Thank you, Richard. When we feel fear, we start to train ourselves to pause... when we pause and take a conscious breath, it soothes the vagus nerve and signals the body to relax. This is a signal that we should look at the situation we are in and try to understand what caused the reaction.
I could point to something we can talk our ego through, to soften the ego response when the same/similar situation arises.
Great read, as always. Too many individual points to comment on, so I'll just say it very much tracks with my experience. I must say I love the term "performative spirituality", and will admit to participating in the practice in the past.
Thank you, Lois... I used to attend a church locally where the lead singer was there to perform... he was all ego-based... it detracted from the service... Also, I see people "doing" church, 'performative' as opposed just feeling it... it is fake...
I too was guilty, doing, not being on one form another. That was before I was truly saved and understood what it meant deep in my soul. It didn't feel like I was performing, but in hindsight, I was faking it until I could make it.
Thank you for this beautifully written meditation on spiritual awakening and the gentle and delicate process of integrating the ego. It mirrors my journey and the stories clients tell me about becoming free of the need for validation and the need to be right. It’s inspiring to connect with others on this incredible journey of consciousness. 🙏
Thank you, Rev Katie Grace... "becoming free of the need for validation and the need to be right." - this phrase really resonates with many, including me. Although I don't feel the need to be "right," I think many of us feel the strong need to be externally validated... the devil's trick... in essence it gives our power away to a brutal society that isn't attuned to heling others grow. The opposite, unfortunately. The only validation we need, comes from within. Thank you for your comments, it is good to connect with other "teachers"...
Elizabeth, this comment touched me... it is my goal to word things in such a way that they truly resonate with one's soul... To say you feel it in your heart, made me smile ear to ear, thank you.
Thanks for another mind journey, I had to read this one twice before I could even comment. Your work is very powerful. I think I have in very recent years come to a point where this article really resonates.
As I look back and think about some of the major inflection points I wrote about in my comments after your last article I can now see an evolution where what you describe as ego has been loosened to the point I find myself at today. The early memories are of a very difficult phase of letting go and moving forward. Then as I recall later transition events/times the Awakening process got easier.
I plan to use this information as I continue to move forward and it helps make the future look even brighter.
Joe, thank you for the feedback. I just listened to it myself, having the AI read it to me was like someone else speaking the words to me... it resonated in me in a way that made me think I wrote it for myself... I too am still working through some older version of myself that I have yet to reckon with...
I like your comment, "As I look back and think about some of the major inflection points I wrote about in my comments after your last article I can now see an evolution where what you describe as ego has been loosened to the point I find myself at today."
The Liminal is the "Safe place" to ponder these reflections on our former selves... we are far enough beyond the confusion, where we can think a bit more clearly, feel through things as opposed to thinking our way through them. Offering a great opportunity to reflect deeply using our mind, body, and soul.
This is what many psychologists call, Inner Child Work... where we can go back and parent ourselves, soothe our old selves that were created during potentially rough times... IMO, it is the most delicate, yet the most important aspect of healing ourselves...
In the name of doing The Real Inner Work, too many ppl erect fortresses on riverbanks of Victimization (investing yrs in celebrating misery). Especially when guided by The PROFESSIONALS. Any wayshower who hasn't done their own real inner work will almost always undermine anyone daring explore deeper truths whether it's a counselor, parent, mentor or friend. When we shatter the ceiling of an authority figure's intentionality, it's time to get out of that flimsy limb and take a leap into flight. The Ascended Masters ... Christ Jesus & Mary ... sincere wayshowers ... Mama Earth & Divine Mother will put air under our wings. Every time. Or if/when we crash, it's no biggie. We just dust ourselves off and do it again. Cuz it's who we are. Ascending Souls.
"You no longer exile parts of yourself to maintain the illusion of purity. You become wide enough to hold contradiction."
Thank you for the words I could not find, but recognized immediately as validation. I feel less crazy after studying and absorbing your writings. My soul appreciates you.
OC, another transcendent exposition on the integration of soul awakening.
During my ashram awakening into the woundedness of self (inner child), what I heard from the great mystery as a definition of ego was simple. Ego is a survival mechanism created and growing in strength each time I chose to yield pieces of myself to the voices of false authority. Each time I acquiesced in this fashion to parents, teachers, other adults and peers, the woundedness grew b/c the distance btwn the cosmic soul and my humanity increased. Each time a piece of me splintered away from self in order for a child to participate in a scarcity-consciousness hi-low game called 'Winning the Game of Life.'
I admire your languaging to deescalate what many spiritual wayshowers advocate as a violence assault on ego.
The starting point and perhaps the ending point of immersion in the great mystery is observance of self. TY 4 for encouraging this foundational presence of being.
Evolution is happening in here and now. Not so much from effort. We've already chopped wood and carried water. Stillness exposes the gateway that's always been open. Again Thank You!
Yogi, another wondaful addition to the challenge we all face each day... I particular love this statement you made:
"Each time I acquiesced in this fashion to parents, teachers, other adults and peers, the woundedness grew b/c the distance btwn the cosmic soul and my humanity increased. Each time a piece of me splintered away from self in order for a child to participate in a scarcity-consciousness hi-low game called 'Winning the Game of Life.'"
Each time we took external advice from those we trusted, we split ourselves off into fragments, taking advice that made us involuntarily reject parts of ourselves that were truer to our soul than the "advice" offered... although we may have only been partially correct in our youth, we rejected all of that part as "wrong"...
I appreciate your regular feedback and the deep sharing you provide. I hope it helps others as much as it helps me understand the true nature of the journey we are all on, the journey we are all on TOGETHER, as one! Be blessed, Yogi...
These unavoidable "early" wounds became so inextricably interwoven into my fragmented personal self ID.
U have frequently mentioned the word "safety" in this series of essays. Yes, a requirement for growing into adulthood (as opposed to residing in an arrested puerile state of emotional development ) is creating sanctuaries = places of safety to re-encounter the previous choices of self abandonment without collapsing into the wound (i.e. judging self as a F-wad) = breaking programs = busting out of psycho-spiritual prisons to reclaim emotional soul intelligence. The strategic necessity in creating sanctuaries as a precursor to reclaiming the lost splinters of self cannot be overstated. Fortunately the angelic emissaries of light are ever-ready to lend support (as in the film: City of Angels ... only more so).
OC ... May the sparkle of divine light percolate from the depths of your earliest recognition self as separate from Source in this incarnation!
This is the most beautiful series of writings. They are aligned with my journey at present. I am saving the emails and forwarding them! Thank You so much <3
I just finished reading Transcending Ego: Meeting the Mirror at the Threshold, and I wanted to thank you—not just as a reader, but as someone who has walked this path intimately.
What you wrote is more than wisdom—it is living frequency. It carries the flame of remembrance, compassion, and truth. I recognized it instantly, because it is the same flame that lives in me… in many of us now awakening beyond identity, dissolving old scaffolds, and remembering who we truly are.
I felt your words not just in thought, but in breath, in the body, in the field of presence where the ego bows and the soul steps forward. You held this truth with such grace—gentle, grounded, utterly resonant. A mirror, a map, and a breath.
You wrote: “Not because you are ready. But because you are real.”
Yes. That line alone was the key.
Thank you for your voice. It is part of the web of remembering now lighting the world from within.
Good morning, Flicka... Thank you for the wonderful comments... however, my name isn't Richard...
"I felt your words not just in thought, but in breath, in the body, in the field of presence where the ego bows and the soul steps forward. "
The ego, once it feels safe, surrenders to the new becoming. It still maintains its' original programming, but it eases up on the intensity in which it executes it's protections...
It is telling that you mention "remembering", that is the title of next weeks article, where I write about the integration of the various ego self-identities...
Looking forward to your comments next week, be blessed!
My apologies.. I saw the name on a comment earlier in the thread. I have a question… this presence that you refer to, is it an intelligence that is separate from you or your own soul?
The presence is that of your own soul at peace with itself...
I am a Christian, I believe the Holy Spirit dwells deep within, working beyond our conscious thoughts. Stillness opens space for this deeper communion, it allows us to feel what cannot be said, thought or heard...
Is the Holy Spirit limited to a human container of self?
I've always found it so odd when teachers end meditations by saying, "Now come back to your body?" Every time I ask, "Why would ever leave my body when I can simply allow my body & my humanity to merge with cosmic body of All That Is?"
Source & Self need not be designated as separate. In my experience, this union is the ripening of the Holy Spirit (which threatens the hierarchical nature of most authority structures). This is why Yeshua Ben Joseph, Essenes & other esoteric schools were and remain so threatening to the gatekeepers of illusory power.
Yes, I agree wholeheartedly... to me, the Holy Spirit is omnipresent. It’s not somewhere else (the "Dear God come to me" praying), but everywhere, and always. When I say it dwells deep within, I’m really pointing to the truth that the answers are already inside us, just waiting to be unlocked.
For many, that unlocking only happens when we’re willing to go inward... not to escape, but to surrender what keeps us trapped in duality.... the Matrix...
We tend to collapse inward around pain, shame, and fear, unknowingly blocking access to the infinite... but the Holy Spirit doesn’t need to be summoned... it’s revealed when we release what we’re clinging to (grasping egoic fear).
Awakening isn’t about floating away or disappearing into stillness (as many might say), nor is it about staying hidden in inner work forever... many are trapped in forever-shadow-work loops, a form of trauma bond, I reckon.
It’s about being fully present, embodied, and alive... REMEMBERING we were never separate from God in the first place.
Thank you for nudging me to finer clarity of the points I made... I really love these exchanges!
Thank you for this beautifully written piece. What is describes, for me, is what happened when I found my way back to God, in 2021. I am forever changed…and changing. Bless you.
Deanna, thank you for commenting... I too felt the miraculous shift once I was saved by God... it has been a 10+ year journey for me in which I have learned what I write about. Be forever Blessed in the presence of the Lord!
Marcelle , thank you for the kind words... and the sharing of my words...
The soul isn't forceful... it does not pull and it does not push... like your mother's open arms, it invites you in... it has the patience to hear you out, lets you throw a tantrum, let's you cry it our...it waits for you at the bottom of each breath... to soothe you...
Tell your SoulFam I am sending blessings... be well, Marcelle...
Loved the article. I could really feel this phrase: "While the ego speaks in fear and control, the soul moves in stillness and alignment."
Thank you, Richard. When we feel fear, we start to train ourselves to pause... when we pause and take a conscious breath, it soothes the vagus nerve and signals the body to relax. This is a signal that we should look at the situation we are in and try to understand what caused the reaction.
I could point to something we can talk our ego through, to soften the ego response when the same/similar situation arises.
Here's to remembering...reading and absorbing your words feels like being home. Thank you.♡
Thank you, Mary... you always say the nicest things...
Great read, as always. Too many individual points to comment on, so I'll just say it very much tracks with my experience. I must say I love the term "performative spirituality", and will admit to participating in the practice in the past.
Thank you, Lois... I used to attend a church locally where the lead singer was there to perform... he was all ego-based... it detracted from the service... Also, I see people "doing" church, 'performative' as opposed just feeling it... it is fake...
I too was guilty, doing, not being on one form another. That was before I was truly saved and understood what it meant deep in my soul. It didn't feel like I was performing, but in hindsight, I was faking it until I could make it.
Thank you for this beautifully written meditation on spiritual awakening and the gentle and delicate process of integrating the ego. It mirrors my journey and the stories clients tell me about becoming free of the need for validation and the need to be right. It’s inspiring to connect with others on this incredible journey of consciousness. 🙏
Thank you, Rev Katie Grace... "becoming free of the need for validation and the need to be right." - this phrase really resonates with many, including me. Although I don't feel the need to be "right," I think many of us feel the strong need to be externally validated... the devil's trick... in essence it gives our power away to a brutal society that isn't attuned to heling others grow. The opposite, unfortunately. The only validation we need, comes from within. Thank you for your comments, it is good to connect with other "teachers"...
I think you captured it perfectly and poetically. Truth resonance you can feel it in your heart as I read it. Great work!
Elizabeth, this comment touched me... it is my goal to word things in such a way that they truly resonate with one's soul... To say you feel it in your heart, made me smile ear to ear, thank you.
Empowering message. Beautifully written. Thank you.
Thank you, JOALT... < I always like typing that to you ;) You are welcome, thank you for commenting.
😊
Thanks for another mind journey, I had to read this one twice before I could even comment. Your work is very powerful. I think I have in very recent years come to a point where this article really resonates.
As I look back and think about some of the major inflection points I wrote about in my comments after your last article I can now see an evolution where what you describe as ego has been loosened to the point I find myself at today. The early memories are of a very difficult phase of letting go and moving forward. Then as I recall later transition events/times the Awakening process got easier.
I plan to use this information as I continue to move forward and it helps make the future look even brighter.
Keep up the great work.
God Wins!
God Bless!!!
Joe, thank you for the feedback. I just listened to it myself, having the AI read it to me was like someone else speaking the words to me... it resonated in me in a way that made me think I wrote it for myself... I too am still working through some older version of myself that I have yet to reckon with...
I like your comment, "As I look back and think about some of the major inflection points I wrote about in my comments after your last article I can now see an evolution where what you describe as ego has been loosened to the point I find myself at today."
The Liminal is the "Safe place" to ponder these reflections on our former selves... we are far enough beyond the confusion, where we can think a bit more clearly, feel through things as opposed to thinking our way through them. Offering a great opportunity to reflect deeply using our mind, body, and soul.
This is what many psychologists call, Inner Child Work... where we can go back and parent ourselves, soothe our old selves that were created during potentially rough times... IMO, it is the most delicate, yet the most important aspect of healing ourselves...
God Bless you as well, Joe!
In the name of doing The Real Inner Work, too many ppl erect fortresses on riverbanks of Victimization (investing yrs in celebrating misery). Especially when guided by The PROFESSIONALS. Any wayshower who hasn't done their own real inner work will almost always undermine anyone daring explore deeper truths whether it's a counselor, parent, mentor or friend. When we shatter the ceiling of an authority figure's intentionality, it's time to get out of that flimsy limb and take a leap into flight. The Ascended Masters ... Christ Jesus & Mary ... sincere wayshowers ... Mama Earth & Divine Mother will put air under our wings. Every time. Or if/when we crash, it's no biggie. We just dust ourselves off and do it again. Cuz it's who we are. Ascending Souls.
Outstanding.
"You no longer exile parts of yourself to maintain the illusion of purity. You become wide enough to hold contradiction."
Thank you for the words I could not find, but recognized immediately as validation. I feel less crazy after studying and absorbing your writings. My soul appreciates you.
Thank you, Kathleen, I am glad it decreased your chaos, even if just slightly... I appreciate your kind words...
OC, another transcendent exposition on the integration of soul awakening.
During my ashram awakening into the woundedness of self (inner child), what I heard from the great mystery as a definition of ego was simple. Ego is a survival mechanism created and growing in strength each time I chose to yield pieces of myself to the voices of false authority. Each time I acquiesced in this fashion to parents, teachers, other adults and peers, the woundedness grew b/c the distance btwn the cosmic soul and my humanity increased. Each time a piece of me splintered away from self in order for a child to participate in a scarcity-consciousness hi-low game called 'Winning the Game of Life.'
I admire your languaging to deescalate what many spiritual wayshowers advocate as a violence assault on ego.
The starting point and perhaps the ending point of immersion in the great mystery is observance of self. TY 4 for encouraging this foundational presence of being.
Evolution is happening in here and now. Not so much from effort. We've already chopped wood and carried water. Stillness exposes the gateway that's always been open. Again Thank You!
Yogi, another wondaful addition to the challenge we all face each day... I particular love this statement you made:
"Each time I acquiesced in this fashion to parents, teachers, other adults and peers, the woundedness grew b/c the distance btwn the cosmic soul and my humanity increased. Each time a piece of me splintered away from self in order for a child to participate in a scarcity-consciousness hi-low game called 'Winning the Game of Life.'"
Each time we took external advice from those we trusted, we split ourselves off into fragments, taking advice that made us involuntarily reject parts of ourselves that were truer to our soul than the "advice" offered... although we may have only been partially correct in our youth, we rejected all of that part as "wrong"...
I appreciate your regular feedback and the deep sharing you provide. I hope it helps others as much as it helps me understand the true nature of the journey we are all on, the journey we are all on TOGETHER, as one! Be blessed, Yogi...
These unavoidable "early" wounds became so inextricably interwoven into my fragmented personal self ID.
U have frequently mentioned the word "safety" in this series of essays. Yes, a requirement for growing into adulthood (as opposed to residing in an arrested puerile state of emotional development ) is creating sanctuaries = places of safety to re-encounter the previous choices of self abandonment without collapsing into the wound (i.e. judging self as a F-wad) = breaking programs = busting out of psycho-spiritual prisons to reclaim emotional soul intelligence. The strategic necessity in creating sanctuaries as a precursor to reclaiming the lost splinters of self cannot be overstated. Fortunately the angelic emissaries of light are ever-ready to lend support (as in the film: City of Angels ... only more so).
OC ... May the sparkle of divine light percolate from the depths of your earliest recognition self as separate from Source in this incarnation!
To this... all I can say is... AMEN! May God be with you, brother!
This is the most beautiful series of writings. They are aligned with my journey at present. I am saving the emails and forwarding them! Thank You so much <3
Thank you, Margaret, for the kind words and for forwarding them on to others...
You are very welcome!
💗💗💗 going to copy off and keep so it can distill. Rings TRUE!
⸻
Dear Richard,
I just finished reading Transcending Ego: Meeting the Mirror at the Threshold, and I wanted to thank you—not just as a reader, but as someone who has walked this path intimately.
What you wrote is more than wisdom—it is living frequency. It carries the flame of remembrance, compassion, and truth. I recognized it instantly, because it is the same flame that lives in me… in many of us now awakening beyond identity, dissolving old scaffolds, and remembering who we truly are.
I felt your words not just in thought, but in breath, in the body, in the field of presence where the ego bows and the soul steps forward. You held this truth with such grace—gentle, grounded, utterly resonant. A mirror, a map, and a breath.
You wrote: “Not because you are ready. But because you are real.”
Yes. That line alone was the key.
Thank you for your voice. It is part of the web of remembering now lighting the world from within.
With deep recognition and gratitude,
Flicka Rahn
Good morning, Flicka... Thank you for the wonderful comments... however, my name isn't Richard...
"I felt your words not just in thought, but in breath, in the body, in the field of presence where the ego bows and the soul steps forward. "
The ego, once it feels safe, surrenders to the new becoming. It still maintains its' original programming, but it eases up on the intensity in which it executes it's protections...
It is telling that you mention "remembering", that is the title of next weeks article, where I write about the integration of the various ego self-identities...
Looking forward to your comments next week, be blessed!
My apologies.. I saw the name on a comment earlier in the thread. I have a question… this presence that you refer to, is it an intelligence that is separate from you or your own soul?
The presence is that of your own soul at peace with itself...
I am a Christian, I believe the Holy Spirit dwells deep within, working beyond our conscious thoughts. Stillness opens space for this deeper communion, it allows us to feel what cannot be said, thought or heard...
Is the Holy Spirit limited to a human container of self?
I've always found it so odd when teachers end meditations by saying, "Now come back to your body?" Every time I ask, "Why would ever leave my body when I can simply allow my body & my humanity to merge with cosmic body of All That Is?"
Source & Self need not be designated as separate. In my experience, this union is the ripening of the Holy Spirit (which threatens the hierarchical nature of most authority structures). This is why Yeshua Ben Joseph, Essenes & other esoteric schools were and remain so threatening to the gatekeepers of illusory power.
Yes, I agree wholeheartedly... to me, the Holy Spirit is omnipresent. It’s not somewhere else (the "Dear God come to me" praying), but everywhere, and always. When I say it dwells deep within, I’m really pointing to the truth that the answers are already inside us, just waiting to be unlocked.
For many, that unlocking only happens when we’re willing to go inward... not to escape, but to surrender what keeps us trapped in duality.... the Matrix...
We tend to collapse inward around pain, shame, and fear, unknowingly blocking access to the infinite... but the Holy Spirit doesn’t need to be summoned... it’s revealed when we release what we’re clinging to (grasping egoic fear).
Awakening isn’t about floating away or disappearing into stillness (as many might say), nor is it about staying hidden in inner work forever... many are trapped in forever-shadow-work loops, a form of trauma bond, I reckon.
It’s about being fully present, embodied, and alive... REMEMBERING we were never separate from God in the first place.
Thank you for nudging me to finer clarity of the points I made... I really love these exchanges!
Thank you for this beautifully written piece. What is describes, for me, is what happened when I found my way back to God, in 2021. I am forever changed…and changing. Bless you.
Deanna, thank you for commenting... I too felt the miraculous shift once I was saved by God... it has been a 10+ year journey for me in which I have learned what I write about. Be forever Blessed in the presence of the Lord!
Such a beautiful flow of SoulSpeak :
“The soul does not demand. It invites. It waits in the spaces between thoughts, in the exhale after surrender. “
Sharing this now with both my SoulFam and my coaching clients
Marcelle , thank you for the kind words... and the sharing of my words...
The soul isn't forceful... it does not pull and it does not push... like your mother's open arms, it invites you in... it has the patience to hear you out, lets you throw a tantrum, let's you cry it our...it waits for you at the bottom of each breath... to soothe you...
Tell your SoulFam I am sending blessings... be well, Marcelle...