Beyond Morality: Beauty in the Ugliness

The suffering self

An image of what I saw in creative visualization. This large, black blog was suffering, imprisoned in an electric fence. This “moral” guy (aka the ego) had him imprisoned, and had lots of idols on the walls, like a Buddha statue. I freed the blob and shattered all the statues.

I don’t know what to say. In fact, I’m not sure I even want to post anything. But I still have something to share today, and I’d be a fool not to. Ok, maybe not a fool. I’d just be me, but I’m going to share it anyway.

Sometimes, we get so invested in becoming good by our definition of it that we ignore our own suffering. We struggle and strive for an ideal that we forget ourselves, in all our darkness, moodiness, suffering, desires, insecurities and fears. When we desire something intensely that we don’t have instead of tending what is within us, it can be like putting ourselves in a cage. We want to become not-ourselves. We want to transform ourselves into only that which is good, rather than seeing the beauty in the real, untransformed us.

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Distinguishing Your Ego, the Hidden Controller

The Ego

The ego can be quite an unreasonable perfectionist.

Recently, I met with my ego. This side of myself is familiar enough that it didn’t feel like a meeting, but it was the first extended meeting on paper in a long time.

I have been wrestling since this encounter to put into words just what the ego is all about and what you can do about it, but nothing seemed right. However, I will share the few thoughts I do have about this side of one’s self, and you can decide if it’s valuable or not.

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Why You Should Bother to Accept Yourself

It can be all too easy to make the mistake that, just because something is inside of you, you can do whatever you want to it. “It’s just a feeling, I can push past it” we might think. “I shouldn’t be afraid, I’m not a coward.” “I’m going to stick to my plan, no matter what!”

…”My feelings aren’t right”, we think, all too easily.

Why Not Accepting Yourself is a Problem

When you step all over yourself no matter how you feel, you might end up achieving a lot. You might make a lot of money. You might win a world record in pie eating. You might also end up with a stomach ache.

A Lack Of Acceptance


Sometimes, the judgement of the mind can go a little too far.

Your feelings have their own reason for being– sometimes your mind doesn’t have it all figured out. You may think you have it all figured out, but just remember, the same voice that says “This doesn’t feel right” can also say “I’m unhappy”. And the less you listen to it, the less happy you’ll be.

Nevermind the brainwashing you can do to yourself. If you’re a logical kind of person, you can end up thinking your way into doing whatever your logical side wants to do all the time. But maybe it doesn’t feel right. If you just stick with logic, you’ll get disconnected from life. You’ll trick yourself into thinking it’s right to live exactly as you are. But slowly the feeling of really being alive and free will trickle out of you. Maybe it already has.

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Avoiding Pity Control

Discovered that one of the most important ways to not be controlled by others is to not give in to being manipulated by pity. People can use the fact that they don’t love themselves, that they want a friend, as a means to control others into remaining their friends, or doing things the other person would rather not do.
“What?? I knew it! You DO hate me!! T_T”
No, it’s just that you want to do something else, or that you dont like the same things as the other person, and want to go elsewhere.
On the other end – learn to love yourself, and you won’t have the compulsion to control.