Your Ego Knows Silence Is Dangerous

Added: 2026-06-02

[00:00:00]Jonathan, speak speaking of of giving things a shape, um I do have a question and you can tell me if maybe this is something that I should speak with with you separately about or whatnot. Um two things actually. Uh there's a part of me that is highly has been lately highly resistant to spending quiet having quiet periods during the day like going into meditation and I don't understand why and I'm just wondering if you've heard other people saying that saying having an issue with that this meditation I I get I get quiet I have that beautiful experience and yet outwardly there's a part of me that is incredibly resistant to to it and I don't know why.

[00:00:46]>> And then the other thing is I noticed is that I'm not getting blatant thoughts rising up in my head, but it's almost like I'm getting a ghost or a whisper of a thought that goes by. Like it's there, but it's so >> faint. And yet at the same time, there's a part of me that wa that is watching and sees it. Yes. these weird little >> and they're so faint. They're not blatant out andout thoughts.

[00:01:19]>> Yeah, I gotcha. I could I can relate.

[00:01:22]So, let's let's go let's let's start with the second one first. I I would say both from my own, you know, genuinely personal experience, but also just from my perspective that yes, I can relate to that that in moments of quiet there's there there's there's almost a way this this wave. I think of it as a like a literally like a wave like this um like the you know the frequency of thought sort of forms itself into a half thought and kind of appears and then the the wave crests and falls away again and it's just kind of they kind of rise and fall like that sometimes and like you said beautifully kind of half formed not even fully formed sometimes a little more sometimes a little less da da da I mean first of all I think we can it's it's really reasonable to look at that and go, "Oh, that's that's just how brains work." I mean, it's just a thing that happens. You know, when air gets to a certain temperature, you reach a due point and there's dew on the grass. It's just how it works. And so, the fact that it arises, there's there's no, you know, judging it good or bad or or anything like that. judging it really in any way would be as unnecessary as getting upset that there was dew on the grass this morning. Um it's just how it works sometimes. Another part of that kind of experience I can relate to greatly and I I'll I'm quite sure they're um maybe maybe everyone on the screen with us today can relate to having a moment where they did take that backward step into that kind of witness awareness and could see their mind almost like a television that's been left on in the background. Like it's still kind of squawking, you know, no one's paying attention. We don't even know what channel it's on. It's just like there's this some talking head blah blah blah something happening. And again, it's just kind of it's just kind of squawking in the background.

[00:03:22]And is there anything particularly wrong with that? No, not really. In a similar way to that half-formed rising and falling, that too can just simply be, you know, seen for what it really is, which is this sort of impersonally blaring squawk box that's just doing what it does.

[00:03:46]Sometimes that's a just a simply help helpful way to look at it.

[00:03:50]the the common denominator there is the faculty of judgment is softer and gentler than than we often carry around with us. If we jump on that and say, "Oh, I must be doing it wrong." You know, or something, that's that'll um that's quite different than just simply letting it go and observing it, if even that is necessary. Because if you leave a TV on in the background long enough, you don't really even have to observe it. Like there's a vague awareness that it's there, but you don't even have to pay attention to it.

[00:04:21]And it can be it can very much be like that.

[00:04:25]You know, as for that first one, it's another one I think probably everyone on the screen can relate to at some time or another where there's basically a part of your mind that says, "I've done the silence thing. It felt really good and for some reason right now I just don't want to." But that other part of your brain is like, "Yeah, but it's good for you. I know it's good for you. I've felt it. It was good before.

[00:04:45]It was nice. It helped me solve a thing or deal with the thing." And yet there's there's this other part of mine that really I for me anyways I can easily relate it to a slightly petulant kid that does not want to go to bed >> cuz that's the kid I was >> like but I'm not tired. I don't want to >> I don't want to go to bed.

[00:05:10]>> Well I to me it's a charming place to dig around and unpack a little bit. So put your mind back for a moment to one of those recent times. I can think of tons of reasons why you might not want to sit quietly even though we both know it might be good for you in some way or another. But what would you say?

[00:05:34]>> Oh, some something important might come up.

[00:05:37]>> Okay. Like I'd have to deal with something.

[00:05:40]>> Yeah.

[00:05:41]>> Okay. Um I can't sit quietly now.

[00:05:43]There's probably stuff I should be getting to. I'm too busy. which I should be doing, which is really dumb because I won't do them.

[00:05:52]>> Yeah. All right. That's a whole that maybe that's perhaps related yet separate issue, but probably related.

[00:05:59]Um, in fact, kind of guaranteed actually.

[00:06:03]>> What else? What? Tell me another reason.

[00:06:06]>> What else does the mind say about it?

[00:06:08]>> It's too early. It's too late. Any any variety of reasons can come up.

[00:06:14]>> I got to get out of here. I don't have time for this.

[00:06:17]>> Too much else to do. All right.

[00:06:19]>> Um, which, you know, that's a beautiful example of something that could easily be, frankly, valid from a just a regular grown-up point of view, or it could be totally an excuse that isn't true at all. And it's impossible, you know, for anyone other than you to know the deepest truth of it. It's one of those things where we have to look at at at the underlying intent uh or the underlying gain to sus it out.

[00:06:48]What I mean is it, you know, love and Holy Spirit could legitimately be saying, "Monica, pack your Get out the door right now.

[00:06:58]It's important. Go."

[00:07:02]Or the ego could be saying, "I just don't feel like it. I don't know. It's bugging me. I don't want to. I'll come up with a reason. Oh, look. I'm late. I have to go. Ha. Can't do it. I guess I'm off the hook. Um, so same result in both case, but motivated in completely different ways.

[00:07:23]And that's where the that's where the inquiry really gets juicy. And now granted the way you've brought it up, it still suggests pretty largely that it's sort of more the latter uh >> than the former.

[00:07:38]>> And and then that begs the, you know, usually interesting questions that are again questions only you can really answer yourself. Uh because it's just obvious that there's some form of, you know, some kind of little fear pattern operating there. And that's something we can easily, you know, that that can be unpacked with a, you know, we shine a little light on that. And there's some part of you that that doesn't want to uh because it feels like it's going to lose and it's not willing to give up what it it let me put it a different way. It feels like something is going to be taken from it and it's going to lose.

[00:08:16]>> I'm I'm suspecting there's a part of my ego that that is involved.

[00:08:22]>> Yeah. I mean on in that kind of dynamic there I mean absolutely for sure.

[00:08:28]What what do I believe I'm losing that I don't want to lose?

[00:08:33]>> I'll have to dig into that. Yeah, >> we can do that kind of thing. But you can see immediately like if you actually go down that road that you are going to end up face to face with some kind of truth with a capital T.

[00:08:49]like what part of me is this involved with and what precisely is it that's uh afraid of being lost?

[00:08:59]So you're clinging to this old way or clinging to this this thing and sussing that out and you know trying to understand what it is, where it came from, what's its validity, what's it what is that grounded on is going to put you face to face with something and that is how truth sets us free unquestionably. That is literally what that phrase is about.

[00:09:24]And what a beautiful thing to raise here because it it means that you know there is a part of your mind that really is genuine about it and I encourage you in it. Let me know what you find. Um of course we can talk about it another time. But you're digging in a very very rich place.

[00:09:46]Very rich because we cannot solve what we don't know exists. We can't let go of things that we don't understand that we're holding on to.

[00:09:59]That's the power of that kind of inquiry.