How To Protect Your Ego

[Grape]

Yep. These are well known and common, but now you know they have scientific terms to them.

(I got these while researching for a Macbeth paper)

• Defense Mechanisms: Activated when an internal or external event violates one’s preferred view of self. (Cramer, 1991; A. Freud, 1936)
• Defense Mechanisms are actually designed to protect self-esteem. (Fenichel, 1945)


• 7 Major Defense Mechanisms:

o Reaction Formation: One will do the opposite of an action that others do not validate.

o Projection: Seeing one’s bad traits within other people, thus rationalizing such a trait as okay.

o Displacement: Altering the target of an impulse. Taking out one’s stress from one object onto another object.

o Undoing: Altering memories of the past to more favorable ones, usually subconscious

o Isolation: Isolates threatening thought from other thoughts. Minimizes interaction thus minimizing violent actions.

o Sublimation: Adjusts ones actions of one’s criticized traits into those more socially accepted. (e.g. A sexually perverted person may result to art)

o Denial: Refusal to perceive physical facts of one’s environment.

More info at www2.sunysuffolk.edu/vollarj/baumesiter%20roy%20-%20freudian%20defense%20mechanisms.pdf



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Now you may view these to be counterproductive in improving yourself by overcoming problems rather than doing so, but truthfully we all do many of these daily.

How many times do we try to find our flaws in others, try to convince our selves the story was different?

These are defense mechanisms, so use them by letting your subconscious learn the concepts.

<33

[nutrick]

Rawr. Prequel to my "10 ways to boost ego" post.. although mine is more satirical if anything

[RMO]

your ego is an interesting animal, if you have huge self-esteem issues then of course you need a decent ego. Of course you need defense, but if you already have that ego, you begin to notice things, the ego is a controller, it is the worst confidence trickster, the ego plays itself as if it is you, but according to the most technical Freudian definiton it is seprate, it is the part that mediates your reality, it is the filter between you and the world. And make no mistake it is not you, it may mask its feeling as your feelings, its thoughts as your thoughts, but the ego is detrimental, he keeps you in the box.

at first it is difficult for the mind to comphrend this, it is to big, to much, the ego is a complex entity, far more complex then even people. One way to help you understand it, in religion the ego manifests itself as the devil, the ego is also responsible for your enemies, no one but your ego is your enemy, your ego takes the qualities of others and makes them against you, since it is that which mediates reality.

remember your greatest enemy is your own perception, your own self worth, your own ignorance, your own ego.

I have a huge post on this, but big part of being natural is recognizing the ego, and knowing that you control it, it is your puppet, not the other way around.

I have a huge post somewhere on here... lets see of i can find it

[Caesar]

I realised the other day that i am not good at taking criticism, not even constructive criticism. Is this a result of my ego, and if so, how do i work towards having a balanced self-esteem and ego?

Caesar

[RMO]

I may be wrong, it could be some terrible tragedy, but I must ask. Do you think that your confidence is not strong enough to stand others opinions. In order to gain this confidence and your natural state you have to man up, mature, traverse the road not taken. I do not know how to make you do this, everyone has a different way.
My way ( which I used on myself and no one else) was to make myself emotionally vulnerable and faced my problems and beliefs head on, I wouldnt recommend this if you dont like being crazy, it was the best of times, it was the worst of times, I broke apart and what was left was who I am. I have spent the last six months in a state of flux and teenage hormones, my life was out of control, and I was able to save myself from such chaos.
I wont even attempt to say that I know what your going through, and I guess it takes someone who is willing to be a leader and go on the path that others will not even anticipate. Maybe its my genes, maybe its PUA.

I will end this with one thing, your ego is one the most powerful things in your life, you can choose to let it control you, or you can man up, rear it up, thats your issue with criticism, a man will eat a yard of his own shit before he admits that he is wrong, thats just your ego, your self- inflated ballon, be strong without it controlling you.

[Caesar]

I do think my confidence withstands other peoples opinions, i (like you) have already tackled my confidence issues head on. It took time, but i ended up leaving my comfort zone, never to return.
The way i took the "man road" was that before i did just about anything, I compared which decisions would be constructive/destructive. Also,in order to take control of situations, i began looking at myself in those situations from a third-person view, or as David DeAngelo calls it, "Alter-Ego".

For my critisism issue, I will make it one of my constrctive decisions to listen to it and see how i may improve myself. It would be the more mature thing to do right? Also, as you said, i will work towards being a person without their ego controlling them.

Thanx mate,

Caesar

[nikkisixx]

awww I don't get down unless I get out-alphad like today

[Jenkinz]

To be out alpha'd is to show that you care about being alpha^
Natural alpha's will use their personality to shine and show they are alpha

I think the 7 points are not accurate BUT i can see how it can achieve what your saying it will achieve. IMO to protect your ego, you just need to be confident in who you are, and focus on the positives of yourself. Once people see that, nothing can bring down your "ego", even the best amog's.

[Chris]

read The Power of Now. Literally solves all your ego problems
with one surrounding concept.

[aarenlainey]

A person's ego can really take a beating sometimes. However, many of these beatings are brought on by one's own indiscretions. To protect you ego limit your use of the words 'always' and 'never' as they have a tendency to haunt you. Don't point the finger of blame at someone else, even when they are at fault. Avoid anger like a deadly disease. The most important don't brag or show off.

[RMO]

not only is this thread a little old but two things

1. read the power of now, just read it

2. DON'T PROTECT YOUR EGO! get rid of it, you don't need the validation of others or that little voice in your head, you are beyond that.

seriously read up on the power of now

[Grape]

let me give the word 'ego' a beautiful euphemism called "self-esteem".

[RMO]

even if you didn't use euphemism correctly (which doesnt make what you said make any less sense or less important). look at self esteem. What is your self esteem? It is how you look at yourself, more specifically how you see your own intrinsic value. This is only important becuase of the emotional reaction to these thoughts, and if you think deeper your emotions are just chemical reactions to your own ego, so you are afraid your ego will label you and you will not be able to live without validation. There is no need for this fear, the trick is to not give a fuck about their opinions, can they change your life? Are their words going to cause an spiritual upheaval? No, it is silly to even specualte on that. You are you, and depending on how willing you are to shed your ego and embrace inner peace, you should not have to be reliant on protecting your self esteem.

So I ask this: If you do not care what others think about you, even if your a PUA who knows how to make those people become attracted to you, how would your self-esteem ever be damaged?

Just read the power of now, or look up any teaching on meditation or enlightenment, they will really improve your inner game.

[Grape]

enlightenment is great and so is self-actualization.
but there comes a time when you must realize that you need to adapt accordingly to society and not live completely in your own world.

like it or not..people have egos. many of us despise having them...but we have them. to say that you don't have an ego is to be completely egotistic.
now...people do naturally look for validation from others....to reject this fact is to be completely ignorant.
the original post was to help people cope when the validation they received was lacking or hurtful to one's feelings.

[RMO]

May 21, 2010 22:24:09 GMT -5 Grape said:

enlightenment is great and so is self-actualization.
but there comes a time when you must realize that you need to adapt accordingly to society and not live completely in your own world.

on a separate note, your first two sentences are completely endorsing going with the crowd, and adapt to society, and I find that interesting since the whole concept of PUA is a complete outlier in society, you are not the mainstream. Also you make enlightenment and self-actualization seem like some kind of fantansy, like you'll grow out of it, I may be a bit off my rocker but conforming to any society, especially the fucked up one we live in now, is the true madness. You don't deny certain facts, like vomiting on a girls dress is a no-no or stealing or killing is wrong, but not everything is black and white, the goal of enlightenment is to find peace through the self.

Of course people have egos, but the purpose of enlightenment, or pure inner game for that matter, is to disregard it, to go beyond it. I have not reached a point where I can go beyond my ego, it takes time and dedication, I have no achieved Buddha status yet (Buddha is a title that means 'enlightened one') but every day I am getting closer.

I never rejected that fact, saying that you do not have to and rejecting that most people naturally do that are very different things. I don't reject the fact that people in the middle ages did not bathe often, but I think that bathing on a more regular basis is a better idea.

Grape, for me the point of PUA is not to get women, it is to live without the need to validate your existence with women or people in general. You are the prize, you do not need validation from others. Your ebook actually supports what I'm saying with different verbage, but in these posts you sound like someone who has lost all sense of adventure and given up in the face of adversity and that you honestly believe that majority rules. At one point in time society was fine with the concept that the whites were better then all other races and had to control them all in the name of god, but someone went against society, someone tried something else and it turned out that the whites were not a 'master race'.

to anyone else reading this post. Take a long hard look at your emotions whenever you feel like your being hurt. See them as separate from yourself, understand that those feelings are just a reaction to a negative vibe and that nothing can affect you, and in reality rejection will only get you laid more.

Since very few people in the world, let alone on this forum, have actually understood what their ego is, and seen that conforming is a negative, I will give you guys the benefit of the doubt, it is unfair to expect the average high schooler to be able to drop their emotions, but you should try to drop your ego, the defense mechanisms are the natural defenses that most people have and do they always work so well? Either you strike back against the validation to try to prove your self, or your hide from it, you become a weak sheep.

I don't really care if you read this and think I'm a crackpot, but I will never endorse excepting that the majority is always right, you have a choice, you always have a choice to see the world differently and see yourself differently.

also didn't Freud hypothesize that the natural part of getting a sexual identity is a phase where you want to fuck your own mother? Oedipus syndrome?