By Gonny 
Most people like to say: “We cannot live in this world without an ego.”
And in a very practical, worldly sense… they’re right.
The ego is the part of the dream-self that tells us : turn left, pay this bill, don’t put your hand on the hot stove.
It’s the navigation system of the body…a little noisy, sometimes dramatic, but functional.
Yet ACIM gently says something different, not load or as a command, but just an invitation:
“You are not the ego. You are not the body. And everything the ego defends is not You.”
So the questions become: what is it doing here, and can I live without it?
Let’s try a few ‘what if’ scenes, just to see what opens.
– – What if the ego is only an alarm system?
Imagine you feel pain in your shoulder, your ego immediately says,
“Oh no… something is wrong with my body.”
But what if the pain is just an invitation to look at a thought you’re carrying?
We all know : ‘shoulders’ are symbolically connected to “carrying things.”
The question you may ask yourself is then:
What am I carrying that I don’t need?
Maybe there’s an old belief from childhood: I must be strong or everything will fall apart….and you are carrying this believe for years.
Maybe there’s a role you accepted: the mother who must always be available or the partner who must endure anything, or the dependable one who is never allowed to fall apart.
The sboulder pain then becomes a little messenger, not an enemy.
The ego triggers the alarm….the pain.., but the meaning behind it isfor
the mind : recognize there is something old to heal.
– – What if the ego is simply a role generator?
In relationships we put on roles like costumes: mother, wife, healer, teacher…
and sometimes we forget they are just roles.
A mother may think she has to carry everything, because that’s what a mother does. Or as a wife she may think her role means she hs to tolerate, to adapt, to swallow.
And perhaps, if she is not happy, the deepest layer:
“I cannot admit to my father and mother that I made a wrong choice.”
So the ego keeps the roles alive and loves them, because roles keep the world solid.
But Spirit doesn’t need roles…because Spirit has nothing to defend.
– – What if the ego disappears the moment you stop believing in it?
The Course teaches that the ego is literally a belief.
Not a thing or an entity. It’s simply a belief in separation, and like all beliefs… when you stop feeding it, it dissolves.
So could someone live in this world without an ego?
Yes, but not in the way people imagine.
It doesn’t mean you float around like a glowing monk, unable to function.
It means the content of your mind is free, even while you appear to function like everyone else.
You still make a shopping list, still feel a stone in your shoe, but none of it defines you. Nothing sticks.
There’s no self-image to protect, no guilt to carry, no role that imprisons.
This is why some very awake beings look so ordinary… and at the same time so astonishingly peaceful.
The ego has not disappeared as a practical tool, but its voice no longer decides anything.
– – What if living without ego means living without fear?
ACIM describes it beautifully:
“You are either love or fear. You cannot be both.”
The ego is the fear part, so to live without ego is simply to live without fear.
How beautiful it would be to have :
No weight on your shoulders,
No pressure to be someone.
No old promises haunting you.
No guilt.
No comparison.
No …I must be right.
No…I have to carry this alone.
Just openness…love…just simple clarity.
The body would still move, talk, plan, buy groceries, but with an inside feeling of peace of someone who has nothing to defend.
– -What if the question is not “can we live without ego?” but… “do I still need it today?”
Every time we forgive a thought, every time we question a belief, every time we choose peace instead of a role…a piece of the ego gently dissolves.
And we begin to notice how it feels to walk a little lighter. Not because our ego vanished in one dramatic moment, but because we stopped asking it to be our guide.
ACIM says the same thing, in its quiet way:
“The Holy Spirit replaces the ego’s voice the moment you choose again.”
So perhaps the truth is this: we don’t need the ego to survive, we only needed it while we believed we were separated from our Source. And as that belief fades, the ego becomes what it always was:
a temporary storyteller in a dream that is gently coming to an end.
With love and light,
G.