will be one of those small print bumber stickers that cause accidents from people driving to close to read it!

-TC

I started a bumber sticker thread down on the Chatterbox Forum if the mood strikes you!

-TC