Throughout our lives, starting in childhood, we are subconsciously programmed through family trauma, as well as conditioning from schools, government, religious institutions, and our communities. All of this conditioning shapes our ego as well as cause us to develop coping strategies to get our needs met and keep us what it perceives as safe. The ego’s most important mission is to keep us safe from what it perceives as a threat, and give us confidence when and where we need it.
This week in Deeper Thoughts we’re going to discuss two examples of how ego and conditioning can affect your life and what you can do about it.
The ego can and will do things like making us subconsciously push others away first to avoid the pain of rejection, but then once we push them away we can’t see we were the cause of them rejecting us and fall further into that victim mentality.
For example, let’s say if in a relationship you’re always fixing things, or always doing housework early on. You’re doing this because you were conditioned to as a child because that’s what was valued in your family unit, but not what you want to do. Rather than doing what is authentic to you, you do these things to attract a partner because that’s how you were raised. But when you start getting resentful and think the other person is only with you because you do these things. You stop doing them to see if you’re right. And yes you are. This is because the other person thought this was who you are, and when you stop doing these things they feel like they had the rug pulled out from under them. They feel duped and leave. Your ego blinds you to your own actions that pushed them away and instead tells you, “See? They were using you!”
Or it can make us take unnecessary risks to try and prove our worth, despite the harm it causes us if we fail because we don’t think we’ll be accepted otherwise. This can be seen from someone who was raised by a parent who only showed affection from a child who was a fearless winner, and was shamed or even shunned if they were perceived as cowardly or didn’t win.
This conditioning shows up as an adult who accepts risky challenges and winds up hurt in a motorcycle street race. This person is always trying to prove themselves through action and despite the risk, their ego couldn’t handle saying no to a dangerous challenge because of the conditioning and trauma from childhood. The ego says, “I’m not scared and I can beat this guy!” and despite better judgment takes on a dangerous challenge who’s only reward is bragging rights.
We learned these ways of gaining approval as a child and they carry over into our adult lives. As children, we start out as blank slates, hence why it’s so easy for all those aforementioned forces to shape us into who we are as adults. As adults though, we have to go back and unlearn those things that were developed as a response to those traumas and programming.
If we don’t want to be the person always fixing things around the house or the home maker, we need to understand the reason why we use those coping mechanisms to attract a partner, and instead of leaning into them from the get go be authentic and honest so we can let it be known that’s not what you want to do. This way the ego won’t have you pushing them away to prove a point.
If you’re the person making unnecessary risks to prove your worth, understand that parental wounding and when you’re faced with a challenge where the risks outweigh the reward, your ego doesn’t get flared up at the challenge and you can walk away from danger.
To be that Star Wars nerd, I’m gonna quote Yoda. “You must unlearn what you have learned.” We have to do this so we can relearn things about ourselves outside the programming we received as children, develop a healthier ego that helps us in constructive ways, and raise up.
We do this by looking back on our past when these situations arise and look at the patterns. Understand where those patterns came from. Why do you do the things you do to put you where you’re at? Once you identify the reasons for your behavior, begin working on becoming aware of these tendencies when the situations come up. Then actively choose to do them or not, don’t let yourself go on autopilot. Choose to be upfront with what you want in a relationship. Choose to say no to a challenge because you know it’s too dangerous. Understanding how your ego and conditioning affects you is an important part of healing.
Thank you once again for reading and I hope you all have an enlightening day.
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