Student: The ego is hurt...somebody steps on you.

Doug Sensei: "The definition of 'you' is 'hurt'. Be very clear about this. 'You' is 'separation'. Separation is, by definition, hurt. You don't want to know the cruel taskmaster who owns you -- the 'you' -- is an illusion...because 'you' aren't there. And if you knew, the 'you' would disappear. It would evaporate like a fog. You don't want to know that 'you' are an illusion -- an image in a mirror, a reflection in a pond. You want 'you' to be there, and so you purposely get distracted. It's a choice to be distracted. And in that distraction you appear.

(That's the problem with all these you's.) If you are not distracted, you dissolve. And then there's bliss; clarity; non-clinging awareness. But your program -- the whole story of you, the whole story of 'me' -- is to be distracted. The minute I'm not distracted, I'm not there anymore.

There's sensation; there's perception; there's cognition; but none of those things make a 'me' until I attach to this one and push off of that one.

So why does suffering continue? This is a hard one. Are you ready? Because you want it to…. Ouch.

All suffering is self-created."

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