The Illusion of Becoming

The ego’s obsession with fixing itself

Friends,

We live in a time where becoming (…and healing) has become a lifestyle. A project. A mission.

Scroll through social media or step into any modern wellness space, and you’ll find endless invitations to “do the work,” to “unpack your trauma,” to “become your best self.” There’s always another layer to peel, another shadow to integrate, another wound to heal.

And yet…have you ever noticed that no matter how much healing you do, no matter how much ‘becoming’ you work toward, there always seems to be more?

This isn’t to dismiss genuine pain or the tender journeys we walk through as human beings…trying our best to make sense of this thing we call life. But from the deeper view, the one that sees beyond stories and identities, the idea that you are broken and in need of constant repair or improvement begins to fall apart.

What if becoming…or healing, is just another story the ego tells itself to stay alive?

Consider this:

What if the very one trying to become or heal is the illusion?

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Core Truth: You Are Already Whole

From the moment we wake, we are bombarded with messages suggesting that we are not enough, that we must do more, be more, achieve more to attain happiness or fulfilment…heal more! This pervasive narrative fuels a cycle of perpetual striving, keeping us tethered to a future version of ourselves that never arrives.

Yet, if we pause and turn our attention inward, we may begin to sense a quiet presence that has always been with us, a spacious awareness that is not defined by our accomplishments or failures. This presence does not seek to become anything; it simply is.

As the Zen master Seng-Ts’an wrote:

The Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences. When love and hate are both absent, everything becomes clear and undisguised.

This "Great Way" refers to recognition that our true nature is beyond the dualities of success and failure, good and bad, broken and healed. It is a state of being where we are not striving to heal or become something else but resting in the awareness of what we already are.

When we cease to identify with the transient contents of our mind, the thoughts, emotions, and stories, we begin to experience a profound sense of freedom. We realise that we are not the ever-changing phenomena but the unchanging awareness in which all phenomena arise and pass away.