When we are kids, we are not learning about or for ourselves, we are copying and pasting the behaviors that we experience from others.
Because we are reliant on our caregivers, their time constraints, and rules, we do not have the ability to let our true selves radiate. We are not allowed to opt out of church with our family or eat something for dinner other than what our parent cooked. As a parent, some of this dictatorship behavior is necessary to ensure the health and well-being of our children. However, if we are modeling negative choices (fast food for dinner, yelling when there is a difference of opinion, complaining about people at work), what do we expect our children to do?
They are taught that we as parents are omnipotent and omniscient. So of course they are not going to speak up to tell us that we are making choices divergent from our true nature. Therefore, they end up modeling the same behaviors: eating the same unhealthy food, screaming at us when they are upset about something, complaining or whining about homework/chores/etc.
The interesting part is that we are born with the blessing of knowing who we truly are: love. We are grounded in that as newborn babies.
Then we enter the world with all its imperfections, judgments and noise and we forget who we were created to be. We let the words we hear seep into our being and we start to question our wholeness. We start to believe that we are separate from other beings and there is something we need to “fix” about ourselves. That separation from our true nature is how our ego is born. The ego is the false persona we create and, eventually become so intertwined with, that we no longer know who we are or, even worse, we believe we are the ego. We believe the nefarious messages from society; that we are our bank account, our credit score, our friends list, our college degree, our job title. And sadly, our nature of love gets lost.
The great news is that by becoming lifelong learners we can shed our egos and return to our original state of agape love. How? By staying in the present and concentrating on using every experience as a learning tool. What we will notice by doing this is that we will stop blaming outside circumstances for our moods. We will turn inward and ask, “What is MY lesson here?”, apply it, and move on. When we are able to do this, the ego no longer has power over us and we will begin to feel the love we are shine out for others to see.
Charlie Miller is an entrepreneur, public speaker, and master basketball trainer. He has owned his business, ATTACK Basketball Academy for 7 years and is passionate about mentoring the youth of today. You can contact him by email at charlie@attackbball.com.
