The Ego versus Love

A young man, in really bad shape, came to me for advice. Everything seemed to be going wrong in his life – he suffered from recurrent allergies, he was jobless, penniless and very lonely. The very first diagnostic check-up was enough for me to unveil the cause.

Allergy is a response by the emotional system trying to get rid of repressed emotions. His mind was pointing to a deeply-rooted fear. The young man had been under tremendous pressure to grow up and be on his own. It was only natural though, given his age and the circumstances – he had lost his father, and his mother was rather old.

The fear of taking responsibility for his own life was getting the best of him – he didn’t want to grow up, and his allergy was a subconscious method to get compassion, support and attention. It was his cry for love, as he came to realise under pressure, how lonely he had been. He didn’t want to change though, the spoilt, arrogant young man he had been, but he still longed for love. The situation was getting worse, he had withdrawn into a shell, and everything just collapsed.

I unearthed the truths he had been avoiding to face. He’s intelligent, but in his case it was rather a flaw than an asset, as the ego had his intelligence under control, finding excuses for any situation that might have changed him.

I suggested an experiment he should try: for two weeks he was supposed to live under the rules that differed from his own, the common sense rules in accord with the rules of the universe.

His medical condition was the first to improve, very quickly at that, as his allergy had gone. He found a job, and spontaneously started a relationship with a girl he met there.

For a while, the ego had been tamed by the force of evidence and practical application. Having made a choice, he asked me to teach him the skill of living, and I accepted. I gave him a guidebook and a homework. The problem seemed to be solved, because he appeared perfectly capable of living his life and taking care of himself. I was wrong.

Barely a month had passed and there he was, back in my office, with the guidebook in his hands. He opened the middle section, and I could see the pages scribbled all over with notes, and a couple of paragraphs completely rewritten!

“Why did you do it?” I asked.

“I’m getting bad again. I’ve lost the girl, and the job!” he said, in a judgmental tone of voice. “I’ve rewritten the book, because I can’t agree with the essence of it!”

“If yours had been the right way to live your life, you would have never come to me. We wouldn’t have met! What you changed in the guidebook and within yourself, that was the essence, teaching you how to be healthy, how to have healthy emotions, job and money. You are right back to where you started, yet you are here, asking me what’s wrong? Go home, and think again. Carefully.”

He didn’t say a word, looking at me as if I was the reason behind all his troubles in life.

If you say that your life is fine as it is, and refuse to change anything, you’re just advertising your own ignorance, weaknesses and cowardice.

I had a very similar experience with an older woman. She had come to me with severe pains in her wrists. It was so strong that she couldn’t move her hands. Her medical tests had come back fine, and having diagnosed her as a hypochondriac, her doctors sent her home. My examination proved the pain was real, but not only that – I knew exactly where the cause of the mysterious pain laid.

“You can’t move your wrists, and your hands are stiff. The reason why is that you’ve become emotionally rigid, making your wrists as inflexible!” the woman was looking right into my eyes, her husband gazing intensely at her.

Joint inflammation indicates resistance to emotivity. She, for one, found it very difficult to embrace her emotions. The ego can often offer an excuse, and we compensate by being cruel to the very same people we should normally show our emotions to. As if they are the source of our problem, while it’s exactly the other way round. That’s also why the energy stagnates in joints. In other words, we draw the energy out of the wrists, which normally send it from the heart to the hands, and that’s how we can express our attention and love. The wrists also make it possible for us to express our creativity and work energy. If a wrist is dysfunctional, it may be from fear of expressing that energy, from anger or resistance to it.

Her husband was right there, and she couldn’t contradict my words. It was easy to find the cause of the behavior disorder, and the difficulties she had had in expressing her emotions. She had been selfish, and wanted a constant flow of attention for herself. Her grown up children had lives of their own, which triggered her cruel behavior – she would accuse her family of not giving to her what she had denied them first – love and emotions. Her homework was extremely simple and straightforward:

She needed to stop being selfish, understand and love the people close to her, instead of accusing them repeatedly. We all agreed that her husband should be a supervisor of sorts. I was going to see her again the following week.

The second she walked through the door, she opened fire on me:

“I am so angry at you! My wrists hurt! You’ve done a lousy job, and I’m still in pain!”

“She didn’t do a single thing you had told her to do. She’s acted even worse, treating us all more viciously than before!” her daughter said, walking in seconds after her.

“Get out! You want to suffer, and you deserve the pain! I won’t let you waste my time, and ruin it for those who really want to help themselves!

You can’t expect progress and results if you continue to act and think the same way!