What if your greatest inner obstacle had a name: the ego? In personal growth, your personality unfolds on three levels — the body, the ego and the essence. The ego, the seat of your automatic reflexes and filters, distorts part of reality and locks you into fear. Transforming the ego means taking back responsibility for your inner states and letting the adult in you speak, so as to reach the essence, where your true potential resides. Here is how this journey takes shape, level by level.
The three levels of personality: body, ego and essence
Your personality unfolds simultaneously on three distinct levels. First, the Body represents your physical dimension. Next, the Ego is the seat of your automatic reflexes, whether useful or limiting. Finally, the Essence brings together all of your potential, the potential that lets you express yourself freely.
The circumstances of life, however, push us to set up filters. These filters make us approach the world on the basis of predefined ideas and beliefs that distort a certain part of reality.
The three centers of the ego
The instinctive center: action above all
The instinctive center represents action and ensures your physical and psychological survival. It constantly compares the present situation with similar moments from the past. Although action aims to escape the dangers of existence, sometimes inaction is the better attitude.
This permanent sense of urgency rules out any emotional response and any constructive mental reflection.
The emotional center: reacting in the moment
The emotional center reacts immediately to interactions with yourself, with people and with the environment. This function, dominant in some people, directly shapes their approach to personal growth. To go further on this ground, our feature on emotional intelligence and the art of working with emotions sheds light on the mechanics of feeling.
The mental center: structuring for the future
The mental center structures inner representations to manage the future. It enables choices, decisions and insights relevant to your personal evolution.
Understanding core fears to evolve better
Every human being has a core fear that determines their psychological profile:
- The fear of not being loved
- The fear of being abandoned
- The fear of being wrong
- The fear of suffering
- The fear of not knowing
- The fear of being in a position of weakness
- The fear of failure
- The fear of separation
- The fear of not having a stable identity
Each core fear produces a corresponding desire that makes up your psychological profile. For example, the fear of not being loved generates a desire to be loved and develops a profile centered on earning others' affection. These protective reflexes tie in with what we describe in our article on emotional defense mechanisms.
The ego: a false friend of your personal growth
The ego is that "me" that expresses itself constantly: "That's so me," "I'm just like that," "I can't help it!" But who really hides behind this mask?
The ego is the main parasite of thought. It breeds a deceptive mindset that drowns out plain common sense. As a result, we lose ourselves in traps of frustration, suffering and unhappiness.
Attachment or love: a crucial distinction
There is a fundamental difference between attachment and love on your personal journey. Attachment aims at your own interests, whereas love aims at those of the other:
| Attachment | Love |
|---|---|
| Aims at your own interests | Aims at the other's interests |
| The energy is directed toward oneself ("don't leave me") | The energy is directed toward the other |
| Leads to disregard for the other's freedom | Is a freely given offering |
Taking back responsibility for your inner states
We alone are responsible for our inner states, our joys and our sorrows. Facts don't cause suffering directly — our interpretations of them do. Those interpretations stem from our beliefs, our values and our points of view.
A hurt, a shame, an anger, a frustration or a jealousy are all forms of suffering tied to our personal interpretations. Revising these reflexive readings ties in with the practical wisdom of the four Toltec agreements for living serenely.
Toward mastery and personal evolution
Mastery means deciding who is in charge, choosing who commands within you and giving that part authority over your destiny. The ego, for its part, resembles a terrible child: anxious, easily swayed and prone to sentimentality.
The first goal of evolution is to reduce this opacity and give the adult a voice. Only the adult can devise intelligent plans for growth and, in doing so, find happiness — a happiness that, as we explore in happiness, your true key to success, is cultivated from within.
Dignity and intention: reaching the essence
Every human being is the living expression of an intention that is both collective and individual. Fundamental dignity means striving to be worthy of that intention.
"I am this way, and I am happy to be that person. Now, what am I going to do with everything I have been given?" Make good use of it on your journey toward the essence.
