Is your Ego stopping you from being your best self?

 

I have had many a discussion about the ego and its utility. One of my favourite group activities is to debate the topic “is Ego friend or Foe”. Without exception these conversations produce a wide range of strong opinions and many disagreements. There are some who strongly believe that your Ego is the main driver to greatness citing that many of the top athletes and performers in the world have exceptionally big egos. Then there are those who belief that the ego leads you to a place of arrogance and selfishness, and can lead to caring more about image than substance. I have spent a significant amount of time reading about this topic, and with over 20 years of sport coaching under my belt I think I am starting to understand the Ego and can now see it at work in real life settings. 

First it is important to define what the ego is and what the ego is not. Or at least define it as I refer to it so that you can understand where I am coming from. The Ego in its simplest terms is how we identify ourselves. It is our view of ourselves and where we fit into the world around us. There are a couple of conditions that come with your ego. 1) Ego will compare itself to others and 2) your Ego always wants to be right. When our ego speaks it will always come from a place of judgment and comparison. It needs to be seen as better or as the best, and it needs to be right. The ego is on a constant quest to do two things…. show its strength and hide its weaknesses. To the ego, failure is simply not an option and it is to be avoided at all cost.

I have come across many people who believe that this desire to be the best and this failure avoidance are truly great qualities especially in producing top performers. I agree that there are many top performers who have massive egos, who strive to be the best in the world, and who believe failure is not an option. Yet there are far more people with massive egos who’s quest for greatness ends without trophies, titles, fame and recognition. Often they end in collapse, or at least with untapped potential and a bunch of excuses as to why they didn’t make it. 

The Ego Trap

The ego lives in the world of threat assessment. With a goal to demonstrate superiority and avoid failure there is a constant scan for threats to the ego. Based that threat assessment the ego decides on whether or not it can demonstrate its competence. 

LOW THREAT

In low threat scenarios the ego can relax and coast freely because there is no worry whatsoever that its supremacy will be challenged. In these settings it is not uncommon to see complacency or arrogance. One cannot help but think of Goliath’s reaction to first seeing the challenge of young David. 

HIGH THREAT

In high threat scenarios we see a different side of ego. We see stress and anxiety, often followed by less desirable or destructive behaviours. This is where we see responses like avoidance of challenging situations, emotional outburst, excuse making, and even cheating. 

There is a moment where the ego can shine. It is right in the middle where the threat is perceived at a level where they will need to perform at its best, but at a level where the Ego truly believes it can and will be successful. 

But this is not where the problem with ego lies. It lies outside of this spot. It lies with arrogance when you truly believe you know more than those around you and have nothing to learn. It lies with the complacency that occurs when you believe you can beat someone without even trying. It exists in the lies that you tell yourself after a poor performance shows you that you don’t even have to try or to perform at your best to be successful. The problem with ego rears its ugly head the moment you assess a threat to your success. You doubt your ability, you fear you may fail, you worry about how you will be perceived by others, and because of this you go into self preservation mode. These are the moments where the ego is destructive. 

The goal should be to move beyond ego and towards a true confidence. Confidence is a feeling of self-assurance arising from one’s appreciation of one’s own abilities or qualities. This self-assurance is not rooted in comparison with others, rather it is based on being happy with who you are in the present moment. Confidence comes in the form of knowing you possess the right skills and attributes to perform a task or a challenge. Confidence is knowing that even if you cannot perform a skill now, that you will be able to learn how with some time and effort. Confidence also comes in the shape of being ok even if you can't be successful at a task or a challenge, but knowing that you will be proud of your efforts along the way. Let’s look at ways to move out of ego and towards confidence. 

6 Steps to Avoid the Ego Trap

1. Practice Humility – Humility is a belief that you are not the most important person in the room. It is knowing that you can learn from others and that you are not all important. It is being grounded in the sense that you are just one person in a bigger picture and that the moment does not simply revolve around you. Humble people listen first, put others ahead of themselves, say thank you, learn from others. 
2. Focus on Personal Growth – One of the greatest ways to counteract the negative aspects of ego is to come from a mindset of personal growth and mastery. When you have this approach you always believe you can improve at something and are always working hard to get better. People know that when you are learning and growing mistakes and errors are inevitable. You learn to see them as natural and as temporary states rather than personal attacks and a reflection of your value or who you are as a person.
3. Live in the Present Moment – The Ego is scanning for potential threat and will work to avoid it. It is also making excuses for why things maybe didn’t go your way in the past. By living in the past and the future you waste energy by dealing with emotions that are often just not practical for the present moment. You may live dreading an upcoming event because of how you will look, or spend your days resenting something that you feel you deserved but was overlooked for. This is not only unproductive, but highly draining of your energy. You can avoid these drains by focusing on your current reality, and staying locked on to things that you can control. 
4. Develop Empathy – Empathy is the ability to understand how others may be thinking. It is not simply thinking how you would feel in the same situation, but trying to understand how someone else may be thinking. By doing this you move beyond a selfish perspective of how something is effecting you, and to a perspective that allows you to fully understand how someone else is thinking and feeling in the moment. 
5. Be Positive – The ego loves negativity, it feeds off of it. It comes in the form of blame and excuses (I got ripped off, this isn’t fair) , but also in the form of self-sabotage (I am not good enough, I don’t deserve this). Change your thinking to positivity and gratitude and avoid negative thoughts and words. It is a difficult task, but once you tune into how many negative thoughts and comments you have you will see how your ego wallows in this self pity. By changing your thinking you can begin to change your perspective and reality. 
6. Compare with yourself, not others – There really is only one person you should try to compare to and that is yourself. Comparison with others fuels the ego. It tells you that you are better than someone or worse than someone, which goes back to the ego trap. When you avoid comparison to others, and start comparing to yourself you will start to notice growth and positive change. You will no longer be worried about how you stack up and not be in constant fear of how you will look around others. It is ok to see other people as an inspiration and as a guide to what may be possible. But using them as the benchmark for your personal success can be a dangerous game. Your personal best is a great achievement, don’t let it be ruined by the fact that someone else’s personal best may be higher. 

So back to the debate. If you ask me I would say that having a big ego is ok, until it isn’t. Then it can be disastrous. The key is to be aware of your ego and make sure it isn’t steering you into thoughts and behaviours that are not what you want. Then move on from Ego and focus on growing true confidence in who you are as a person, and focus on personal growth and being the best version of yourself.

Steve Simonson