MOST people rely on something to make them feel important. You could say it’s their idol because it replaces God in their life or the place where God should be.
Before, mine was being attractive or hot and I took it as a part of my identity. I was a product of the consumerist society that sold the “Barbie-Megan Foxx” ideal. Still, everyone has their thing: being smart, being funny, being rich, being well-dressed or well-read. It’s all the same. It feeds ego.
The problem is, ego is weak. Ego is fleeting and meaningless. Most of all, ego-based confidence is on shaky ground.
You get insulted and your world/ego comes tumbling down until you rebuild it in a wall of defensiveness and/or hate. You protect it with intellectualism that exclude the ego-manufactured other: “Only the smart can understand Nietzsche” or “Being this rich means I don’t have to talk nicely to people who don’t have at least one Louis Vuitton in their closet.”
Divides are built from ego to society: Religions protect their own, capitalists protect their own, the models protect their own. From ego stems the brick and mortar that build prejudice and war.
Even in businesses, the main problem isn’t productivity but the human factor of relationship and politics. Why can’t we get along? Why can’t we forget whose idea this was? Why can’t the boss be wrong?
It is for ego that many an injustice has survived in the crevices of companies that calcify their progress to a standstill.
This New Year I urge you to break free from the constraints of your burdensome ego. Allow your importance to fall, and accept your own unique strength as a child of God. When you see the greatness and goodness of God and take part in your belonging in Him, you become unshakeable. Your ego is dead. Yet, a dead ego allows you to love and serve others, be fully invested in outcomes, instead of power struggles, and fully serving others because you yourself are filled to the brim.
You are not the brand you wear or the title on your desk. It would seem scary to an ego-centered person, but when you find the true you, the child of God that is greater than any property or title you might have, you will finally be completely solid in confidence.
More than this, you will be free not to have to defend how important you are all the time. You will be free to just be you. You will be open to giving attention and kindness, and receiving the gains of stronger bonds with colleagues and lifelong friends.
Stephen Covey speaks of “principle-centered leadership” where principles are your core. That is great because principles won’t change. The problem arises when one fails in implementing a principle like honesty or frugality. It is because their core identity is still not in line with that principle.
When you start seeing your identity as a child of God, you will be a completely free person.
An ego-centered individual will always be assessing and reassessing how he or she is coming off or appearing to others because they are out to protect their ego. With a dead ego, you can be free to be yourself, plan the goals that truly make you feel fulfilled, laugh at yourself and ignore mean spirited comments of people. With a dead ego, you can focus on turning your dreams to reality, connecting with the divine, finding your passion and nourishing your most loved ones. Where once ego was a blindfold that kept you in your own self-sense, being “ego less” allows you to view others with more empathy, kindness and understanding.
Here are the fruits and symptoms of a dead ego:
- You can appreciate the strengths and beauty of everyone around you.
- You can be happy for other people’s success and blessings even if you don’t have them yourself.
- You can laugh at yourself and the mistakes you make without feeling angry.
- You can let snide or catty comments slide off you like butter on a hot pancake.
- You freely compliment and support others.
- You can interact with others without mentioning your idol/ego-strength.
- You see yourself as a child of God or a special person, just like everyone else.
Killing your ego is one of the best things you can do for yourself this 2018. Free yourself of the hassles of self-consciousness today by consciously doing any or all of these emotions straight from the heart. Knowing that you are more than your ego is just the first step to a richer inner life that is yours if and only if you take a gun to that ego now.
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Maxine Mamba is a regular contributor to the Millennials page of the BusinessMirror. The views expressed in her column, however, do not necessarily reflect those of the BusinessMirror’s. E-mail her at millennialuniverse@yahoo.com.