Moods, ego, and personal development decisions March 17, 2014
Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Ego Management, Fear and Anxiety.Tags: controlling ego, depressed mood, ego management, managing the ego, personal development, personal growth, positive thinking, Richard Carlson
add a comment
In our ongoing effort to develop our personal growth potential, our ego and its periodic bad moods can sometimes have a negative effect on decisions we make.
This can happen when for some reason we are feeling “down” or in a depressed mood (for whatever reason), when we are feeling physically unwell, or when we are overly fatigued.
In such cases we need to realize that managing the ego is important from the perspective of recognizing that we are in fact, actually only “in a bad mood” with all its attendant and non-realty-based negative perceptions and feelings. At such times, we can make poor decisions based on this negativity.
Dr. Richard Carlson, a consultant on stress and happiness, explains that when we “are in a bad mood, life looks unbearably serious and difficult.” He reminds us, however, that moods are fleeting; moods (good and bad) are “always on the run”, so to speak.
And he cautions, making important decisions about our lives at such times, when everything looks bleak, can be disastrous, because our perceptions of actual reality can be negatively influenced.
“When you’re in an ill mood, learn to pass it off simply as that: an unavoidable human condition that will pass with time, if you leave it alone. A low mood is not the time to analyze your life. To do so is emotional suicide. If you have a legitimate problem, it will still be there when your state of mind improves,” Carlson says.
When our state of mind improves, we are able to handle problems more effectively and positively.
The ego and the unconscious formation of prejudices March 12, 2014
Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Concept of personal development, Ego Management.Tags: A New Earth, awareness, controlling ego, Eckhart Tolle, ego management, managing the ego, personal development, personal development potential, personal growth
add a comment
If we are to realize our personal development potential, an important goal for us should be to try to diminish as much as we can the role our ego plays in our lives.
The ego – a phenomenon which Eckhart Tolle describes as a constantly chattering voice in our head; a voice which can interfere with taking our personal growth to a higher level of consciousness.
For Tolle, the need for discipline in the conscious management of our ego is one of the foundational requirements for discovering our true inner being. It is the pervading principle underlying personal growth realization in Tolle’s 313-page book, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose.
Paraphrasing Tolle’s view of the ego, we can say that, left to its own devices, the ego will construct many prejudices (1), and one of the ways it does this is by continually categorizing practically all of our experiences onto a neat bookshelf of attitudes.
In A New Earth, Tolle comments, “The quicker you are in attaching verbal or mental labels to things, people, or situations, the more shallow and lifeless your reality becomes, and the more deadened you become to reality; the miracle of life that continuously unfolds within and around you. In this way, cleverness may be gained, but wisdom is lost, and so are joy, love, creativity, and aliveness.” (2)
The problem, for most of us, of course, is that the formation of these verbal and/or mental labels about things, people, and situations is something we are not consciously aware of; because the process is performed unconsciously by the ego.
And this ego-process is something must make a constant, daily effort to resist.
One of the reasons why personal development/growth is a lifelong effort, and not a quick-fix program.
(1) I am using the word prejudices in the sense of forming any pre-judgements about externals.
(2) Page 26, Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth; a Plume Book, paperback
Personal Development Ideas 