How to Begin to Erase Ego and Re-invent Yourself

Adapted from the Teachings of Don Carlos and Victor Sanchez

The ego is nothing more than a description. We are generally slaves to that description. Anything you can say after I am... is part of the ego. You are not what is held in the description of your ego, but you behave as if that description constituted reality. However you have defined yourself, you have limited the vast possibilities that exist within you as a divine being, because you have thought to be impossible, things that were not contained in that description of self. Psychotics are no longer certain about their identities, since they cannot remember the description of their prior ego identity.

You can make a conscious choice to de-structure and dismantle the ego, to reinvent the self as an intentionally created open system, capable of infinite behaviors and choices. Such magical beings are not slaves to one way of being. They are always creating new ways of being to fit new situations, transforming themselves any time circumstances require it or just for their own delight and exploration of awareness.

Eliminating the obsession of the ego to make itself important is one of the primary ways to free up energy for other acts of consciousness. Self-importance constitutes an excessive and useless waste of life energy, since it is a mode of perception, rather than an act. (We don’t even notice it because it is the way we perceive.) We look compulsively at the world around us for confirmation and reflection of our self-importance. We focus on the demands of the ego description to the point where the world is significant or meaningful only to the degree that these demands are met. All our energy wasting emotions and debilitating routines are only possible because we feel important.     

Cycling and repetitive emotional reactions consume immense amounts of life energy. Emotions relegate perception to second place importance. Feelings are a response to what we perceive, while emotions are the product of thought, not perception. Feelings are not energy consuming, emotions are. If you want to reinvent yourself apply this secret: emotions cannot be produced without the “appropriate” thoughts. When you find yourself on the edge of an emotionally agitated state, do something to avoid thought and the emotion cannot happen. (Do something crazy like sing a song, dance around wildly). This moment will give you an edge when you still are at conscious choice about this energy expenditure.

To begin to re-invent ourselves we consciously break our relationship with decisions and choices around past events and persons that play out in our present, as modes of expression and ways we live unconsciously. We must, in short, become aware of those incidences from the past that have limited our present expression and bring the light of conscious awareness to them.  There is a basic resistance to behaving in novel ways, in changing, because we believe that we are incapable of doing anything outside the inventory of past actions and descriptions. We would rather deal with ego labels, fears, pain etc.  than open to the uncertainty and mysteriousness of the unknown. It is only in the mysterium that we can consciously create, choose, or be anything we want to be. It is the only field of true freedom.

One of the most important ways to re-invent yourself is to disrupt your routines: what you eat, places you frequent, where you sleep. What you think, talk about, desire, hate, love, repetitive modes of behavior, emotional and thought patterns. When you behave unpredictably, un-routinely you open up new circuits in your being for the mystery to enter and surprise you. You open your perception into the possibilities inherent in flexible awareness, ie: dimensional slippage into the mystery.

Another way to re-invent yourself is to stop the continuous stream of the internal dialog, self-talk. Since we are always talking to ourselves, we consider it natural and an inevitable condition of human life. This dialog literally forms and perpetuates the egos description, causing us to perceive reality as we do, acting as a jealous guardian protecting his or her work, keeping up the incessant flow of drivel. When the word factory shuts down, the world ceases to appear exactly as we kept telling ourselves it was and other facets of reality, formerly considered strange or impossible, then become accessible.

Another way to re-invent yourself is to recognize that you are nothing more than an actor and then enjoy that fact. When you take on other descriptions of the self fully, it is easy to see that the ego and the world in which you once believed you were trapped, was only a mirage, just one more character in one more play, with actors who had forgotten they were acting in a “play”. If you become good at the game of “acting”, you modify your perception and move your assemblage point.  The art of pure acting becomes the art of transmutation. A shaman has learned to “act” like a crow and simply modifies their perceptions to match the “feeling” of a crow, modifying their assemblage point in reality. Reality is a feeling.   

Through performing unusual, non-logical, strange, out of the ordinary acts, we create a disruption in the habitual patterns of our energy use and begin to loosen perception. Once this loosening process begins we can redirect energy formerly spent in consuming energy, for more awareness. With this extra energy, our field moves into what we thought to be the realm of doing the impossible and our perceptual possibilities widen until the tendency to act in accordance with the egos description simply ceases and we become magical beings. Shall we begin?

Techniques for Re-inventing Yourself

Adapted from the Teachings of Don Carlos and Victor Sanchez

l. Don’t automatically reveal everything you do to people around you, since this impulse comes form the ego’s desire to confirm itself. Remain mysterious.

2. Begin to interact with people you would never have chosen to from your prior ego description.

3. Don’t explain or justify what you do. Refuse to tell anyone what you do.

4. Change your personality, way of speaking, the places you go, your way of responding to situations, food and sleeping habits.

5. Go to a shopping mall. Carefully observe  people, avoiding judgment or speculation, simply sense them and their energy. Observe how many people seem, strong, happy, energetic, present, aware. If someone appears to be this way, try to speak to them without revealing the true nature of what you are doing. If it is possible without intruding on their reality, see if your perception was accurate.

6. Be the Fool.  Write down several ways that you are identified in your ego. This act is especially good for those who like to make a good impression on others. If you are someone who is usually very careful and agile, begin to be clumsy, tripping or dropping things. If you are identified with looking good, go somewhere sloppy and poorly clothed. Do the opposite of  how you are identified in your ego.

7. Catch yourself in the act. Switch positions. Begin finding your most frequent thought or phrases you repeat to others so that they will see you in a certain light, nourishing your self-importance.  When you hear yourself say them in conversation, stop and catch yourself in the act.  Switch positions. Say the opposite. If you want to appear intelligent... make a stupid remark.

8. Walk of Attention: Walk with your attention focused not on thoughts, but on the walk itself. Walk in silence. Don’t try to stop thoughts, simply let them flow, listening to them as through they were just any other natural sound. Concentrate breathing to make it easier to focus attention on it. Maintain continuous attention on the surroundings and the feelings brought up. Pay attention to how your body feels. Focus attention on sounds.

9. Walking through the forest blindfolded. Use all your senses, except sight to discover the forest.

10. Actor for a day:

l. Choose or create a character with very well defined traits... preferably one with characteristics diametrically opposed to your own.

2. Write down the character’s characteristics, in order to know all the details of their lives. Fill in the ego portrait for them… How they think, feel, act, move, etc.

3.Prepare your character’s entry into the world. Get the proper clothing and begin practicing personal habits in private… attitudes, tone of voice, education, vocabulary, interests, activities etc.

4. Go public and interact disguised as your character. You must go out, converse, visit places, according to the role you are playing. It requires great discipline not to slip back into your everyday ego mask. The key is to convince yourself of the role, and think as the character would.

Techniques for Re-inventing Yourself

Name:

Age:

Favorite Manner of Dress, What do you like best to wear?:

State of Health:

Places you spend the most time:

Places you avoid:

Most common state of mind or mood:

Type of person most attracted to:

Type of person avoided:

Types of work done in the past, and current work:

Reactive emotional patterns: (What makes you react emotionally?)

What is the image you try to project and present to the world:

What is a typical daily routine:

Internal structural routines -

How do you rate yourself as a communicator?

What are some of your favorite subjects to converse about?

Ways in which you like to spend your free time:

What is your economic status? (watch for reactions to this languaging)

What are you major strengths of character or personality?

What are your major flaws, problems or weaknesses?

What do you consider the best thing or things you have done in your life?

What are the worst thing or things you have done in your life?

What is the best thing that has happened in your life?

What is the worst thing that has happened in your life?