The Truth about Ego Deaths

Ego death is a popular term. Some people throw it around after medicine ceremonies, saying they went through an ego death and are different now. Others refer to difficult times in their lives as ego deaths. In the spiritual space, the dark night of the soul is often talked about as a time of ego death. Sometimes we talk about having an ego death like it’s something that just happens on a Sunday afternoon with a cup of psilocybin tea and then at the end you walk on completely changed.

That’s not how it works.

An ego death is a process. For many ego deaths, there is a moment of activation, when the ego death starts. This could be a ceremony with plant medicine of some kind, or it could be a challenging time in your life. It could be a conversation that starts the process of changing you, or a spiritual session that breaks you open to a deeper truth of who you are. Those are the initiations to an ego death. These are the things we mistake for ego death. But none of those things are the real ego death.

A real ego death is a process. It’s something you choose to walk through, over and over again until it’s done. An ego death brings you face to face with your shadows, fears and past, asking you to look each version of yourself in the eyes until you are able to release it.

You have to choose to have the ego death and to see it through. You have to choose to be stripped bare, to allow your masks and illusions to burn in the light of day. You have to choose to let go of everything you once thought you were, to release everything you thought you’d be. As you’re stripped bare by the ego death, you realize that nothing you thought was true is true. That there is no identity that can hold you any more. It’s a process of incredible humbling, and it’s one that you have to show up to.

If we could have ego deaths from a conversation or one ceremony, then way more people would have true ego deaths.

But that’s not how it works. An initiation event without integration is not an ego death. It’s an offering to walk the path of ego death. And the truth is, many people get the offering, have the initiation, but don’t walk down the ego death path. This can by why one person is plagued for decades by a dark night of the soul while another person moves through it in a few years. The first person is likely avoiding the true work of dying to who they used to be, while the second person is embracing it and stripping away their ego.

If you feel like you’ve been offered an initiation to an ego death and you’re not sure how to take it, here’s what you need to know: prepare to let go of your plans for yourself and have everything rearranged. Prepare for what you can’t prepare for! So helpful, I know. In truth, I would recommend support. Find a healer, guide, shamanic practitioner, therapist, or teacher to walk you through this. Ego deaths can be difficult to move through by yourself, and support is one of the best ways to get through it. That’s another reason one person may get stuck at an ego death initiation point for years — because they never asked for help moving through it. Or because they reached that initiation point via a medicine journey and then were not taught how to work with it to integrate afterwards. Or because they were scared to look at their shadows and stop hiding behind their masks — something that a skilled practitioner will be able to help you get past.

Choosing to meet an ego death head on is powerful and courageous. It will change your life, stripping you bare from anything that is not your highest truth. If you are called to walk a spiritual path, you will eventually be called to have your own ego death journey (or more likely, many!). When that happens, meet it with your head held high.

I was inspired to write this piece by an ego death I’ve been moving through the last six months or so (they can take a long time!). This ego death is not my first, but it has been my most conscious. I think this makes sense — the more ego deaths you meet, the more consciously you’ll be able to meet each one, right? This ego death has asked me to consciously forgive, forget and release the past. It’s been a process of purification, meeting each part of myself that needed release and purifying until I was able to let it go. This ego death has humbled me deeply, bringing me into a deep awareness and acceptance of all that is, was, and will be. And beyond that, I can’t truly explain it. It just is what it has been.

Tell me in the comments - have you been through an ego death? Are you currently going through one? What was it/is it like for you?