07-16-2008, 06:33 AM
The concept of Ego-sphere and the Ironic Risk that Belongs to Becoming Wealthy [1][2][3]
There can be little doubt that every human being possesses an Ego. In fact, having an Ego is what defines our very nature. Broadly speaking, the functions of Ego lie in its ability to nurture and protect the Self.
Without the Ego a human simply ceases to be human by failure to sustain the Self. The Ego therefore is indispensable for survival. Unfortunately however, it is not always used to nurture and protect its host in the most efficient and appropriate manner when keeping its wellbeing in mind. Success in sustaining the Self depends on how the Ego is used. If the functions of the Ego are proper, one could speak of a healthy Ego. If they are improper, the Ego may be called unhealthy.
Unhealthy Egos fail by shifting emphasis from normal or healthy Ego-functions to functions that are ultimately and paradoxically damaging to the host. Examples of healthy Ego functions would be actions that directly attend to the biological survival needs of the bearer and, by natural extension, everyone dear to him or her. In other words, a healthy Ego focuses on primary survival needs of him or her, his or her family and primary material belongings.
A classic and relevant example of a fatally unhealthy Ego is provided by the theme of the well-known Greek tale of Narcissus [4]. Narcissus was a man who was obsessed with his own beauty to the point of becoming dismissive of all needs and drives in life that would have mattered to any healthy human being. The tale concludes with Narcissus becoming mesmerized by his very own mirror-image to such extreme extent that it ultimately leads to his own demise. The moral of the story makes an excellent illustration of the principled misallocation of the functions of the Ego. That is, in the case of Narcissus, the Ego shifts from seeking to attend the nurturing and protecting functions of the self, to nurturing and protecting a mere visual image of the Self, a weak and routinely artificial surrogate of the true Self. The Ego of Narcissus thus perverts to become a pompous and heartless archetypal guardian of vanity and, as such, inescapably spells doom to its keeper.
This is a wonderfully accurate metaphorical rendition of the perennial tragedy of the human Ego. We too often are too much engaged with nurturing and protecting mere images (or mirages) of the Self, while neglecting the demands and interests of the genuine Self. As such, by systematically betraying our true Self we categorically fail in becoming spiritually healthy and thus hopelessly fail to gain a natural sense of happiness, one that promises to emerge were we to have a properly functioning and non-corrupted Ego.
Another tragic perversion of the Ego lies in the human tendency to procure and hoard material riches, an inclination that, of and by itself, is not necessarily counter-productive since a minimum of material possessions is necessary for self-sustenance. However, the obsessive habit of seeking to acquire more and more matter (e.g. money hoarding) is likely to have a detrimental outcome to the wellbeing of its keeper.
We seem to have an almost innate longing to not be content with already acquired wealth but to continually strive for expansion of one's own base of material riches. Perhaps there is an underlying minority complex at the heart of the problem. After all, unless you feel comfortable with what you already have, why would you invest your own precious resources in wanting to have more than your neighbour does?
The ramifications for the Ego regarding matter acquisition I propose to be the following mechanism. With every newly acquired material object the Ego, out of necessity, must expand its domain of protection if control over the object is to be maintained. Thus the domain of the Ego, or Ego-Sphere if you will, is an increasing function of the extension, or quantity, of gained material wealth. Stated succinctly, richness requires a progressively inflating Ego. This drive to defend one's material riches can easily become pathological if the original and inherently benign functions of the Ego are superseded. As with Narcissus, the preoccupation of the Ego with the defense and nurture of surrogate images of the Self may ultimately wreak itself in the development of conditions that are paradoxically detrimental to the self. For instance, workaholic businessmen, while becoming extremely successful and rich as Rothschilds, they may also become so narcissistic that it causes them to neglect their physical health and become viable to lethal diseases or afflictions (e.g. cancer and heart-attacks), or it may cost them their marriage, or cause them to lose precious relationships (with their next of kin). For many people life is but a sad and wasteful rat-race where, by default, good health is all too eagerly sacrificed to Mammon and Tinseltown icons and essentially irrelevant pursuits.
Besides Narcissism, another consequential tragedy of the perversion of the Ego lies in its implications for the enjoyment of freedom. Let us first settle on a workable and practical definition of freedom. A free person is someone who has been able to maximize his or hers degree of manoeuvrability, chiefly by maximizing detachment from agents that serve to undercut this manoeuvrability. A free person, for all practical purposes, is unrestrained to go, be and do whatever he or she pleases as long as it does not conflict with other people's expression or desire of his or her freedom. When there is such a conflict, any possible resolution that is applied, by necessity, implies a reduction of the freedom in at least one of the involved parties since a moment of conflict is but a temporary occurrence. It is an elementary given that if a person has a large protective Ego-sphere it becomes increasingly cumbersome and difficult to maintain the enjoyment of freedom without running into conflicts with concurrent Egos.
There's a cute analogue to be found from elementary particle physics where particles are now to be substituted by Ego-spheres. As such, pictorially, in terms of Ego-spheres the situation can be rendered as follows:
The message of this picture illustrates that people with inflated Egos (or Ego-spheres) unfortunately experience progressively less enjoyment of freedom. This is quite a strong argument in favor of the age-old saying that money does not bring happiness. Indeed, if freedom is a measure of happiness it seems that happiness as a function of material wealth features an optimum rather than happiness being an ever increasing function of matter. Hence we pinpointed the inherent tragic risk associated to being wealthy. The sketch of the situation is as follows:
References:
1.Introspection
2.Observation
3.Reflection
4.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism
There can be little doubt that every human being possesses an Ego. In fact, having an Ego is what defines our very nature. Broadly speaking, the functions of Ego lie in its ability to nurture and protect the Self.
Without the Ego a human simply ceases to be human by failure to sustain the Self. The Ego therefore is indispensable for survival. Unfortunately however, it is not always used to nurture and protect its host in the most efficient and appropriate manner when keeping its wellbeing in mind. Success in sustaining the Self depends on how the Ego is used. If the functions of the Ego are proper, one could speak of a healthy Ego. If they are improper, the Ego may be called unhealthy.
Unhealthy Egos fail by shifting emphasis from normal or healthy Ego-functions to functions that are ultimately and paradoxically damaging to the host. Examples of healthy Ego functions would be actions that directly attend to the biological survival needs of the bearer and, by natural extension, everyone dear to him or her. In other words, a healthy Ego focuses on primary survival needs of him or her, his or her family and primary material belongings.
A classic and relevant example of a fatally unhealthy Ego is provided by the theme of the well-known Greek tale of Narcissus [4]. Narcissus was a man who was obsessed with his own beauty to the point of becoming dismissive of all needs and drives in life that would have mattered to any healthy human being. The tale concludes with Narcissus becoming mesmerized by his very own mirror-image to such extreme extent that it ultimately leads to his own demise. The moral of the story makes an excellent illustration of the principled misallocation of the functions of the Ego. That is, in the case of Narcissus, the Ego shifts from seeking to attend the nurturing and protecting functions of the self, to nurturing and protecting a mere visual image of the Self, a weak and routinely artificial surrogate of the true Self. The Ego of Narcissus thus perverts to become a pompous and heartless archetypal guardian of vanity and, as such, inescapably spells doom to its keeper.
This is a wonderfully accurate metaphorical rendition of the perennial tragedy of the human Ego. We too often are too much engaged with nurturing and protecting mere images (or mirages) of the Self, while neglecting the demands and interests of the genuine Self. As such, by systematically betraying our true Self we categorically fail in becoming spiritually healthy and thus hopelessly fail to gain a natural sense of happiness, one that promises to emerge were we to have a properly functioning and non-corrupted Ego.
Another tragic perversion of the Ego lies in the human tendency to procure and hoard material riches, an inclination that, of and by itself, is not necessarily counter-productive since a minimum of material possessions is necessary for self-sustenance. However, the obsessive habit of seeking to acquire more and more matter (e.g. money hoarding) is likely to have a detrimental outcome to the wellbeing of its keeper.
We seem to have an almost innate longing to not be content with already acquired wealth but to continually strive for expansion of one's own base of material riches. Perhaps there is an underlying minority complex at the heart of the problem. After all, unless you feel comfortable with what you already have, why would you invest your own precious resources in wanting to have more than your neighbour does?
The ramifications for the Ego regarding matter acquisition I propose to be the following mechanism. With every newly acquired material object the Ego, out of necessity, must expand its domain of protection if control over the object is to be maintained. Thus the domain of the Ego, or Ego-Sphere if you will, is an increasing function of the extension, or quantity, of gained material wealth. Stated succinctly, richness requires a progressively inflating Ego. This drive to defend one's material riches can easily become pathological if the original and inherently benign functions of the Ego are superseded. As with Narcissus, the preoccupation of the Ego with the defense and nurture of surrogate images of the Self may ultimately wreak itself in the development of conditions that are paradoxically detrimental to the self. For instance, workaholic businessmen, while becoming extremely successful and rich as Rothschilds, they may also become so narcissistic that it causes them to neglect their physical health and become viable to lethal diseases or afflictions (e.g. cancer and heart-attacks), or it may cost them their marriage, or cause them to lose precious relationships (with their next of kin). For many people life is but a sad and wasteful rat-race where, by default, good health is all too eagerly sacrificed to Mammon and Tinseltown icons and essentially irrelevant pursuits.
Besides Narcissism, another consequential tragedy of the perversion of the Ego lies in its implications for the enjoyment of freedom. Let us first settle on a workable and practical definition of freedom. A free person is someone who has been able to maximize his or hers degree of manoeuvrability, chiefly by maximizing detachment from agents that serve to undercut this manoeuvrability. A free person, for all practical purposes, is unrestrained to go, be and do whatever he or she pleases as long as it does not conflict with other people's expression or desire of his or her freedom. When there is such a conflict, any possible resolution that is applied, by necessity, implies a reduction of the freedom in at least one of the involved parties since a moment of conflict is but a temporary occurrence. It is an elementary given that if a person has a large protective Ego-sphere it becomes increasingly cumbersome and difficult to maintain the enjoyment of freedom without running into conflicts with concurrent Egos.
There's a cute analogue to be found from elementary particle physics where particles are now to be substituted by Ego-spheres. As such, pictorially, in terms of Ego-spheres the situation can be rendered as follows:
The message of this picture illustrates that people with inflated Egos (or Ego-spheres) unfortunately experience progressively less enjoyment of freedom. This is quite a strong argument in favor of the age-old saying that money does not bring happiness. Indeed, if freedom is a measure of happiness it seems that happiness as a function of material wealth features an optimum rather than happiness being an ever increasing function of matter. Hence we pinpointed the inherent tragic risk associated to being wealthy. The sketch of the situation is as follows:
References:
1.Introspection
2.Observation
3.Reflection
4.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism