I grew up in the American Midwest, in a place where people worked very hard for not a lot of reward. And yet, I can’t remember a single instance of a farmer saying ‘I deserve’ a better life. Everyone I knew behaved as if self-denial was humble and spiritual and a sign of goodness, and ‘I deserve’ was presumptuous and greedy.
It’s the ego that makes these comparisons. Ego identity comes with the situation we’re born into, formed by interacting with who and what is in our world, and by what works for us as we go out into our world. It’s the character we think we are, the separate I and me, as we deal with others.
This is just a guess, but I’m thinking the inferior ego of my early upbringing could be a very old pattern, related to the class system. These farming families are descendants of European immigrants, pioneers to the Midwest. They brought their cultures, Christian religion and languages with them, as well as their ideas about who they are, collectively...read more>>>...