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EGO GETS THE BOOT: LETTER FOUND ON KITCHEN TABLE

3/4/2012

26 Comments

 
Dear Ego,

I’m breaking up with you. 

No more circular discussions, no more eleventh hour recriminations. We’re through. 

This is not an emotional decision. Actually, it doesn’t feel like a decision at all. 

We’ve been drifting apart for some time now, and more than anything I’m just acknowledging the distance between us. Whatever kept us together just isn’t there anymore. 


It won’t do you any good to turn on the charm. Don’t bother trying to fill my head with thoughts about how great we are together or how lost I’ll be without you. You no longer have that kind of power over me. I see right through you now. I look, and there’s nothing there.

It took me a long time to figure you out. Like so many unhappy couples I know, we drifted into our own little world and for the longest time I mistook it for reality. If you asked me to pinpoint the day this shift occurred, I couldn’t, because it happened so long ago. But I vaguely remember what life was like before I met you. Actually, it’s more a feeling than a memory, a feeling of freedom. Not an “I-have-a-whole-weekend-in-front-of-me-with-no-plans” kind of freedom, but something different altogether. It’s more a sense of spaciousness, the kind children must feel before their heads become filled with worldly nonsense, before their sense of wonder contracts, before they begin to imitate the behavior of the troubled souls around them.

I can feel that sense of spaciousness right now when I close my eyes and forget that I have a body. It’s like I’m not even a person anymore, I’m just this space that goes on forever.

I don’t expect any of this makes sense to you. It never has before. You always have to define things, slot them into categories. But this isn’t something that is easily explained. It’s beyond words-- I know, I know, you hate it when I talk like this, when I challenge your rigid view of things. You slip into this really pouty silence.

In the old days I misinterpreted that silence. I felt wrong, even a little crazy, for expressing myself. Now that silence tells me something totally different. It tells me that I threaten you. And it tells me something else, something really important. It tells me that I’m capable of living on my own. When your voice dies away, my voice appears. It's just there. It's probably been there the whole the time, but you were always drowning it out. It’s a clear voice. And strong. I’m going to be just fine without you. 

My friends think I’m crazy. They wonder what I’m going to do without you. They’ve seen what happens when we’re together, the crazy highs and lows, the bizarre behavior, but they still question my decision. This really throws me until I remind myself what it was like to live in an unhealthy relationship. The worst part is you don't think it's unhealthy. You're convinced that it's perfectly okay to be miserable all the time. Month after month, year after year, you think – it’ll get better. We'll work this out. But it doesn't get better. It can’t. Sick relationships like ours don’t get better, they just get sicker.

It’s a small world and no doubt we’ll be running into each other a bunch. I guess it’s more like “see you around” then it is “goodbye”. As long as we maintain a proper distance, we'll be fine. I need to be far enough away from you to hear my own voice. I actually wouldn’t mind your company once in a while, like when I’m fixing the sink or packing for a trip. We've always gotten along pretty well in those situations. But this time around, you’ll need an invitation. You can’t just come barging in. You don’t live here anymore.

Please pack up your stuff and leave your key on the table. When I come home later, all I want to hear is the sound of you being gone. I'm going to lose myself in the spacious silence, forget where I begin and end. You said something to me once. You said I’d be nothing without you. Remember? Well, I want to end this on a positive note by telling you that you were right. Without you, I am nothing. Nothing at all. If it weren't for all the hell I went through because of you, I'd have never arrived at that momentous conclusion. So thank you, even if you have no clue about what I just said.

Love always,




​
John Ptacek


26 Comments
Bobbi
3/8/2012 10:12:43 am

thank you for this, John. Thank you

Reply
M
3/11/2012 08:28:26 pm

So precise, relevant note, and at the same time humorous and elegant !
Besides, for me myself, some meaningful informations/confirmations about life in a couple...
Great ! :)

Reply
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5/17/2012 07:38:33 pm

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4/17/2013 05:42:35 pm

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John Ptacek
4/17/2013 06:27:52 pm

Je vous remercie et s'il vous plaît revenir !

GB
3/30/2012 05:05:15 am

This is so fun! A conversation directed at ego. Brilliant. When I left ego behind the voice remaining wasn't nearly as coherent or even... nice. It was pretty much just silent. The drifting apart phenomena, really. I invited my ego to read what you wrote so now it really gets the message. Thank you.

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John ptacek
3/30/2012 05:11:14 am

Hey GB, thanks for chiming in. Sweet, sweet silence.

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Harish
7/18/2012 01:01:38 am

Interesting to be in a relationship with ego. Haven't recognized that before. To me, Ego seems more like an accessory. A fancy footwear or clothing you adorn to make yourself attractive to yourself and a few others. And everyone outgrows it, I think. Its only a question of time as to how long it takes. Sometimes its just in there in the closet put away for many years taken out to be worn for special occassions. And when a sibling/grand-kid/a loved one picks it up, all you are left with is a sense of nostalgia and delight! :)

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John Ptacek
7/18/2012 08:32:26 pm

Harish, thank you for your thoughtful post. I am not so sure that we outgrow our egos. If this were the case, Earth in 2012 would not be such a miserable place for so many people. But it sounds like you have quite an amicable relationship with yours. Still, I'd be careful.

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Mary
9/18/2012 02:06:26 pm

so this is about ego??

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John Ptacek
9/18/2012 07:56:55 pm

Yup. This is about ego, that sinister pack of thoughts we confuse with who we really are.

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eric
9/27/2012 07:43:32 am

thank you !! exactly i have struggle with it. And right on about we confuse with who we really are.

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John Ptacek
9/27/2012 08:40:22 pm

Yes Eric, we all struggle with it until there is no one left to struggle with anything.

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swati link
10/28/2012 06:39:48 pm

Brilliantly written.
I've been trying to break up with (more like crucify) my ego for a while now. At first he didn’t get it, thinking that I was just going through a phase. He kept coming back. Pining. Luring me back into his blinding arms. I fell for his act a few times – struggling between the trade-off of disillusion comfort and vulnerable freedom. It’s okay now though, I've changed the locks.

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John Ptacek
10/29/2012 08:29:17 am

Hey Swati, it seems like we've been under the spell of the same tricky characters. Congrats on changing your locks. And if he shows up again, and he will, let him freeze on the door step while you sip hot tea watch Law & Order reruns. Ha!

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Tom Schoenhofer link
6/6/2013 11:45:24 pm

Once the heart chakra (the residence of the soul) is opened and the feminine energy allowed to flow through, it will balance out the masculine energy of the solar plexus chakra which is the will. With these two in balanced harmony, the will is then directed by the soul and not the ego any longer. The ego remains to do its one valid function which is to manifest into physicality the desires of the will.

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John Ptacekp
6/7/2013 01:53:49 am

Tom, thanks for your comment. Can you help me understand the concept of masculine and feminine energy?

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Chris Villa
7/31/2013 06:17:00 am

This journey of inner-unraveling that has taken place has been wonderful. I look back at all the "mistakes" I've made to get here, to this realization that my identity is an elaborate story I tell to myself and others. This accumulation of labels, memories, collective identities, social roles, personal identities and experiences has led me through so much personal turmoil and agony. But then to realize that I am not those things. Those are merely constructs of the mind. Who is the experiencer? That is the question that drove me to explore my inner depths. Who is the person that has identified with all these hollow props and concepts? Who was I before I was named and conditioned?

I'm not in way any saying that I've taken off all the costumes yet. This process is ongoing. And the last thing that needs to happen is that yet another identity of a "spiritual person that has transcended form" be created to replace the former self.

But things are quiet now. Quiet and open. That's the best way to describe it.

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John Ptacek
8/2/2013 07:58:07 pm

Inspiring post, Chris. Glad to know you have not ascended to a higher spiritual identity. Hooray!

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11/1/2013 01:06:58 am

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Gisela Méndez
2/2/2015 05:18:06 pm

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jimrich link
7/13/2015 04:39:42 pm

I was amused at how bad and unwanted you ego is/was. I always saw the ego as a bad thing until I read the work of Hal and Sidra Stone in which they demonstrate how important it is to understand and EMBRACE our Egos or Selves instead of trying to get rid of them. They cannot be gotten rid of them and they will go underground and then hit you from behind! If you or anyone is interested in the 'embrace your ego' system please go here: http://delos-inc.com/reading-stone.htm

Reply
John Ptacek
7/15/2015 03:18:16 am

jimrich,

I am not advocating for suppressing the ego. This would be a fool's errand. I say, "as long as we maintain a proper distance, we will be fine." My article was meant to suggest that there is more to us than our thoughts, which are the building blocks of ego. Thanks for piping in on this conversation. Please come again!

Reply
Mary Ptacek
1/27/2016 02:55:54 pm

I've thoroughly enjoyed what you have written about ego, John.
I don't know where I fit into all this, but for me, I think it's okay to say that I can live with ambiguity.

Reply
John Ptacek
1/28/2016 10:36:31 am

Aunt Mary, ambiguity implies an open mind. I say hooray for that!

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