The Pressing Need for Everyone to Quiet Their Egos

[Super Nova]

Interesting article. Made me think of someone so i put it here for all to read and contemplate.

The Pressing Need for Everyone to Quiet Their Egos

Why quieting the ego strengthens your best self

We live in some times. On the one hand, things are better than they've ever been. Overall rates of violence, poverty, and disease are down. There have been substantial increases in education, longevity, leisure time, and safety. On the other hand... We are more divided than ever as a species. Tribalism and identity politics are rampant on all sides of everything.

Steven Pinker and other intellectuals think that the answer is a return to Enlightenment values-- things like reason, individualism, and the free expression of as many ideas as possible and an effective method for evaluating the truth of them. I agree that this is part of the solution, but I think an often underdiscussed part of the problem is much more fundamental: all of our egos are just too damn loud.*

Watching debates in the media (and especially on YouTube) lately has been making my head explode. There seems to be this growing belief that the goal is always to win. Not have a dialectical, well-intentioned, mutual search for overarching principles and productive ways forward that will improve humanity-- but to just win and destroy.

IT IS TO LAUGH.... Ha HA

Now, don't get me wrong-- I find a good intellectual domination just as thrilling as the next person. But cheap thrills aside, I also care deeply about there actually being a positive outcome. Arriving at the truth and improving society may not be explicit goals of a WWE match, but surely these are worthy goals of public discourse?
There is also an interesting paradox at play here in that the more the ego is quieted, the higher the likelihood of actually reaching one's goals. I think we tend to grossly underestimate the extent to which the drive for self-enhancement actually gets in the way of reaching one's goals-- even if one's goals are primarily agentic.

Since psychologists use of the term ego is very different ways, let me be clear how I am defining it here. I define the ego as that aspect of the self that has the incessant need to see itself in a positive light. Make no doubt: the self can be our greatest resource, but it can also be our darkest enemy. On the one hand, the fundamentally human capacities for self-awareness, self-reflection, and self-control are essential for reaching our goals. On the other hand, the self will do anything to disavow itself of responsibility for any negative outcome it may have played a role. As one researcher put it, the self engenders “a self-zoo of self-defense mechanisms.” I believe we can refer to these defensive strategies to see the self in a positive light as the “ego”. A noisy ego spends so much time defending the self as if it were a real thing, and then doing whatever it takes to assert itself, that it often inhibits the very goals it is most striving for.

... more here

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/be ... heir-egos/

[Super Nova]

Anyone that writes this sort of thing clearly is bigot and is planning to build on the preconception of someone to run them down and denigrate them. That is to win and boost their own ego at the expense of another.

Well......don't be surprised if I soon become a louder mouth on refugees. My latest driver.....a bloke from the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Belguin Congo) fled to Uganda....and there got refugee status to come to Australia....and then flew to Australia.

I'll winkle his story out slowly so as not to offend him. All I have are those bare facts so far.

[Super Nova]

The ego and win at all costs attitude of some sometimes leads the sick ego of some to reveal their true thoughts and when there will be social consequences begin obfuscate and lie to prevent their real intention being known. Win at all costs is a real society illness. Arguing until the cows come home not matter what is said just to win....

If ten million citizens (or even one) elect to stay in a land stateless, meaningless, a landscape .....after the State of Israel was moved......yes, they made their bed, even if it be slaughter.

Then they raise the stakes when in a corner to try and win and recover some moral ground to launch their next attack to win.

"I'll leave this Forum forever" if you can quote a post I made which contains just the words....."I will happily precipitate the slaughter of ten million Jews."

And what is your counter bet, xxxx. What will you do.....if you can't?

Words games do not hide the intent of the author and only their ego and obsession to win at all costs compels them to continue. Enough contradictory material does reveal the truth that they are racist and do not care about their fellow human beings. Win at all costs even if 10 million people die.

The ego is a dangerous thing when out of control. thank god it has no real power of influence in the world.

[Super Nova]

Another example of win at all costs. Create the battle.

I hope he tells the truth. Everybody who seeks refuge from Africa seems to have a death sentence on their heads. None of it can be proven though.

So.....he put one over 'Dutton?' Is that what you are saying?

Now the lines are drawn... a battle to win will begin. Never interested in the debate... only the battle and the win.

[Neferti]

Tee Hee. Mr EGO himself.

[freediver]

Romanticising the past.