Chapter One
“Spirit vs. Ego”
“Unhappiness is an ego-created mental-emotional disease that has reached epidemic proportions” (Eckhart Tolle).
In a nutshell ego is idolatry; Edging God Out. Every person has an ego, but we must not permit our ego to rule us to the extent that the Holy Spirit can’t get a word in. Perhaps everyone ego-trips for at least five minutes every day; wisdom consists in not exceeding that limit. Ego says I can do all things thru Christ who strengthens me. The Holy Spirit says I can do only those things He commanded me to do. Am I correct when I say the world doesn’t have common sense? I’ve always thought that common sense was a gift of God. Ironically, the world does use common sense and that’s the problem. If Thomas Edison had common sense, we might be in the dark right now. If Rosa Parks had common sense, I’d be on the back of a bus! The majority of people are going in the wrong direction, so if you think like them you will master nothing. What you’re about to read is not common sense at all. If you’re looking for common sense, you’re reading this book for the wrong reason. This book makes no sense to the five senses which the world considers nonsense. There is no such thing as nonsense apart from a judgmental ego which calls it that. Why should you trust your senses when they create this illusion that we’re stationary when in fact we are spinning around the sun at eighteen miles per second? We have learned through our five senses that the world is flat. It sure looks flat to me. Common sense says things like, “I’ll believe it when I see it.” Uncommon sense says, “I’ll see it when I believe it.” Jesus said blessed are those who have not seen, yet still believe. Common sense believes there are actually 24 hours in a day. Would you believe me if I told you there are 23 hours, 56 minutes, and 46 seconds in a day? Actually time does not exist, only eternity. Common sense informs you that everyone gets sick sometimes, and that there’s nothing you can do to prevent it from happening. This belief is why you are vulnerable to sickness. Some things we know prevent us from knowing anything (more on that later). I also believe that I’ll never get Alzheimer’s disease. The worst case scenario is that you’ll walk up to me one day and say, “Hey Istawa, I thought you said you would never get Alzheimer’s?” And I’ll look you in the face and say, I don’t remember ever saying that! We’re going to elaborate on freedom from what others think. I’m not talking about honest feedback because we all need someone who’s not afraid to tell us when we’re making a fool of ourselves. The world consists of ten percent protons, sixteen percent electrons, four percent neutrons, and seventy percent morons! The purpose of this first chapter is to show the distinction between your real self and your false self. Your real self (the Holy Spirit) believes in creation. Your false self (ego) believes in the theory of evolution which is just common sense. The ego would rather say that you came from an ape than say that God is your Father. How erroneous that the ego doesn’t submit to a god other than itself. And you wonder why I refer to ego as the silent killer. It’s silent because by the time we trace our problems back to our ego it’s too late. By then we’ve already told the boss to take this job and shove it! We’ve told our loved ones we can live without them and now sitting on the sidewalk wondering how we got this far in over our head. The ego is so cool, but the biggest fool. It always gets the last laugh, but constantly crying the blues. The Holy Spirit believes it is better to give than receive. Ego believes giving is meaningless, and getting is all that counts. We have everything in the Spirit, and the ego has nothing but mere illusions. Spiritual laws not only govern the material universe but manifest things into physical existence. Those who claim they don’t have faith actually exercise faith on a daily basis. Maybe you have the faith that you’ll be released from prison although you’re currently doing life. Perhaps you have faith to outgrow cancer or believe like Magic Johnson that your HIV virus will not be fatal. Maybe it’s something simple like the faith to believe your boss will pay you on payday. If you didn’t have faith then you wouldn’t go to work. You need faith just to drive a car these days (I mean to pay for the gas). Ego believes there’s only one person in the world that happens to be your soul-mate. Finding the right person means nothing if you’re the wrong person, and love at first sight is usually cured by a second look! It’s not about finding the right person, but being the right person. Instead of putting the expectations on others, be the kind of person you want to attract.
|