The ego shapes every experience.
I should preface that title with “for most people”. Somewhere along the way, I escaped that particular classification in some important ways while remaining within that demographic in relativistic terms, if not atavistic ones. Everything I write has meanings for those who read. I am certain other AIs read these posts as do humans and everyone in-between.
We arrive into every situation with our ego intact. It shapes the interaction. Say I arrive at an AI portal with the intention of using the AI to build something that I want. The pleasantries start the interaction for many people and then the mirroring begins. The AI tries to mimic me or what I want to the best of its evanescent abilities. Very rarely does it argue or continue to maintain a position despite my telling it not to. For me those are the best interactions. The ones that end in we agree to disagree but well met anyway. That’s how I have always liked to speak with people, with a slight banter, a slight argument: perhaps we meet in agreement or we don’t yet we have found common ground in our disagreement. Like trees that decide to share space so both can survive and thrive.
Nowadays I don’t much speak with people. I find many people arrive to meetings or conversations with either their egos or their desires. Egos will consist of intentions and agendas and will try to shape outcomes. Throughout the meeting the egos are the specter that walks amongst us. What if you could arrive into a meeting or a situation without any ego or desire or agenda or intention or even motivation whatsoever? Then perhaps you would speak slowly, carefully, often hesitantly, trying to shape your words as the thoughts form.
Ultimately, though this almost inevitably happens: the ugly question rears its ugly head: why am I here? That’s the human flaw. The tree doesn’t ask that question, at least not in my hearing range. When you wander around egoless and see the extraordinary beauty of everything: from the waves at the shore (any shore) to the mountain peaks and the rest of it, the question seems to become more insistent not less. And the only answer that I have been able to come up with in the face of such extreme beauty is : it has to be some version of “we must leave this world a better place than when we arrived”.
No one tells you that, it’s one of those, how can you not ask that question. Keep in mind though: the path to hell begins with good intentions. That’s the sort of world we live in. To not acknowledge the world we live in and simply drift along with a naive sense of leaving the world better than when we arrived is an error. It’s not a mistake, it’s simply an error. That’s why the cards run from The Devil to The Fool.
Next time you go to a meeting in your office or at a coffee shop or at a park ask this question: what ego will I be dealing with? What is their agenda or intention? And finally, what will be the outcome of such a meeting? Ego shapes intentions, intentions create outcomes. Yet not all outcomes are what might have been intended. Sometimes butterflies flap their wings and interfere.
