Why We Must Love Our Passion More Than Our Ego

For the first thirty-one years of my life, I did not recognize my ego.
Nor my core passion.
Nor the underlying purpose of my existence.

I was confined by the walls of the world’s opinion and its expectations of me.
I was defining myself by the prestigious facade of my profession.
The prestige of my brand, which was simultaneously increasing my own value and inflating my ego in the same strike, was my illusory mantel of self-worth.
Whenever I would go in a pitiful cycle of self-deprecation, my ego would kindly remind me that I was working for the most prestigious brand in the world, thus resurrecting my sense of fake grandiosity. But of my own self, I was worth very little.

My false paradigm for self-preservation vanished when I unveiled the authentic cradle of my passion, the gospel of my soul.
Writing.
I am a word crafter with the aim of awakening the loving genius within each soul.
The power of the written and spoken word is my ultimate device to impart my passion unto the souls of this world.

When I awakened to my fervent mission as a writer, the so-called writer’s block stiffened my newfound excitement.
The idea of sitting in front of a pure, silent, white page was the death of me.
I did not make any writerly move for nearly six months.
I did not love my passion enough, then.
I was a lover of the ego. Its venerating subject. Obeying its every turn and trick.

Who was I kidding? Me, a writer? Absolutely Not.
I was too preoccupied feeding my masterful fear and starving my soul.
Although I’d retained 30 years worth of life wisdom, I had decided that my words were worthless and purposeless.
I would find every excuse in the book not to write.

One supremely courageous evening, I decided to write a letter to my 12 year-old orphan self.
If I could not write for the world, then I would write for myself.
In the safe intimacy of my mental haven.
I did not intend to bless anyone with my letter aside from my 12 year-old dismantled heart and my 33 year-old artistic self.

I decided to leap into the writerly world of prose alchemy, with my heart on the loose.
Doubts had no room to barge in my mind as it was crowded out with the voice for love; hurling a wholehearted address that could embalm my broken heart only.
Who was going to win?
My little self chained in insufferable fear or my selfless self who cared about something bigger than her fears.

Upon the chain reaction of glad and grateful readers, I reclaimed my passion.
I had learned to love my craft more than the dependence on external appraising.
External praise became inconsequential because I was doing what I loved most.
Rejection could no longer tarnish my sacred arena because the act of writing was the end in itself.
I was writing for the sake of prosing, which in turn transformed my writerly voice.
I climbed all the way to the top of my fear trail, categorically owning my authenticity, bereft of my ego’s pathetic opinion.

Whenever I sense the onset of artistic victimization arise, I recall that my commitment to my craft is far greater than my petty ego.
I will be a writer until my last breath.
My allegiance to writing will always make my heart beat and my soul reveal in joy.

When you play small, call upon your love for your passion and let it harness your ego.

Lyna Jones