The ego is a psychic entity that we build to navigate our days throughout our lives. It is about the construction of a series of action mechanisms that allow us to express ourselves and adapt to this world and that are created from the moment in which our essential Being is not allowed to manifest itself as it needs.
In the following Psychology-Online article, we are going to expose What is the ego and how does it operate?how to recognize it and how to eliminate it.
What is a person’s ego
The “I” or ego of a person refers to the “character” we have created about ourselves and we have internalized as the image that represents us, the being that we believe we are. The ego is the result of the sum, combination, structuring and elaboration of our experiences events that occur from pregnancy, throughout childhood to adolescence and from our interpretation of them.
From the psychoanalytic approach, the ego is based on the “reality principle” and involves the adjustment that our body makes between these two psychic instances to adapt to the family and social system in which it finds itself:
- The “it”: the innate needs that the person feels from the beginning of life and whose satisfaction, in most cases, guarantees the survival and favors their optimal development (for example: crying when hungry, when they need affection, when they feel afraid; sucking the breast as a vital need for food and protection; requesting presence and emotional care; moving freely; exploring the world; etc.)
- The “superego” (or moral conscience): from the age of 4 or 5, this psychic entity begins to develop in a linguistic-verbal way, but from the very beginning of pregnancy an internal discourse is created about what is right and what is wrong, how we should act, who we are, how much we are worth, what we have to do to receive love, how we should protect ourselves, etc. that, in these primary moments, are registered at a corporal and non-verbal level, therefore, at a very unconscious level, but whose force on us is immense, precisely because of its unconsciousness.
For this adjustment, the ego makes use of different “defense mechanisms” through which manages the combination between these needs and the internal moral discourse to end up constituting the definitive personality, the character that the person will represent in their life.
How the ego works
The functioning of the ego is as follows: the baby/child feels, from the beginning of his life, impulses that lead him to act with the intention of satisfying said needs. But it happens that sometimes, said needs are not covered just as you need. At this time the baby suffers a great anxiety and pain.
When this situation is repeated when faced with the same need, it occurs at a critical moment in life development (for example, during pregnancy, during birth or before one year of age) or with a high level of intensity (some neglect or abuse). , the baby makes an association between his impulse/need and the response received, concluding a certain idea/sensation that internalizes as belief about himself and what he deserves from others (constituting himself as a superego or moral conscience).
Re-living this situation causes pain but, nevertheless, you continue to feel that impulse/need. As cannot directly and healthily satisfy this need, will look for an alternative solution that will be determined by the internalized belief about the situation (the superego). The result of all this will be the creation of a certain “Defense mechanism” that will allow you to cope with that impulse without so much pain.
According to Anna Freud there are the following defense mechanisms:
- Repression: mechanism that eliminates, repressing in the unconscious, any situation or experience that causes pain (example: not remembering that one has experienced sexual abuse in childhood).
- Denial: deny some fact or feeling due to the person’s inability to accept and integrate it.
- Projection: This is a type of denial of one’s own feelings or desires that are attributed to another because one cannot equally recognize and accept them in oneself.
- Rationalization: allows you to provide a rational explanation for a fact or emotion that, otherwise, could not be accepted
- Intellectualization: mechanism by which the person analyzes situations in detail to put distance from their feelings and emotions and, in this way, not suffer.
- Reactive training: leads the person to express precisely the behavior or emotion contrary to what is felt, due to not being able to accept that own feeling.
- Regression: When faced with a situation of stress or discomfort, the person will return to behaviors typical of childhood evolutionary stages in which they were fixed, that is, which they were not able to resolve.
- Displacement: the focus that causes our anxiety or anger is replaced by another to reduce the discomfort that would be generated by directly expressing the emotion on the main causing focus.
- Sublimation: This mechanism transforms a potentially dangerous impulse into socially acceptable behavior.
In this article we talk in depth about the .
How to recognize the ego: examples
With what has been said, the ego is built on the basis of not listening to and not accepting one’s own needs (denial, sublimation, projection, etc.) as a result of the anguish or fear that has caused the original experience of non-attention of his impulse. Therefore, the ego is built on frustration of all these needs together with the irrational listening to a series of false beliefs about ourselves (superego). As a result of all this, the ego is constituted as a weak and scared part of ourselves that goes out to battle with sword and shield to defend itself from the hostile world in which it lives through different defense mechanisms.
How can we recognize the ego?
- To recognize the ego it is enough listen to ourselves internally and detect, of the behaviors we do, those that will always make us feel bad, they will hurt us. Even when the behavior is outwardly hurtful (for example, being haughty or aggressive toward others), internally it is equally hurtful to us as it is directed by the ego. In fact, over the years, the continued manifestation of this entity harms the person who, in order to heal, manifests these wounds through all types of illnesses (physical or emotional).
- Another way to recognize it is through the body. The egoic behaviors always assume the contraction of some part of the body (breathing, eyes, jaws, thorax, abdomen, cervical, etc.). Body work is a great help to detect our contracted areas.
- The third way to recognize the ego is to observe What part of us generates this behavior?. When this is motivated by our ego, it is directed by negative thoughts (fear, distrust, resentment, etc.) or by (anger, sadness, anxiety, uncontrolled joy, etc.).
Some examples of egoic behaviors they would be the following:
- Dominant and manipulative: People with these behaviors control situations to feel safe. Here you can see more information about the.
- Aggressive-defensive: distrustful people who always see the negative in situations and defend themselves by attacking.
- Elusive-avoidant: people who avoid facing certain situations to avoid facing the discomfort they experience.
- Scary-scary: equally distrustful people whose response to certain aspects is fear, paralysis and contraction.
- Smarty: knowing everything, or believing it, gives you the security you need. In this article we talk about.
- Proud: is unable to recognize when he has made a mistake.
- Hoarder: His behavior is always aimed at being the center of attention.
Differences between the ego and the self
Being clear about what the ego is, we can differentiate it from what the BEING or authentic manifestation of the person is, which is beyond egoic behaviors.
We can observe the clearest expression of our authentic Being in babies and children of early ages. People are born pure and free from any type of external or internal conditioning. In these moments, our being manifests itself in a way real and authentic There is total coherence between what we feel and express. However, over the years, the external conditioning that we live through our experiences creates our ego and we begin to manifest ourselves through this character as a way to survive and obtain what we need in this world.
Unlike the ego, the authentic Self is the direct reflection of our soul. He is kind, sincere, well-intentioned, cordial, happy, peaceful, brotherly, etc. The Being manifests the real and inherent values of the human being that are violated as a consequence of the construction of the ego. In this article we explain the.
How to remove a person’s ego
The elimination of the ego is not a simple task, although it is necessary for the real healing of our souls and bodies if we wish to change the world (the manifestations of the ego are the cause of the discomforts and injustices of this world). To eliminate the ego, “catharsis” or internal cleansing will be necessary that will allow us re-connect with our essential Beingthe real manifestation of ourselves.
The steps to carry out this catharsis process will be:
- Carry out an introspection process to detect what defense mechanisms act in us. In this article you will find.
- Search the origins that caused the constitution of said mechanisms.
- Re-live that situation and be emotionally contained just as we need at that moment.
- Re-construct that situation from the present moment, differentiating the truths from the lies that happened at that moment.
- Start a process of prohibition and rejection of lies that sustained the defense mechanisms, strengthening the benefits of our pure and authentic being.
- Stay active, firm and alert in this discernment to not allow those old chimeras to re-establish themselves in moments of weakness and fragility.
The manifestation of our essential being is a process that should not be interrupted from childhood. However, taking into account the social system in which we find ourselves, it is complicated by the interferences and obstacles that arise when mothering/fathering/educating. It is, therefore, necessary to carry out the process of inner personal purification in order to, by gradually freeing ourselves from our character, finally manifest ourselves as the kind and brotherly beings what are we. Only in this way can we improve and change the world. Here we talk about the.
This article is merely informative, at Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.
Bibliography
- Alonso, A. (2015). Definition of the week: Id, ego and superego.
- López Morcillo, A. Understanding the ego: discover why you are not who you think you are.