Raise your hand if you like being sneakily diverted from your spiritual path by your own mind

 OK, part 2/the ending (maybe, we'll see how long it ends up going)

So, the final night, the spiritual teacher was taking questions. Lots of questions. I had been wanting to raise my hand, I had questions I wanted to ask, especially about my job search, but again, I was afraid that this person with their keen intuition and awareness would see right through me and scold me for 'being bad.'

However, I had at some point that day realized that the part of me that didn't want to be seen by this probably enlightened individual was my ego. Ego in the enlightenment sense, the false sense of I that is afraid of it's own dissolution (which will happen with enlightenment, since that's the realization of your true self.) and so, somehow, is able to act like a very intelligent saboteur to your attempts at enlightenment. It's kind of fascinating how it seems like there is a second living entity within you that is sabotaging you from your goal of enlightenment, when in fact there is just your own mind, no one else home, but it really does feel like there is someone working against you sometimes. Perhaps I should say me, I don't know if you experience this.

However, many people on the spiritual path do. Whether it actually feels like someone else in your head fighting you or just your own unhelpful patterns, the fact is there's often great resistance to doing things that would move you powerfully towards your own self realization. And apparently, the closer you get to enlightenment, the more tricky, subtle, and in some ways powerful, this inner enemy becomes. Perhaps it's simply that you've seen through all the simple tricks, so they may still be getting triggered, but they're not stopping you, so when something finally does stop you, it's because it's something really powerful. Theory. Anyhoo:

I realize that the part of me that was afraid to raise my hand and be seen, was my ego, trying to keep me from doing something that might significantly diminish it. And that felt like fear. But that voice was the last thing I wanted to listen to, because it was (is) diametrically opposed to my #1 most important goal in life, being the world's greatest cheese connoisseur. 

Joking :-) 

It's enlightenment. It's always enlightenment.

Anyways, if there is a voice diametrically opposed to my #1 goal, then unless it learns reverse psychology (not so far), if it tells me to run away and be afraid of something, that is most certainly not what I should do.

So, my ego is afraid of raising my hand and talking to the enlightened person? Then I'm definitely going to do it.

So I did.

End part 2 🤣