Doris from London, England
When Doris Johnson first read A New Earth, a specific part jumped out at her: "Resentment is often the emotion that goes with complaining."
"It started a question within me," Doris told Eckhart and Oprah over Skype™. "I thought, like, but where do hurt feelings belong to? Is this something that my ego tells me to feel?"
From sadness to grief, she wanted to know more about the different kinds of pain people feel. Although Eckhart confirmed that these feelings do, in fact, originate in the ego, he added that it's important to stop and accept those feelings in the moment.
"You can't say, 'Oh, I shouldn't be feeling hurt, and I shouldn't have an ego,'" Eckhart said. "It doesn't work."
Instead, Eckhart said, Doris needed to recognize those feelings and what was creating them. Often, individuals can develop a specific image of themselves. Yet, if someone else says something critical, it can call that image into question. The person reacts negatively, and the ego wants to defend itself.
Eckhart used an incident of road rage as an example: If another driver were to call you an idiot, that may hurt on some level. For many people, that pain could turn into anger.
"Immediately, the ego goes into self-repair mode, as I call it, and will shout something back in order to repair itself," Eckhart said.
Find out how Doris is doing today...
