The Truth About Ego

And Yes Women Have Them…

As a collective, women have been attacked so much for so long that it is imbedded in our nervous systems to be on the alert for attack and to go on the defensive even if there is no reason to do so. Often when a woman feels invalidated in her pain, her ego will come out swinging. (I’m a woman so I’m speaking from that perspective, even though men have egos too.)

Egos not only self-aggrandize, they often make us feel less than. When we feel lacking in some way, or put down, our egos want to make us feel better. We usually do this by lashing out and project our feelings at another instead of examining and observing them.

Emotional triggers happen when we have an unhealed parts of ourselves. The outside world in general will trigger us to feel what we have yet to heal. When we embark on a healing journey, women tend to seek out a tribe, or group to belong to because we want to feel safe, validated, heard, and understood. For a time, the tribe can make us feel welcomed and accepted. But what do you do when you get emotionally triggered? Do you feel safe to communicate that with members of the group? Or do you lash out at the one who triggered you? How many “bitch” sessions have you attended with your girlfriends, but have you ever come to an agreement on how to move past an issue?

True safety comes from within – no one can give you the love, support, and safety that you need for yourself. It takes diligence and patience with yourself while you do your inner work. When we have a need to be validated, our egos perceive a threat when another person challenges our ego in some way. Our egos can feel challenged when someone simply asks how they can help us move beyond the pain, or they ask us to see another perspective on the same issue.

Our egos want to keep us stuck. Ego will do whatever it takes to hold onto the same narrative we’ve been telling ourselves for quite some time. It wants someone to be right, and someone or something else to be wrong. I’ve seen it happen many a time where a support group fails because someone does not want to look at what they need to heal. Instead, they ego recruit others in the group to divide the group and make someone an outsider. Sounds like playground stuff, but this happens with grown adults all the time.

For example, years ago, a friend of mine called me up and ranted on the phone about her husband and son. She proudly stated how she had yelled at them, and felt perfectly justified in her actions, choice of language, and that they deserved her wrath. While I no longer recall her exact words, I remember how uncomfortable I felt listening to her. From my perspective, the things she said to her loved ones were borderline abusive. When she had calmed down, I gently pointed out that her behavior mirrored that of another person she’d complained about as being abusive. I asked if she wanted to talk about how she felt. I felt okay giving my perspective because we had done healing work together and talked about these concepts all the time. Except my concern was met with verbal abuse in my direction.

Concepts are fine to discuss but it’s putting them into practice that makes the difference in your life. With my friend, I thought we had the type of friendship where we could discuss these things. She certainly felt okay to point out what I needed to heal, and as good friends do, I wanted to help her. To say it wasn’t met well was an understatement! People like being the one to help, but not being the ones to receive support. And that’s the ego thinking its shit don’t stink!

Another time, a friend asked me for my perspective on a concept. I explained how I viewed it. She became angry at me because I was confident in my answer. While I felt confident to answer, I didn’t tell her that I was right nor that she had to adopt my belief. In fact, I thought we were having a discussion until she projected her anger at me. She didn’t want to be responsible for being emotionally triggered. Despite being yelled at, I held space for her anger, then dealt with my own emotions later. Getting caught up in her anger would not have been productive.

There’s a lot of talk, especially in spiritual communities, about healing, the ego, etc, but when it comes to the real work – open, authentic, and honest communication with yourself and others – there is a big unwillingness there and ego acknowledgment is often lacking. People want to point out what others need to let go of, but don’t enjoy turning the tables on themselves. This again goes back to our nervous systems – when you have been persecuted and held back, your ego will manufacture a way to keep this cycle going. You have to allow yourself to be vulnerable and know that you’re safe no matter what.

Open, authentic, and honest communication begins with yourself. Acknowledge when your ego is triggered. If you don’t feel safe to discuss it with the person who triggered you, take space for yourself. If that person truly cares for you, they’ll want to talk about it when you’ve had time to process. Should they not want to, then you can find someone else. Another person can only be as honest with you as they are with themselves, and vice versa. You won’t be on the same page as everyone all of the time.

Learn to heal yourself from within. Learn to hear yourself. Take time to stop yourself from reacting when you are emotionally triggered. That is the key to taming your ego. Bond with others over your healing, not your pain. Trust is a process and it begins with you. Sometimes the best healing happens when we take the time to be alone to do our work.

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