Friday

The EasyJet Blog, Part Two, (The Ego).

The beach at Helios Hotel, Paphos.
Normally on the first night of a holiday by the sea, I wander down to let the waters nibble my toes, breathe deeply and greet the devas of the land.

This time I did just that too ... but it became a spiritual exercise to continually calm and release the chattering of my ego. The devas were a bit cross too at the start. Devas do like to be noticed and greeted and they made it quite clear that they don't give a flying you-know-what about lost suitcases. I could almost hear them sighing and saying, 'Get a grip, Whitehouse!'

Egos are brilliant for repeating things; they are the part of the brain that remembers stuff but they're not very good at anything new. You need the conscious self for that. The wonderful thing about holidays somewhere new is that we spend a lot of time conscious because the ego has nothing much to offer. Unless, of course, it can lock onto an old worry pattern. This aspect of the ego (Eckhart Tolle calls it 'the pain body') figuratively eats negative emotions and enjoys calling them up for a nice, yummy, supper.

But Cyprus was not a new country for us; some of our family live here and, the last time we visited, I was sick so that was the level of energy that my ego was just delighted to be offering.

The Hebrew word for ego is Yesod and it really was being a little sod that night. But at least I could observe it instead of being eaten up by it.

It was also doing its job in pointing out that Harold had been on the flight so something was seriously wrong. He wasn't just lost.

The only options, it said, were:

  • He'd gone back to England. 
  • He'd been damaged and hidden.
  • He'd been stolen.

Option 1 was possible but doubtful as he'd been one of the last cases on the plane. Option 2 was also possible but seemed ridiculous. Option 3 was possible too but who would want one small case with a very old laptop and clothes? Harold himself was certainly a darling but cabin luggage isn't exactly the kind of thing hardened thieves fight over.

My ego went on (and on...and on...) remembering exactly what was missing inside Harold and giving me little digs about how utterly inconvenient it all was. Even when we went to bed in our lovely appartment at Helios Bay Hotel, just as I was dropping off, it brought up, 'and another thing...'

Given that Harold had contained essentials, this is what Yesod, with clever little jerks of distress, worked out was missing:


  1. Two bras (I always travel in a Patra crop top).
  2. Seven pairs of knickers - and with no balcony to our room the one pair I had would have to dry over the back of a chair which wasn't going to happen very fast! 
  3. Swimsuit.
  4. Sunglasses.
  5. Ariadne's present.
  6. Black silk trousers.
  7. White linen top - these two were the clothes I was going to wear for the family party in two days' time.
  8. Laptop computer with all my contacts on it.
  9. Computer lead.
  10. Mobile phone lead.
  11. Lion's iPad lead.
  12. The beautiful turquoise top, given to me by my Bishop when I was going to perform at the Edinburgh Festival. 
  13. Sun dress. 
  14. Cotton trousers. 
  15. My blue embroidered waistcoat.
  16. Two teeshirts.
  17. Hairbrush.
  18. Handkerchiefs.
  19. My birthday cards for the next day (and a present).
  20. Olive-coloured bolero.
  21. The lovely golden silk scarf, given to me by my friend, Bernadette.
  22. Some jewelry.
  23. All my vitamins and medicines (including painkillers).
  24. A hessian bag for the food shopping we planned to do because we were self-catering.


I won in the end, and the last thing my ego offered did make me laugh. It pointed out that if I were to have any genuine cause for complaint to the airline should Harold not return, I had absolutely no right to enjoy myself in the meantime. I should be miserable. Cunning! But that one's not going to work. :-)







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