Ego + Identity Deaths Amidst Big Changes
Wrapping my mind around being pregnant and all the upcoming changes that this will mean for me and my family has been a lot to digest.
It feels like I’m slowly starting to have my feet underneath me again.
Transitions
I’m reminded how with each new stage, each transition, there is an identity (and likely an ego death) required.
And make no mistake about it, life is really one big transition after another, amiright?
We would like to get to the other side without the dying, but it’s impossible. New life doesn’t emerge without death.
This is true whether the transition is something that is good, desirable, and sought after, or the transition is something that feels like it has happened *to* you.
Although I have undergone a major faith deconstruction and reconstruction in the past few years, Christ is still the universal archetype that is the guiding force for my life.
Life, death, and resurrection is the universal blueprint of life that is inescapable, and it happens many, many times in our lifetime.
The only real question is whether or not we fight it, which only makes the process longer and more painful, or if we surrender to the dying, trusting in new life to emerge.
Identity + Ego Death
Amidst my current transition, this is what I’ve been digesting and slowly allowing to break down within me:
I have identified so deeply with my role as a coach and my ability to help others with my business.
This isn’t *bad*, and it truly comes from a place of desire to serve and to wholly use my gifts in the world to help others.
When I coach I feel like I’m doing what I was created to do and allowing myself to be a unique expression and instrument of the divine.
*And* simultaneously, there has been a lot of ego hiding in it, even from me, until I was faced with this transition that I don’t quite yet know how anything is going to look on the other side.
The ego of striving after success, status, purpose from that success, and to not to be financially dependent.
This stuff is fucking painful to look at.
Being honest with ourselves is often painful (temporarily), but it’s incredibly liberating.
Shadow work can be so tricky–the way the ego can hide amidst our true purpose, passion, and gifts and be all wrapped up together in one big ball of yarn, hidden until there is a death required.
I share this with you because I’m a fellow human with you on this journey, and I’m not immune to cycles of transitions, identity, and ego deaths.
I have no shame around it or sharing this with you, because it’s all just part of the human experience that we all share.
The Gift In The Dying
Life/God/The Universe/The Divine/Source–whatever works for you and your understanding, wants you to be FREE.
Really, really free.
Ridiculously free.
And often that freedom requires the painful process of an identity + ego death.
On the other side of this transition for me, though incredibly painful, is the freedom to enjoy my purpose and giftings without the snare of ego attached to success and financial independence.
This requires surrender.
I am consciously choosing to surrender to getting my purpose from just *being*.
I am consciously choosing to surrender to allowing myself to be financially supported.
This surrender purifies and allows me to have the thing that I paradoxically thought I was losing, in a more potent form.
The Feminine
This cycle of life, death, and resurrection, with the surrendering to the season, feels incredibly laced with the feminine to me.
As a woman, we cycle with the moon every 28 days or so. We are cyclical beings that experience our own summer, fall, winter, and spring every single month.
Growing up seeped in patriarchy, I am well versed on living primarily from my masculine essence (as human beings we all have both masculine and feminine energies)-produce, hustle, achieve–and don’t you dare rest.
By choosing to surrender to this season, by letting go of these identities and ego that is no longer serving me, I am honoring my feminine essence.
I surrender into what this season is asking of me.
I allow the death, trusting in new life on the other side.
And something about that feels incredibly healing and integral to my wholeness, bringing a soul-quenching balance of the feminine essence to my life.
What Identities Need to Die In You?
No doubt, you likely aren’t going through the exact same transitions I am right now, but we are all undergoing transitions throughout our life.
I am reminded of one my former coaches + mentors who I greatly respect, Madison Morrigan’s, question that she ends all of her podcast episodes with:
What identities have you had to let go of in order to live your fullness today?
For me, I’ve had to let go of Good Girl, People-Pleaser, Codependent, “The Responsible One”, “The Fixer”, The Overachiever, and now life is asking for me to let go of more identities for me to be even more free.
Instead of fighting it, feeling like something has “gone wrong”, or falsely clinging to control that is only an illusion, I choose to surrender, knowing that it’s being done for my ultimate freedom and benefit.
This has been my prayer amidst this season (borrow it if it feels life-giving to you):
May it strip me and break me of all that needs to go in order for me to be more whole and complete, and may it be as gentle and joyful as possible.
May the old identities and ego that needs to die, die, and a new me be born.
May I cling to nothing.
May I choose to yield to the season I’m in rather than fighting it.
May it reveal more of the true me, to myself and others.
And may it be as gentle and joyful as possible.
Reflection Questions:
What identities are currently needing to die in order for me to live my fullness?
What do I need to surrender to and stop fighting?
What kind of support do I need to allow myself to have in order for this to be as easeful and joyful as possible?
Where have I been making this process or myself “wrong” just because it’s difficult?
Feel free to comment below and let me know what landed for you from this post. I always love hearing from you and respond personally.
