The Ego as Guru PDF Print E-mail
Written by Gina Lake   
Here is an excerpt from Radical Happiness: A Guide to Awakening by Gina Lake about one of the guises the ego takes on. Sometimes the egoic mind (the voice in our head) takes on the tone of a spiritual advisor, which is called The Guru in this excerpt. Radical Happiness is available on Amazon.com.

The ego can pretend to be good and wise, but that doesn’t make it so. It can sound like it has your best interests at heart, but the ego is a con man. Underneath the supposed wisdom is judgment, because The Guru is essentially The Judge, but on spiritual matters instead of mundane ones. The ego as The Guru is a con man because it cons us into thinking it’s guiding us spiritually, when it’s really creating the same contraction, discontentment, stress, and striving the ego is known for. When we are aligned with our true nature, we feel relaxed, at peace with life, content, happy, and loving. And we are naturally attuned to the wisdom of the Self (Essence). Listening to The Guru, however, doesn’t bring such peace and contentment, but only more striving and the sense that we still don’t measure up. The Guru shakes its finger at us, saying: “You’ll never be enlightened. You have to be more (fill in the blank)¬ and less (fill in the blank).”

The Guru is often referred to as the spiritual ego because it is the ego in spiritual guise, the ego that is trying to be spiritual by following rules and precepts to the letter. The ego doesn’t know how to “do” spirituality; it only knows how to mimic it: It pretends to be kind, holy, good, but it doesn’t want kindness, holiness, or goodness. It pretends these things only because it wants something else: power, superiority, respect, control, or other things it values. To the ego, spirituality is a means to an end, a means to get more of something or to better one’s position in life. The ego thinks that being spiritual will get it what it wants.

The spiritual ego drives people to try to attain enlightenment, when enlightenment is not something anyone can attain, least of all by striving, but quite the opposite. The spiritual ego strives for perfection because that is its idea of spirituality: “Be perfect, don’t make any mistakes, know everything, be wise.” It hopes to attain such perfection through practices, abstentions, and other means, but these activities are engaged in for the wrong reasons: to strengthen and empower the me instead of to dissolve it.

The Guru speaks to us primarily in shoulds: “You should meditate twice a day.” “You should be present.” “You should be nice.” “You shouldn’t drink so much.” “You should get to bed earlier.” “You should be doing your life purpose.” “You should be saving the world.” The word should is a sign of the ego. When the Self motivates us to meditate or be kinder or more present, or even to take better care of ourselves, it doesn’t inspire us through a thought, but through an inner impetus to do these things. That impetus is true guidance coming from the Self. Such subtle nudges and intuitive messages are continually being sent to us, but we may miss them if we are wrapped up in our thoughts.

It’s easy to tell the difference between true guidance coming from the Self and the false guidance of The Guru, besides the fact that the former comes through intuitively and as a drive, and the latter comes through as a thought. True guidance is received without resistance, unless the ego comes in later and resists the impetus or drive to act. The Guru’s guidance, on the other hand, causes us to feel contracted, not good enough, and needing to strive to get somewhere. When we are listening to The Guru, we feel like we are insufficient and need to do something to be good enough, valuable, worthy.

The ego is the only thing that causes us to feel contracted and insufficient, since that is not the Self’s perception. We are loved by the Self, and our humanness and so-called imperfections, like everything else, are accepted and cherished by the Self. Perfect and imperfect are not in the Self’s vocabulary. Such a categorization is a concept, like the concepts good and bad, which also have no reality. These types of categorizations belong to the ego. In truth, we are neither good nor bad, perfect nor imperfect; we just are.

Because the ego can’t comprehend or even experience the Divine, the mystical, the ego often misunderstands and distorts the spiritual teachings it comes across. Since The Guru is the ego, and the ego doesn’t understand the Truth, listening to The Guru’s distortions and lies results in a lot of confusion for spiritual seekers.

Spiritual teachings are meant to guide seekers out of the egoic mind and into the experience of their true nature, but when spiritual seekers are firmly stuck in their egoic minds, the teachings are often misunderstood and then used by The Guru to make the seeker feel insufficient, and those negative feelings perpetuate ego-identification. The ego doesn’t really want the Truth to be discovered because then the ego can no longer remain in charge. Discovering the Truth may not completely annihilate the ego, but it changes our relationship to the ego dramatically, and that change is felt like a death to the ego.
 

9 Comments

  1. Seda makes this comment

    Tuesday, 19 January 2010

    This is slightly on a tangent but I've been wondering about it recently. I keep reading that humans are 'social creatures' and are 'wired' to 'need' others for happiness. Of course, babies do, but once we are self-sufficient, do we really need to be around others as some biological imperative? Is this more egoic 'wisdom'? Perhaps to fulfill a life purpose, we need others around to receive our contribution or help us develop our skills but a life purpose is not so much a need as a drive or longing. I'm always suspicious when psychologists try to make sweeping statements about human behavior. What do you think?

  2. shel makes this comment

    Tuesday, 19 January 2010

    Hmmmm. . .does this not point the finger back at the writer?

  3. some random guy makes this comment

    Tuesday, 19 January 2010

    every kind of teaching is egoic to a certain degree. the only true "teacher" (god, self) allows you to express yourself in any kind, shape or form, even in egoic :)

  4. Gina Lake makes this comment

    Tuesday, 19 January 2010

    Hi Seda, It's hard to address this big question in such a small space without making a lot of generalizations. I think some personality patterns (astrology charts) need to be social or partnered more than others. And we need people at some points in our life more than at others. And it's safe to say we need others to survive, since that is the function society serves, and few people can survive on their own. We need others, as you pointed out, usually to fulfill our life purpose and learn lessons. Yes, I think you could say we need others for a number of reasons--spiritually, emotionally, and physically. Although some people may feel they need friends or a partnerships to be happy, I don't think anyone really needs others to be happy. Love...Gina

  5. Seda makes this comment

    Tuesday, 19 January 2010

    Thank you Gina...I guess it's just hard for the ego to admit because 'needing' others in these ways takes away some of it's sense of power and self-sufficiency. But it is the truth.

    Love,
    Seda

  6. Jane makes this comment

    Wednesday, 20 January 2010

    This explains why one can hate and blame the teachers and the gurus, and not understand what is going on. The ego can take the form of the guru or the teacher and when this happens, the misery can be unbearable. The ego can literally take the voice of the guru or teacher and this can make one think that the guru is misery like itself. Very nice to read this from Gina Lake. Thanks

  7. Ralph makes this comment

    Thursday, 21 January 2010

    The 'ego' is the greatest manipulator, it's true funtion is to keep you from revealing its true nature .... when you can see that in yourself, then your true nature is instantly revealed and this is where you will find peace and freedom. Once again, thank you Gina.

  8. Kaushik makes this comment

    Saturday, 23 January 2010

    Thanks Gina--excellent article. The spiritual ego is a tough nut to crack, because the ego gets a great deal of validation from pursuing spiritual activities and concepts while remaining firmly in charge.

    Thanks, very illuminating.

  9. Maribelle makes this comment

    Wednesday, 27 January 2010

    Thanks for this article Gina!! I have clearly seen the Guru at work many many times, and be reading your article I can now for sure make another choice. The choice to ignore it ! It is a con srtist at it's best. Thanks again !

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    If you are enjoying these blog posts, you will enjoy Embracing the Now and Living in the Now.
    These books by Gina Lake are composed of short articles and former (and some current) blog posts.
    Radical Happiness, another book by Gina, will give you a foundation for understanding these posts.