Ego Check

Today I spent a little bit of time checking on my ego.  My head can get blown up pretty quickly if I’m not careful.  Egomania has caused me a lot of problems in the past (in retrospect – it’s not something I really noticed at the time), and I’ve expended a lot of effort trying to gain in humility.  Without necessarily going in the ‘humiliation’ direction, if you know what I mean.

If you don’t, that means that I don’t find it to be a very productive ego-deflation exercise to tell myself I’m a piece of sh*t.  That’s a crappy way to try to get to a state of balance.

Rather, I prefer more positive ego-deflation:  asking the opinions of others (ideally, before I act) – people I trust, mind you.  Then weighing their opinions against my initial impulse and trying to plot the course of least spiritual/moral/interpersonal-relationship-related resistance.  I try to do this especially in times when I think I know exactly what I’m doing or what the next step is.  It’s when I don’t want to ask someone else what they think I should do that I need to do so the most.

For the most part, my eventual decision isn’t necessarily all that much different from my initial impulse.  However, taking the time to consider my options and the possible outcomes is incredibly valuable.  Receiving and considering the opinions of others with regard to my future actions also gives me additional considerations I’d not thought about before.

For example, a hiking analogy:

If I’m bushwhacking (hiking somewhere through the woods where there isn’t a marked trail), and I pass another hiker along the way, I’ll say “I’m going to get to the top of the mountain via such-and-such a route”.  And they’ll say “I’ve been that way before; it’s a lot shorter, but watch out for the stinging nettles”.  Or they’ll say “nobody goes that way; everybody approaches from the north – it might be longer, but there’s a herd path about halfway up that you can’t miss – I’ve also heard that the climbing gets pretty technical just before the summit”.  Some will imply that I’m an idiot for choosing that route, but I usually ignore them.

In the first two cases, however, I received additional information I hadn’t had before:  the nettles might make the going slower, and not necessarily worth it if I’m in a hurry or really don’t feel like getting all scratched up that day.  Or I might be looking for more of a mindless workout than an exercise in daytime land navigation, which makes the prospect of a herd path much more ideal.

A herd path, by the way, is basically an unmarked and unmaintained trail – enough people use that route (hence the “herd”) that it’s pretty easy to follow.  Herd paths grow up to be trails.

If it’s the winter time and there’s fresh snow on the mountain, anything is better than breaking trail – following other snowshoe prints is always easier and faster – no matter how convoluted the trail.

Even if I choose not to take the advice of those who have gone before me, at least I know what to expect:  nettles and/or some (possibly frightening and dangerous) hands-and-feet climbing.

I spent quite a bit of time yesterday and today asking the opinions of others before taking action.  That means I wrote draft emails and sent them to people with a prefix of “what do you think?”  For the most part, I made the changes they suggested, while still getting across the point I wanted to.  In a couple of cases, I found that the readers misinterpreted what I was trying to say, so I had to re-word a few sections to properly make my point.

For one such email, I basically told the client that no, we’re not going to drop our fee, especially when you’re (now also) asking us to do additional work.  I sent the draft to the owner of my company and he said “go for it – you’re free to make the decisions.”  Which was pretty scary, because the client could very well read my email and decide to part company with us on this project.  I received the owner’s email while I was driving home and was like “oh shit”.  I turned the radio in my car off and checked my ego:

Things have been going pretty smoothly for me at work lately – by which I mean, things have been going my way.  People have been taking my suggestions and implement my plans.  That feels good, but my tendency is toward egomania, which means that after a couple of successful meetings, I figure I’m the man and should be running shiz from here to Timbuktu.  Not a good way for Ted to think.

So I spent some time this evening driving home with the radio off and looking at my actions and decisions over the past couple of weeks (while things have been going well and people have been taking my advice).  And do you know what I found?

I skimmed right over everything and basically said “yeah, I’m good – I’ve been making the right decisions”.

Which, in theory, doesn’t sound like such a bad thing.  Later on this evening, I realized that I was kind of scared to really look at my decisions and actions – afraid that I’d find selfish motives and other ego-based stuff.  Whether these things are actually present or not, I don’t know – the point is that that fear is not a good thing for me to have.  The fear of finding bad motives behind my actions, that is.

As far as fear goes, I really don’t have any right now – in a prospective sense.  My fear is all retrospective.  Did I fuck up?  Did I act from a poor motive and possibly hurt someone’s feelings or make a wrong choice somewhere along the line?

Again, whether I did fuck up or make bad decisions isn’t the problem here:  it’s my fear of looking at the past.  There’s nothing I can do about finding those things – they’re either there or they’re not.

I need to spend a bit of time in retrospective meditation in order to conquer this fear.  Otherwise, I might continue to fuck up and make poor decisions, while glossing them over with what I believe to be acceptable results.

I don’t really think I’ve fucked up or made bad decisions, but I still need to take some inventory and keep an eye out for the crappy items I have in stock so that I can trash them, instead of carrying them around with me.

NB:  I don’t think that spending some time in retrospective meditation is inconsistent with staying in the moment – as long as I’m in the moment when I do so.