So far we have studied about ego, its origin, its effects,
losses incurred due to it, types of ego, spiritually evolved people and ego,
etc. From the Issue 222, we have
started discussing various ways to reduce ego through spiritual practice. In
this Issue, we will continue that discussion.
The important components of spiritual
practice to reduce ego are:
 |
Service |
|
Sacrifice |
|
Spiritual love without
expectation (priti) |
|
Repetition (chanting*)
of The Lord’s Name |
In the last Issue 223 we
studied some points about service. In this issue we will discuss
about sacrifice and spiritual love.
Sacrifice: To be able to sacrifice and offer everything
unto God, one needs to sacrifice one’s body, mind, wealth
and ego in a stepwise manner.
Discarding selfishness is necessary to destroy ego
2.
|
Giving an
object which one likes to someone else means curbing one’s
desire. By doing so, thoughts about oneself gradually reduce
and consequently ego begins to decrease. |
3.
|
One should offer one’s
house to the Guru mentally and take care of it with the spiritual
emotion that ‘I am a trustee of His house’. Due
to this, ego about owning a house, household items, etc., begins
to decrease. |
4.
|
Making efforts to see
that the spiritual practice of performing service of other
seekers is expedited means sacrificing one’s own time. |
Spiritual love [love without expectation]: Generally in
worldly transactions, one expects something from someone He loves.
Spiritual love is to love God and each and everything created by
Him without any expectation.
1.
|
One cannot
truly love two things simultaneously. If one loves ‘I’ then
he cannot truly love God. And if one truly loves God then one
cannot love ‘I’. Hence when one loves God truly,
the love for self decreases, that is ego decreases. |
2.
|
The more one thinks of
others, the less one thinks of oneself and this helps to make
the mind expansive. In the process, we attain the state, ‘The
entire universe is my home’. |
In the next Issue we will study how chanting
helps to decrease ego.
|
