[Jonathan Mead]

I don't think when spiritual teachers are talking about losing the ego, they're talking about "Waging a War on it." That's a highly misguided interpretation.

What they're talking about is not sole identification with the ego. It's the realization that the "me" you think you are is not really the real "you." You are much more than your idea of your seperate self. You are actually the whole totality of everything, you are simply having it in the experience of a self-referential consciousness.

There is no war on the ego. The whole point is to transcend and include the ego. The whole must include the parts. When you trancsend the part, you don't reject it, because it creates the whole. You include it and accept it.

I'm sorry Steve, but your whole idea of the War on the Ego would be really easily misinterpreted because it misses the point of what ego-transcendence is about. It's not about killing the ego, it's about realizing you are more than your ego. I'm not saying that you didn't touch on this a little in your post, because I know you mentioned it's about including the ego, but aligning it with selfishness as well as selflessness. This is an essential realization.

If anyone is waging a war on the ego, they're greatly misinterpreting the teachings of mystics and spiritual teachers. I'm just worried that when you say that all these people have a war on the ego, that they're going to interpret spiritual traditions "going beyond the ego" as a bad thing. And that would be a great mistake. I guess it's up to people to figure things out for themselves though ultimately.