When you understand ego, you will be
able to deal with it and your Self better!
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| Cartoon Courtesy: Surendra/The Hindu/Internet |
I have come to believe that if you really
want a crash course in learning to handle ego, you must try commuting using an
auto-rickshaw within Chennai. No matter what your net worth or self-worth is,
the auto-rickshaw drivers will cut you down to size. They will be, often
without provocation, nasty, irreverent and downright greedy and abrasive. The
most humiliating part, the unkindest cut if you may want to call it so, is when
you are trying to tell the driver (before boarding) what your destination is,
and he simply drives away – no explanations, not even a glance at you, forget a
“Sorry, I am headed in a different direction!” … It can be very humiliating and
surely the fastest way of ridding yourself of your ego.
Last evening, I was, yet again, subjected
to such a treatment trying to hail an auto-rickshaw. And that brought me to
reflect on Osho’s, the Master’s, perspective on ego. Osho says the ego does not
exist. He likens the ego to darkness. He says just as darkness is the absence
of light, which disappears the moment light arrives, the ego too will be
powerless if there is self-awareness. He says ego is just that state when there
is absence of self-awareness. If you know your true Self, says Osho, you will
never have a problem with ego.
On a simpler plane, the ego is the feeling that
your mind whips up that you are in control of your Life and of everything and everyone
around you. So, when someone, like an auto-rickshaw driver in Chennai, behaves
in a discourteous, and often obnoxious, manner your mind pumps up your ego to
demand “How dare you?” But a Chennai auto-rickshaw driver cares a damn –
neither for law, nor for humanity. He will simply rubbish you. Which is why I
say that spending time on the streets of Chennai trying to hail auto-rickshaws,
over a period of a few weeks, can help you learn to manage your ego better. To
be sure, you will learn to appreciate and value the truth that you control
nothing.
Understanding ego is a very important
aspect of intelligent living. This whole feeling that you are in control makes
you a hostage of your ego. Ilayaraja, the music maestro, was once on Radio Mirchi, talking about the ego. I
remember him saying this, so beautifully: “Show me one human being who says he
is the one causing the digestion of all that he eats. Everything, absolutely
everything, is controlled by a Higher Energy. We don’t even have the ability to
control the digestion of the food that we imbibe.” I can totally relate to that
perspective. This does not mean we must become defeatist in our approach to
Life. This only means that we become more aware.
Know that there’s a Higher Energy leading
you and your Life. By all means do whatever you can and must in each situation –
but for a moment, never imagine and believe that you are controlling the
situation. The more aware you become, the more you understand ego. And the more
you understand ego, the more you realize that your Life was never in your
control in the first place. How do you control something that you have no
control over? The game of Life will be played no matter what
you do or don’t do. The best you can do is to simply play along and flow with
Life – pretty much the way you will end up learning to hail an auto-rickshaw in
Chennai!!!
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