Insanity...

Insanity...
Do not let the good cheat you out of the best. My ego has saved my skin many times. It keeps me alert to danger in unfamiliar places. It has kept me sharp and hopefully one step ahead of trouble for years. Ego is a critical part of the desire to survive, and without a well developed ego, no species can long survive. That's the good part.
But my ego is pure fear, it can be nothing else. And it screams at me when I am approached by this novel spiritual approach to my drinking problem "You dare not go there, do not look at these things with an open mind. For they will spell the end of you".
And my pride tells me "You need not go there, for that path leads nowhere". Both of them in their own fashions have what they believe to be my best interests at heart, but they both are mad. My ego is pathologically insane and it knows the path of spiritual growth spells only trouble for it. And my pride just doesn't know any better. There is a subtle form of madness about it all.
The form of insanity the book talks about reminds me of the guy who gets a flat tire right in front of an insane asylum in the middle of the night. In the process of changing his tire, he accidentally kicks the lug nuts into an overgrown ditch. Sitting there in the dark, in despair, lug nuts lost forever, he hears a voice. Looking around, he sees this little inmate sticking his face against the bars or his second floor window. The guy yells down to him to take one lug nut off each of the remaining three wheels and that will hold the spare on until you get into town. The guy with the flat yells back up, you're a genius, what are you doing in a place like this? The little inmate yells back "Oh no man, I'm as crazy as a bunk house rat, but I ain't stupid."

I in turn wish you the best in clear fearless thinking,
Shadowalker164