The Ego Has No Attention of Its Own

Why Your Likes and Dislikes Are Steering the Ship

This post grows out of work I’ve been doing with Cynthia Bourgeault’s course Practicing Living Presence: Discovering the Mind of Christ Within, which itself is a sustained engagement with Kabir Helminski’s Living Presence. In particular, it draws from the chapter titled The Power of Being. What follows is not an argument against the ego, nor a call to suppress desire or preference. It emerges instead from a quieter observation: the ego does not possess attention. It feeds on it. It redirects it. But it does not generate it.

We tend to assume that attention belongs to the self we habitually experience. We say, “I decided to focus,” or “I chose to think about that.” Yet when we begin to look more closely, the sequence is different. Something catches us first. A memory, a notification, a tone of voice, a sensation in the body. Attention moves. Only afterward does the ego step in and narrate what is happening. It claims authorship over a movement that had already begun.

Projection and the Story-Maker

Helminski makes the radical claim that what we project outward onto things is already within us. We imagine that the object, the person, the circumstance is responsible for the state we are experiencing. In reality, attention has already been drawn by attraction or aversion. The ego then fastens onto that movement and builds a story around it. “I like this.” “I can’t stand that.” “This will complete me.” “That threatens me.” Attention, which arises from a deeper source, becomes captured inside the commentary.

The Ego’s Steering Mechanism

The ego does not create attention; it directs it through preference. It moves attention toward what promises reinforcement of identity and away from what threatens it. The direction matters.

When praise appears, attention leans forward. It wants to extend the experience, secure it, deepen it. When criticism appears, attention contracts. It scans for defense, explanation, counterattack. Attraction expands; aversion tightens. Both are movements within attention, but they are not the same movement.

The ego lives inside that oscillation. It does not know how to rest in simple awareness. It requires contrast. It requires something to pursue or something to resist. Without attraction or aversion, it feels as though nothing is happening. And so it keeps scanning, bending attention toward the next object that confirms or protects its sense of self.

The Field of Being

This is where Bourgeault’s distinction becomes critical. She speaks of the difference between being lost in activity and retaining a subtle awareness of the field in which the activity unfolds. That field is not reactive. It does not lunge or recoil. It simply knows. When even a sliver of attention remains in that field, something shifts. The ego is no longer the sole interpreter of experience.

We do not reclaim attention by fighting our preferences. Trying to eliminate likes and dislikes only creates another layer of reactivity. Instead, we begin by noticing the moment attention has been bent. “Ah. There it goes.” That recognition does not come from the ego. The ego does not enjoy being observed. The recognition arises from Being itself.

Space Within Reaction

In that instant of seeing, the movement does not necessarily stop. You may still feel anger. You may still want what you want. You may still act. But the action is no longer entirely driven by unconscious pull. A measure of space enters. The field widens. The reaction becomes one element within awareness rather than the center of it.

Helminski describes the spiritual path as one of “fastidious remembrance”. This remembrance is not about holding a state. It is about repeatedly rediscovering that attention originates in Being, not in the ego’s commentary. The ego cannot create the light of awareness any more than a lens can produce light. It can only color what shines through it.

The Deeper Source

The ego will continue to prefer. That is its nature. But it no longer steers alone. Attention, reclaimed even briefly, begins to source from a deeper center. And from that center, action is less reactive, less compulsive, less driven by the endless oscillation between reinforcement and threat.

We do not transcend the ego by defeating it. We outgrow its dominance by remembering where attention truly comes from. Being is already present. Attention is already luminous. The work is not to manufacture awareness, but to stop mistaking the ego’s movements for its source.

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Recommended Reading

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• Living Presence: A Sufi Way to Mindfulness & the Essential Self by Kabir Helminski