What drives us to act? What drives us to create? What drives us to learn?
Does the ego drive us or does an unknown, powerful spirit from beneath rise up within us desiring to express itself?
In short: both. I have always sensed a power, a push, a spirit which commands me to work, to learn, and to create. This is the will of Life, the I AM demanding to be expressed. The ancient americans called this the “Eagle’s Emanation” – the eagle being the life force that makes all things be and act.
Incredibly however, we can also suffer during this process of expressing our inner-art that demands to be acknowledged? The suffering is a result of the ego believing lies about our value and worth.
The first lie the ego believes is: “I am not valuable. I am not enough”
The second lie the ego believes is: “If I become important in the eyes of the world, I will finally become important – I’ll finally be enough”
Of course the ego has a million different strategies for trying to become enough. The strategies range from name dropping to perfectionism at work to acquiring as much knowledge as possible to acquiring wealth to winning recognition and awards. All these external activities the ego believes will eventually pay off and reward us with the prize of “being enough” someday. Ironically, “someday” never comes, and it never will.
Eckhart Tolle writes about one such strategy (lying) in A New Earth:
” . . . many normal people tell certain kinds of lies from time
to time in order to appear more important, more special, and to enhance this image in the mind of others: who they know, what their achievements,
abilities, and possessions are, and whatever else the ego uses to identify
with.”
In my field, technology, there is enourmous pressure to know all the latest information about all the latest technology if you have any chance of being “somebody.” The pressure is the implication that if you are not savvy on what’s going on in the tech field, and if you’re not on the cutting edge of it, you are going to get way behind the times and eventually kicked out of the industry. The technology industry changes so rapidly that folks who were once at the healm of the lastest and greatest innovations can be lagging behind in less than a year if they don’t work to keep up.
One can feel this type of pressure in any industry -the need to keep up, the need to be somebody in the huge mix, the need to be important. Sometimes we feel it strongly, and at other times, we don’t feel this pressure at all. Yet it is wise to look mindfully into our motivations in all the actions we take and in all the words we speak.
This is not a fun way to live, nor does it make work enjoyable. When you are caught in these lies, nothing you do or accomplish is ever good enough. Work becomes a chore rather than a joy. When work is not joyful, we resist it with our entire being. This resistance is suffering.
We can choose to question these lies within our head. We can question whether or not “being important” is really important? We can question whether or not we not enough right now. When we begin to see that we are enough as it is and need nothing external (approval, love, attention, important) to make us feel enough, we are then free. The freedom manifests in the ability to reside in the Will of Life to move through us; to express the art of the universe through every cell of our body. In this way we become artists. Our actions and words become a form of art. As art, our actions and words are not judged as good or bad, but respected as beautiful no matter how they appear. The form of the art is not important – it cana be a piece of music or a tax return – there are no limitations or definitions – it is all an emanation from the Eagle (Life).
