Facebook ego

Yesterday I opened my Inbox to see this Facebook message:

“Smile! You were recorde by a hidden camera”

Followed by this message:

“I see you in this video. When was it?”

I immediately clicked on the link and tried to open the video. I should have known something was wrong when it would not open. Yet I kept clicking and clicking, wanting to see this video of me! All sorts of thoughts raced through my head – when was it taken, what was I doing, how did I look, hope it is nothing embarrassing, etc. I eventually realised something was terribly wrong when I received a message from a friend asking if I had sent him the same video! As it turns out, over the weekend a hacker had penetrated the Facebook privacy firewalls causing a maelstrom of messages throughout the network. Friends are becoming enemies, as some of the messages are quite offensive.

Having warned all my Facebook friends, and cleaned up my laptop as best as I could, I now pause to reflect. Why was I so desperate to see the video that I kept trying to download over and over, despite a little voice that nagged at me that something was wrong? Why have my friends behaved in the same way, e-mailing me frantically, wanting to see their video, despite my posting warnings on my Facebook wall? Looking at my own behaviour I can only conclude that it’s EGO at work!

You see, the ego loves itself over and above everything else. It loves its own image, voice, smell – anything and everything that reminds it of itself, that will support and build its own image of itself. The ego is totally committed to its own perpetuation at the expense of everything else. It will destroy everything about you, just for its own sake. I put my laptop and my Facebook friends in danger because of my ego. Something (that inner voice) told me that what I was doing was not right. Yet, driven by my ego, I refused to listen. I continued on my mad clicking spree knowing deep inside that I was out of control, doing the wrong thing.

It is so ironic that at a book reading the previous evening I had read the chapter from my book “Free and Laughing” entitled “Something Told Me”, which is all about the importance of listening to the inner voice. Hours later, I had forgotten all of that, totally consumed by my ego. I now realise that I always have to be on guard with my ego. I always have to keep it in check. I must be aware that whenever I am doing something, and that niggling feeling, whisper or discomfort arises, it is an indication that my ego is in control. Time to stop, breathe and clear the frequency, so that I can hear the inner voice loud and clear, without the noise of my ego.