Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Day 40
It is a useless endeavor to fight the ego with intellectual arguments, since like a wounded hydra it produces two heads for every one cut off. Reason alone is incapable of forcing the soul to love or of saying why we ought to love for no profit, for no reward. The great battle for integrity must be fought by aiming at the very heart of the ego and by enhancing the soul’s power of freedom.”(Man is Not Alone pg.141/2).
Immersing ourselves in the last sentence above seems like too much to do. The Latin origin of the word integrity is ‘intact’ and the Hebrew word is Shlemut ‘ wholeness’. Rabbi Heschel is advising us to gear up and do battle with our egos so we can remain both intact and achieve wholeness. What a mind-blowing experience/thought. While many people believe we live in an one and done world, constantly looking for what is next after we climb this rung of the ladder, Rabbi Heschel is informing us that we have to be aware that the battle for integrity, the battle for wholeness and to stay intact is an ongoing one. We have to be on guard each and every day, we have to stay aware and not go through life willfully blind, blocking our ears, inattentive to our souls’ call to us. Rabbi Heschel is informing us, reminding us and cajoling us to grow our souls’ power of freedom each and every day, I believe.
How do we do this? OY!! This is where the work begins. To “aim at the very heart of the ego” I have to be aware of what is a healthy and necessary ego and what is a false and unhealthy ego. Without ego, we would be unable to fulfill the Ineffable One’s call for us, unable to live in a way compatible with being a partner of/with Universe. This is an important distinction, I believe, because to have no ego is to be a slave and, in my understanding and belief, even being a slave to Force of the Cosmos is not healthy nor is it freedom. A healthy ego is an ego that knows its/our capabilities, knows how to achieve realistic and needed goals we set for ourselves in conjunction with God’s plan for us, and continue to learn and grow without blame nor shame-always making honest appraisals of our situations, learning/failing forward, and grateful for each of life’s experiences. A healthy ego is an ego that is in service of our soul, in service of another human being, in service of something that is greater than ourselves and in service of our authentic needs. This takes an awareness that we need to build on each and every day, it takes a dedication to knowing oneself and being able to say yes to oneself whenever our healthy ego is serving a greater good for the sake of the greater good and not for the sake of ourself. A healthy ego is achievable by all of us when we accept our flaws and our strengths, our talents and our need for assistance in the areas we are not talented in.
To aim at “the very heart of the ego” is to get out of the self-deception we are living in, to break out of our need to engage in mendacity with another(s) and to be in truth as to our assets and our deficiencies. Going to “the very heart of the ego” is to let go of our need to be right all the time, our need to be perfect and our need to rule over another to feel good about ourselves. The weapons of this “great battle for integrity” are teachings/books/teachers/guides of spiritual living, constant awareness of what is, living in wonder/radical amazement, letting go of ‘where’s mine’ attitude, letting go of ‘don’t you know who I think I am’ way of being, carrying on a positive truthful inner dialogue, blocking out the lies that the world/society are bombarding us with, leaving the prisons and slaveries of needing someone’s approval, permission and/or self-loathing. We need to adopt, enhance and continue to live our lives as children of the Creator, as royalty if you will, knowing that each of us has a patch of the garden, called Earth, to tend and commit to tending it each and every day. Knowing that our corner is neither less than nor greater than the corner of another, just different and that is okay. Becoming aware of and engaging in the need for another to help and heal us just as we are needed to help and heal another. This battle is ongoing, we engage in it each day because the false ego gets subtler and subtler each day, because we continue to grow and need to keep adjusting/readjusting where we bring our gifts and talents to those who need them now.
Leaving self-deception, mendacity, conventional notions and mental cliches is a difficult journey and we can make it, it is a difficult battle and we can win it. Are you willing to engage in this battle to achieve wholeness and be intact for today’s experience?
In recovery, we are engaged in this battle each and every day, sometimes moment by moment, hour by hour. We know that our false ego lures us to take actions that seem to make sense and yet, lead to the destruction of connections, love, spirit and leave us wanting and shattered. In recovery we are constantly engaged in seeking the right questions for the experience we are in and finding solutions knowing the results are out of our control. Just this recognition is a weapon in the “great battle for integrity”.
I have to wrestle with my ego daily. I do this by remembering Whom I am serving and making sure it is not me alone. I pray each morning a prayer of gratitude and I engage in this writing to ensure that I learn something new each day. I consistently check in with my ego and my soul at regular intervals, sometimes I buy into my own self-deception and over the years less and less. I engage in seeing people for who they are and holding out hope that can be/becoming the spirits I see in them. I am blessed to know I am intact and a whole human being from these battles with all the scars and wounds. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark