The soloist sang with technical perfection as her voice danced nimbly from octave to octave. Her volume, gestures, and facial expressions gave the impression of great passion. And yet, somehow, it all came off a bit flat, more like acting than singing. Although all of the ingredients were present, no chemical reaction occurred.
Can the ego praise God? It’s an important question to ask yourself. From writing and singing to dance and painting, from work to play, and throughout all human interactions, we can express ourselves from our ego or from our soul. We can be live, or pre-recorded. We can be flesh and blood, or we can be manikins. We can be fluid, or we can be mechanical. We can be vulnerable and playful, or we can be controlling. We can have depth, or we can be superficial.
Sometimes when you go to see a performance, you get a different kind of performance. Maybe you came to hear someone sing with passion but what heard was someone pretending to sing with passion. You expected soul, but you got ego. What do you do at the end of this performance? Do you stand and clap with everyone else, pretending you got the real goods when you know you didn’t? If you do that, then I guess you’ll be putting on a performance of your own.
Can the ego praise God? It’s an important question. How you answer it may affect whether your own life praises God.
.....Copyright © Andy Drymalski, Ed.D. Excerpts may be used provided full and clear credit is given author with link to original article.
Enjoyed this post. It reminds me of Dr. Harry Tiebout’s paper “Surrender vs. Compliance in Therapy with Special Reference to Alcoholism” http://silkworth.net/tiebout/tiebout_surrender_compliance.html. In my opinion, recognizing the difference is vital in helping someone recover from addiction.
Hi, Ella. Thanks for your response, and for the link to Dr. Tiebout’s article. I guess we can really live life or just comply with life, and there’s a world of difference between the two. Andy