Mind, intellect, memory and ego are four aspects of the mind. Mind is that through which you perceive, you feel. That, which goes out through the five senses and experiences is mind. Intellect is the judging or discriminating aspect. As you experience something you say, ‘oh, this is good, this is not good, I want this, I don’t want that’; you are going into a dialogue, this is intellect. Memory is that which stores all this information. So sometimes when you experience something you feel, ‘oh! I have experienced this before’. When you enjoy apple pie, not for the first time, you say ‘oh I have enjoyed this before, I had this pie before’. So memory is recognizing the experiences and storing it in the memory

And then comes ego. Ego is simply being unnatural, pretension, showing something that you are not.  It always needs someone else to appreciate and recognize you. Ego is – ‘I am something, I am intelligent, I am stupid, I like this, I don’t like that, I am rich, I am very poor, I am ugly or I am beautiful, I am something, I am’, that is ego.  Ego is also like a dream. You can’t call a dream real but you can’t call it unreal either, because you have experienced it.

If you find you have a big ego, don’t try to destroy it because that effort will only increase it. Let it be. Trying to meddle with your ego becomes a bigger problem. Then you say, “Look, I erased my ego!” “Nobody could do this!” It’s so difficult to get rid of the ego. It’s like saying – ‘I’m the most humble person in the world! You can’t find anyone with more humility than me!’ Does it make any sense? So if you find there is any ego, let it be like that happily. Just smile. The antidote for ego is just being natural. Be natural like a child. Ego is separateness, non belongingness, lack of maturity or knowledge. In the Bhakti Sutras, there is a sutra which says ‘knowledge is one of the aids to discover the naturalness.’

When knowledge is full, when knowledge has matured, then ego drops and simplicity dawns. Everyone is made up of love. Knowledge is an aid to develop the innermost state in you, which is love. A seed has a covering or shell over it and when you soak it in water, it sprouts and then the covering drops. In a similar manner, ego is a necessary unnaturalness that develops in you. Knowledge uncovers the shell over you and makes you like a child again – natural, simple and innocent. Once you are in a child like state, then there is no ego. To uncover the ego, practices such as yoga, meditation and breathing practices help.

Place everything where it belongs

Ego as a stiffness in you is not necessary. But, ego has its place. The reason we have ego is because it is necessary for our growth in life. Ego should be there when there is challenge and creativity. In success, drop your ego but in failure, hold on to it. You need your ego when there is a place to fight. When you think you are failing, the ego says, come on what is this, nothing can touch me. Pump up your ego when you have to face new challenges and take on new things. See, money should be in your wallet not in your mind or head. Similarly, ego should be present but not when there is love, oneness and spirituality.

Usually we say “I am miserable,” or “I am happy.” Shift this atom of ego from identifying with the body and the conceptual world, to identifying with the real world. We make a big fuss of how we feel. ‘I follow my feelings’. Feelings come and go. You feel good and a little later you feel bad about the same thing. And whatever you felt bad about, a little later you feel good about it. So, our feelings about things, good or bad, they all change. When we base our life on such temporal things, that are so impermanent, then there is no stability in our lives.

When you’re at home, you relax. When you feel ease, then ego is not there. When we are worried about what other people are saying about us, then there is ego. Even when you are doing good, there will be some people who will find fault with it. Similarly, there will be people to praise even if the person is corrupt. So, don’t worry about it. If you make a mistake, accept it. That is intelligence. In the same way, others can also make mistakes. Don’t wait for them to ask for forgiveness. You forgive and move on. Give everyone freedom to think whatever they want to think. Then you’ll find you’re so much at ease, at peace with yourself.

Life is a process of expanding the ego

When you love somebody deeply, then ego does not stay. When there is love, there is no ego because then you are very natural. When you feel a separation or distance between yourself and others, then ego arises. We don’t have ego with our family or those who are closest with us. Similarly we don’t have ego issues with people whom we don’t know at all. It happens only with people we know a little. So, when you feel a sense of belongingness with everybody else, that we all belong to each other, we are all one – then there is no ego. Patriotism is nothing but an expanded ego towards the boundaries of the land. But if that ego expands beyond territories thinking that the Earth, Universe and Divine belong to me, then comes the feeling of Aham brahmasmi – I am that; Soham– I am that.

The “I” or ego is a tiny atom. It causes heaviness, discomfort. Like an atom is inside the molecule, one that is subtler than the spirit is God. The connection is even more subtle than that between a molecule and atom. Even subtler than that is ego and that which is more subtle than that also is the mahatattva (grand element). The one whose ego has been totally dissolved, he is called Mahatma.

If this atom, the Ego is associated with the body, with matter, it identifies with matter. If it is associated with the being, the infinite, it identifies with the infinite. When this atom, the ego, identifies with the body, it becomes miserable. But when it is associated with the spirit, the Self, it becomes Divine. It becomes shakti – energy. In a huge atomic reactor, it is just one atom that has exploded. In the same way, in our whole body there is just one atom of “I.” And when this “I” explodes, it becomes the light of the Self. In‘Giridhari’ (Krishna’s name), Giri means mountain, which is ego. Ego is like the stone. The stone is not hollow and empty. Instead, it is solid. And Giridhari lifted the whole mountain with his little finger. You can’t do much work with the little finger. Lifting the mountain with the little finger means that even though the ego is like a mountain but with a little bit of love, you can lift it.

Ego does not let love flow. It desires to prove and to possess. So, be in unconditional love and then ego automatically disappears. Then you wake up and see that there is nothing to be proven and nothing to possess.