The hero is strangely close

To those who died young.

Permanence doesn’t interest him.

His dawn is his lifetime.

Daily he takes himself off

And enters the changed constellation

Of his everlasting risk.

(Ranier Rilke, Duino Elegies)

Rilke was writing of the loss of ego consciousness with the line, “Daily he takes himself off.”  And when the ego is “taken off” one can take a leap of faith into the unknown, into the “changed constellation of his everlasting risk.”  Karl Jung taught that the crucifixion was a metaphor for this death of the ego.

But the ego dies a hard death.  It fights for preservation and wins with most people.  However, I should qualify use of the term, “death”.  The ego must not be destroyed as that would lead to insanity.  What is taught by these and other spiritual teachers is that the ego needs to lose its primacy in our lives and this “loss of primacy” often feels like a death or crucifixion.