What really is your ego? 

We held events in the San Francisco Bay Area a week ago and a common point of discussion turned out to be confusion over the definition of ego.  No surprise to us, as Unity Quest is focused on two men who have to face their ego in very different times.  What was a surprise is how many people were thinking egotistical behavior was the only way to identify the ego.  If it were only that easy!

The ego evolved out of the evolutionary process that formed modern day humans.  The ego is a fantastic survival mechanism.  It operates out of experience and causes lightening fast reactions.  The ego is so fast that the developed mind hasn’t got a chance most of the time to stop the reactions.  When we needed security and safety, food and water, warmth and health, the ego served to store the experiences that helped us conquer, live longer and thrive. The main function of the ego is to protect to survive another day.

Now we come to modern day western civilization -- meaning any time after 1000AD let’s say and certainly in the developed world.  Much of the population is not hunting, farming or finding itself in day-to-day survival mode. Even with the economy struggling to sustain a recovery without government life support, humans are not in a life or death survival situation.  But, the ego still operates as if it is. 

The ego has become a mental image of who we are as individuals, an image we will go to any lengths to protect.  This function of protector of our “self image” cuts us off from others.  This ego, being mind-made, is extremely efficient at filtering out thoughts, words and actions that challenges our sense of self while reinforcing the experiences that validate our self image.  The ego is the chatter in your mind that keeps feeding you messages that cut you off from others.  The ego, being a creation of the mind, is not in touch with your heart.  Love is not the home of the ego.

To quote Eckhart Tolle - Albert Einstein, who was admired as almost superhuman and whose fate it was to become one of the most famous people on the planet, never identified with the image the collective mind had created of him. He remained humble, egoless. In fact, he spoke of "a grotesque contradiction between what people consider to be my achievements and abilities and the reality of who I am and what I am capable of." 

The ego is an illusion.

As a construct of the mind, it can still serve us to filter out real dangers and behaviors that are not ones we choose to experience. But, for nearly every soul walking this planet, making the ego the central part of ourselves is a grave error.  We need the discipline to identify how our ego was formed, own its effect on our daily lives, and then learn how to dislodge it from it’s central place in our lives. In Unity Quest, we write about waking up to the enormity of how the ego is unconsciously controlling our lives. 

Our message is simple: as long as the ego is in charge, you will continue to believe that you are an individual cut off from the truth of just how connected – and interconnected – you are with every living thing.