Your Ego is like a reverse Terminator.
It’ll do anything to keep you alive, including preventing you from living…
Our egos are wily. They are very clever and cunning. The reason for this is because they are trying to protect us or, better put, they are repeating a programme learned at a point in our formative years. At a time when we didn’t have the emotional ability to deal with whatever was happening so, to protect us, our ego reduces our capacity to feel. This has happened to every single person on the planet, including me and you.
In the last couple of months, I’ve had a few contractions of anxiety. Which, years ago, would have spun me out, perhaps for weeks. Nowadays it’s more like, “That’s interesting, I wonder what my body is trying to tell me or release?” I see the feeling of anxiety like the contractions that happen during childbirth. I’ve recently been emotionally squeezed to release something and let a new version of myself be born. An amazingly powerful reframe that changes anxiety into being seen as a good thing — which it is (it just feels “negative”).
As one deepens into this work our ego Terminator starts to fret — our earlier life programming is its programming. Without it, it doesn’t exist. In effect, it dies. So, for our egos, things literally are life and death and in order to stay alive it has to become sneakier and sneakier in direct correlation to the healing we have done. Therefore, the deeper the healing the subtler the alert signal. Why? Because the ego doesn’t actually want you to change behaviour. Without problems, it’ll die.
I’ve been accepting various things about myself in the past few weeks — it’s called shadow work. Our shadow is the parts of us that we have been conditioned (by our parents, acquaintances and society) to believe as unacceptable. BUT (it’s a big but hence the capitals) we all have the capacity, because we are all humans, to do EVERYTHING a human can do the good, bad, dark, twisted, and ugly, all of it. Most of us choose not to do dark stuff but until we deeply accept, and make peace with the fact, that we can our ego has power and will keep us trapped in certain behaviours that no longer serve us.
E.g. Being a Snob. I choose not to but I have the capacity to be one. It was a subtle trigger but I could always feel a reaction to being called a snob (or arrogant — that’s another and I believe they are linked). What you aren’t yet aware of is that when I was a kid my folks moved us from down South to the Midlands. There, the house size/price ratio was dramatically different (as it still is) and initially, people at school called me a snob because we lived in a big house and pronounced our Rrrr’s in grass, bath, path, etc. This I did not like so I changed the way I spoke quicksmart — I was six at the time. What I didn’t realise was that my ego took an imprint and logged, If you have lots of money, people won’t like you. The knock-on effect of this subconscious imprint has played a large part in my relationship with having lots of money or not, yet, as the case may be. I mean, on the surface, lots of money would be lovely but underneath my body was like, “Nah, fam.” Of course, there are other factors and many other imprints in play but it’s illuminating to be aware of stuff like this because the implications are huge — life-changing doesn’t even cut it. The practice below is a method to make a start on Shadow work for yourself.
As always, thanks for reading,
Adam (Follow me on IG @thevulnerabilityguy for more)
PRACTICE: Golden/Dark Shadow awareness
WHY: As mentioned above, during our formative years, we are conditioned to believe some aspects of being human are more acceptable than others — it keeps society civil (apparently). However, there’s a huge difference between having the capability to be angry and reacting angrily. But because we’ve learned that being angry is bad — we keep it suppressed and the knock-on effect of that is, ironically, people acting in an uncivilised way.
HOW TO START: Write a list of 3 people you admire and 3 people you don’t like. Then write 3 reasons why about each person. When you’ve done that you’ve, in fact, got a list of 9 things you think are golden about yourself and 9 things you think are dark about yourself. Life is a reflection of who we are inside. For each word, repeat it over and over and over until it loses its charge. There’s more to it than that but it’s a good start.
Adam Slawson is a Transformational Coach specialising in Vulnerability and Authenticity in Relationships and the founder of Plight Club clothing. His mission is to redefine vulnerability (as it’s the catalyst to our freedom). For more tools on tips to become better at expressing your emotions download his free e-guide here and/or visit his website here.
Living consciously and by choice instead of by habit is amazing but it takes practise. Adam will save you a lot of time and support you through the insecurity of change. If you’re curious about this work, book a free discovery call and he’ll answer any questions you may have…
