The False Ego- Our Constant Companion and Troublemaker

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If you become conscious of Me, you will pass over all the obstacles of conditioned life by My grace. If however, you do not work in such consciousness but act through false ego, not hearing Me, you will be lost.

Devaki devi dasi was born in Germany in 1958 and after a long journey of searching, joined ISKCON in Sydney, Australia in 1985. She spent four years in the Sydney brahmacharini ashrama, learning the basics of devotional life. She took initiation from Bhavananda Prabhu and later re-initiation from Prabhavisnu Prabhu. She is now a disciple of His Holiness Niranjana Swami Maharaja. During her ten years in married life (1989-1999) she preached in Riga, Latvia, and spent adventurous years in helping to pioneer the first more organized temple in the former Soviet Union. In 1999 her husband remarried a non-devotee, and Devaki devi dasi then be- came a renounced traveling preacher, spending six months per year in India and Bangladesh, and the other six months in various coun- tries around Western Europe, Ukraine and Moldova. Recently she has been expanding her preaching and also visits North America. In the past Devaki devi dasi was also fundraising for the development of various projects and holy places in Nepal and Bangladesh.

In Bangladesh she is actively involved in the IYF student preaching, conducting seminars and IYF festivals under the guidance of His Holiness Bhakti Purusottama Swami Maharaja.

Perhaps for the first 20 years of my devotional life I was not paying much attention to the false ego. I wasn't even aware of how it affected me every day, prompting me to say things that I should not have said, and to do things that would have been better not to do. I never realised the existence and impact of this constant companion, because the false ego works in very subtle ways. It can so easily remain hidden.

Over time, after compiling several courses on various aspects of spiritual culture and presenting them in many different countries, I gradually came to understand just how important this topic of the false ego is! After all, material life and its culture is all about feeding and expanding our false ego, taking every opportunity to place ourselves at the centre of attention - whereas spiritual life and its culture is designed to transform and dissolve it. Thus, in all the seminars on spiritual culture, we sooner or later come across this subject. And the realisation struck me, how easily we can entirely miss the target of devotional life: We can do the very opposite of what we should be doing all in the name of Krishna consciousness.

Instead of dissolving and subduing the false ego, Krishna consciousness can offer an excellent opportunity to increase and feed it, and this is happening to a very large extent.

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