You can differentiate yourself from others.
You understand that you are an individual.
You can identify your unique personality and you can feel your specific needs and wants in this world.
You can do all of that because you have an ego.
Yes,
You are connected to the people around you,
But you are singular.
You are you.
Your life is experienced through your mind and your body.
Thus you have an ego.
So today we are going to have a look at your ego.
We will try and understand what the ego actually is and how you can make it serve you and others around you.
Our goal is to increase your awareness of your ego.
We want to understand how your ego makes you see yourself and also others.
A healthy ego will add to your life's experience,
But an imbalanced ego has the potential to destroy you.
Muhammad Iqbal said,
The ultimate aim of the ego is not to see something,
But to be something.
Let's try and be something today.
First of all,
Let us talk about what the ego actually is,
Because many people would just say,
The ego is an overly important self-inflated personality or something like that.
For most of us,
The word ego wrongly has a negative connotation by default.
When I am talking about ego today,
I am talking about the awareness of oneself,
The sense of personal identity,
The I.
Furthermore,
I would also define ego as your self-worth.
Because when in balance,
Your ego will show you that you are needed and that you have value.
But when out of balance,
You will feel worthy a lot more or a lot less,
Depending on your imbalance.
So now let us neutralize the word ego,
So we can have an open and explorative mind for today's course.
Now I want to mention where and how your ego is created.
Your ego is partially based on your predisposition by birth,
But much more based on your upbringing.
Strong factors are the way you have been treated by your parents,
Teachers,
Coaches and friends when you grew up.
These relationships will have left you with a certain self-image and self-esteem.
So now that you are an adult,
You will benefit from finding out how accurate this self-image really is.
This will allow you to adjust your self-image and create your own self-esteem if need be.
The more you are aware of your true self,
Your real ego,
Your unique personality,
The easier you can change and the easier you can navigate this world.
By now you might already understand that having an ego is not negative as such.
Your ego is a necessity to understand and differentiate yourself.
So start seeing your ego as an asset.
Let's see your ego as something that serves you.
Your ego has a lot of energy that you can use to grow and create a happy life.
But in order for this to happen,
You not only need to have a good understanding of yourself,
You also need to give yourself permission to embrace your ego.
So let's now have a look at what a healthy ego looks like.
Let us start with your career.
If you have a balanced ego or rather a healthy relationship with your ego,
Then you will strive for and create a healthy level of success.
Your ego will guide you to achieve success but not beyond anything that makes you feel overwhelmed or that disconnects you from others.
Your balanced ego will not only make you understand what you are really capable of,
It will also guide you to neither sell yourself short nor to become greedy.
You will have a clear idea of what you can and can't do and as a result you will walk on the path that is right for you.
Now if your ego is out of balance,
You will either aim too high or too low.
An overinflated ego will make you strive for things that are too big and you will one day be left feeling disappointed by yourself.
An overinflated ego will make you want to invent rockets when you don't have the mental capacity to do so.
It will make you try and surf 10 foot waves when you should surf 3 foot waves.
And even if you do achieve greater things,
It will never be enough.
An overinflated ego is never satisfied.
Now on the other side of extremes is an underinflated ego,
Which will make you underachieve and sell yourself for less than you're worth.
You will then not fully understand how valuable you actually are.
Most likely you will be underpaid in your job and most likely people take advantage of you both in private and professional settings.
So make sure you're checking in with yourself regularly to make sure your ego is neither flying too high nor too low.
Harvest its energy and let it drive you,
But in a very conscious way.
Next,
Let us talk about how a healthy ego can create confidence.
It starts with understanding and accepting your ego,
Which means that you become more self-aware.
When you acknowledge to yourself who you truly are,
Then you can also show up as your authentic self.
Accepting yourself means you're not scared of other people's judgment,
Which shows that you're confident.
Epictetus said,
If you want to improve,
You must be content to be thought foolish and stupid.
And that is a great sign that your ego is strong enough,
When you don't mind that at times people think of you as stupid or foolish.
Now when your ego is inflated and out of balance,
You will believe your abilities are limitless and you will have an unhealthy and exaggerated amount of confidence.
This will be unhealthy for you,
Because one day you will find out the truth.
One day you will become self-aware,
Because the world around you reacts to your real abilities and not what you imagine them to be.
So make sure you become aware of yourself and accept yourself before you create a life that does not serve you.
By the way,
Unrealistic imagined abilities are the problem with most personal development courses.
Courses are often blindly trying to create confidence that is not limited in your real abilities and limitations.
I think it is a better strategy to become more aware of yourself and to accept yourself.
Be careful when people blindly motivate you,
Your ego loves getting excited.
There is nothing wrong with being motivated and getting excited,
But check whether it's rooted in real abilities.
Next,
Let us talk about what happens when your confidence is too little.
Signs of this are when you should shoot the ball,
But you pass it up.
You should take the risk and create an opportunity,
But you pass it on.
You should ask a person out,
But you don't.
An underdeveloped ego will make you animate others to do what in reality you want to achieve yourself.
Of course,
You want to avoid all of the above and make sure your ego is big enough.
A great way to check whether your level of confidence is accurate is to ask the people closest to you about it.
Next,
Another great sign of a healthy ego is that it is very hard to manipulate you.
For their personal benefit,
People will often try to tell you that you are capable of less or more than you actually are.
People might try to belittle or overprotect you.
A healthy ego will make you see these behaviors and react accordingly.
For example,
Most salespeople have a sixth sense for imbalanced egos and will immediately talk up to you or down on you in order to manipulate you.
Make sure you allow your ego to protect you.
Truly knowing who you are will automatically create a life that serves you and not only others.
The next point I want to make is that a balanced ego will make you understand the difference between a.
The value of humans and b.
The value of intellect and productivity.
The value of humans is all the same.
Every human is worth the same.
The value of intellect and productivity is unique and individual.
Once your ego understands that people all have the same value on a human level,
You will be able to communicate with everyone on eye level because you will never value yourself as less or more than anyone else.
You will only differentiate your abilities and capacities.
In an imbalanced ego,
You will constantly compare your apparent value with others.
You will not be able to separate your abilities from your self worth.
You will never be happy because you will never be able to truly connect with other humans.
This is also the reason why people with a balanced ego have a high level of emotional intelligence.
A person with a healthy ego can connect with people from all walks of life.
So now that you understand how you can use your ego,
Let's find acceptance for your ego.
Your ego will always be there.
It is not something you can choose.
So embrace your ego,
Raise your awareness,
Balance your ego and make it serve you.
