Butterflies26

Chapter 31 begins with the question: "You’ve been pretty hard on the ego throughout this book. Isn’t that a judgment in itself?" The author explains that "we have assigned the ego a lot of power during the first half of the Human Game, and we have rewarded it time and time again for the good job it has done, to the point that it seems to have taken on a life of its own. But we should not make the mistake of judging or blaming the ego, or view the transformation into a butterfly as an all-out war with the ego. After all, the ego is simply another piece of the hologram that isn’t real, but only looks and feels real; and it has played its part perfectly in our holographic experiences just like anything and anyone else we have encountered while playing the Human Game."

In Chapter 32, the author tackles the very difficult question of Compassion. "This whole model seems to me a very selfish way to live. Where’s your heart? Where’s your compassion for the pain and suffering of others?"

The author responds that the concept of Compassion, by definition, "belongs in the first half of the Human Game, inside the movie theater, and not in the second half. Why? What’s “wrong” with compassion? Nothing is “wrong.” That would be a judgment. But compassion as it is defined (and practiced) automatically leads a Player to judge the experiences of someone else as “bad” or “wrong,” to think they have the power to change that person’s reality, and to entertain the wish to do so; and none of that is possible or appropriate in the second half of the Human Game. It also inevitably leads the Player who’s trying to be compassionate into frustration, sadness, and sometimes even despair; or, in other words, it leads further into limitation and restriction."