7 Ways to Eliminate Your Ego
by Parker · 41 things on Twos
- "Egotist" refers to someone dangerously focused on themselves and with disregard for anyone else.
- History is also made by individuals who fought their egos at every turn, who eschewed the spotlight, and who put their higher goals above their desire for recognition.
- Wherever you are, whatever you're doing, your worst enemy already lives inside you: your ego.
- These are the tips I use to eliminate my ego supplemented by excerpts from Ego is the Enemy by Ryan Holiday
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- Always be learning
- A true student is like a sponge. Absorbing what goes on around him, filtering it, latching on to what he can hold. A student is self-critical and self-motivated, always trying to improve his understanding so that he can move on to the next topic, the next challenge. A real student is also his own teacher and his own critic. There is no room for ego there.
- You can't learn if you think you already know. You will not find the answers if you're too conceited and self-assured to ask the questions. You cannot get better if you're convinced you are the best.
- The art of taking feedback is such a crucial skill in life. We not only need to take this harsh feedback, but actively solicit it, labor to seek out the negative precisely when our friends and family and brain are telling us that we're doing great.
- The pretense of knowledge is our most dangerous vice because it prevents us from getting any better.
- Today, books are cheaper than ever. Courses are free. Access to teachers is no longer a barrier—technology has done away with that. There is no excuse for not getting your education.
- "It is impossible to learn that which one thinks one already knows." - Epictetus.
- Talk less
- Silence. The ability to deliberately keep yourself out of the conversation and subsist without its validation. Silence is the respite of the confident and the strong.
- Talk depletes us.
- The only relationship between work and chatter is that one kills the other.
- The more difficult task, the more uncertain the outcome, the more costly talk will be and the farther we run from actual accountability.
- Plug that hole right in the middle of your face—that can drain you of your vital life force. Watch what happens. Watch how much better you get.
- "Those who know do not speak. Those who speak do not know" - Lao Tzu
- Seek truth
- Ego crosses out what matters and replaces it with what doesn't.
- We can't improve the world if we don't understand it or ourselves.
- When we remove ego, we're left with what is real. What replaces ego is rock-hard humility and confidence.
- Without an accurate accounting of our own abilities compared to others, what we have is not confidence but delusion. How are we supposed to reach, motivate, or lead other people if we can't relate to their needs—because we have lost touch with our own?
- "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool" - Richard Feynman
- Seek purpose
- If your purpose is something larger than you—to accomplish something, to prove something to yourself—then suddenly everything becomes both easier and more difficult. Easier in the sense that you know now what it is you need to do and what is important to you. Easier in the sense that you don't need to compromise. Harder because each opportunity—no matter how gratifying or rewarding—must be evaluated along strict guidelines: Does this help me do what I have set out to do? Does this allow me to do what I need to do? Am I being selfish or selfless?
- What is your purpose? What are you here to do?
- "What is it that I want to accomplish in life?" What calling does it serve? What principles govern my choices? Do I want to be like everyone else or do I want to do something different?
- Welcome discomfort
- To become what we ultimately hope to become often takes long periods of obscurity, of sitting and wrestling with some topic or paradox.
- You can change, or you can deny.
- "I don't like work—no man does—but I like what is in the work—the chance to find yourself." - Joseph Conrad
- Study people who are successful
- To become great and to stay great, they must all know what came before, what is going on now, and what comes next. Internalize the fundamentals of their domain and what surrounds them. They must be always learning. We must all become our own teachers, tutors, and critics.
- A philosopher must know deeply, and also know how little they know.
- Any fool can learn from experience. The trick is to learn from other people's experiences.
- "People learn from failures. Seldom do they learn anything from success. See much, study much, suffer much, that is the path to wisdom."
- Do work
- Instead of pretending that we are living some great story, we must remain focused on the execution—and on executing with excellence. We must shun the false crown and continue working on what got us here.
- "The way to do really big things seems to be to start with deceptively small things."