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The Benefits of a Quiet Ego

quietrev.com

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Re: The Benefits of a Quiet Ego

#31

Post by dschiptsov »

kfk wrote: post #27

It's funny how most of this ideas are in reality very old concepts of Greek/Roman philosophy. Seneca was a big proponent of "quite ego", for instance (his critic to a strong ego/desire: Tamquam mortales timetis, omnia tamquam immortales concupiscitis). Socrates could be too. I think the common denominator was the understanding that we have no access to the Truth and that we might as well spend the time trying to know…

It is actually Indian philosophy, based on Upanishads, much older that anything Greek/Roman. Basically, they say that it is your "ego" which prevents you, like a veil, from seeing reality as it is, because your mind is constantly busy, preoccupied with petty desires and childish concerns. Think of the ego as a virus processes with results in a high load average

   load average: 5.38, 5.30, 4.11
The oldest maxim says - let it go (killall -9) and you will find everything (the ultimate reality, which is unity of everything, the state above socially conditioned intellect (which could be called 100% idle), and source of endless joy (due to personal realizations of unity and non-self) which is (and always been) within you.

This is, by the way, the basis of Buddhism, which nowadays is ruined by piles upon piles of narcissistic commentaries of so-called teachers.

Re: The Benefits of a Quiet Ego

#32

Post by puredemo »

dschiptsov wrote: post #31
kfk wrote: post #27

It's funny how most of this ideas are in reality very old concepts of Greek/Roman philosophy. Seneca was a big proponent of "quite ego", for instance (his critic to a strong ego/desire: Tamquam mortales timetis, omnia tamquam immortales concupiscitis). Socrates could be too. I think the common denominator was the understanding that we have no access to the Truth and that we might as well spend the time trying to know…

It is actually Indian philosophy, based on Upanishads, much older that anything Greek/Roman. Basically, they say that it is your "ego" which prevents you, like a veil, from seeing reality as it is, because your mind is constantly busy, preoccupied with petty desires and childish concerns. Think of the ego as a virus processes with results in a high load average load average: 5.38, 5.30, 4.11 The oldest maxim says - l…

The idea of some "ultimate reality" is so annoying to me. There is regular ol' reality which our mind and senses have evolved to perceive as best they can via natural selection over millions of years.

The reasons we have a lot of "scripts" running in our mind is because they have historically helped us survive and pass on our genetics. Turning them off doesn't manifest joy but a genetic dead-end, in aggregate.

Re: The Benefits of a Quiet Ego

#33

Post by puredemo »

zhoujianfu wrote: post #5
leoh wrote: post #2

I really liked this — but how to cultivate a quiet ego?

Sadly, I would say experiencing a great personal tragedy is a "good" way to cultivate it. There really is nothing like the death of a loved one to put everything, including your own place in the world, in perspective.

That gave me more of a sense of urgency and egoic ambition, not the other way around.

Re: The Benefits of a Quiet Ego

#34

Post by vrp101 »

thetruthseeker1 wrote: post #18

Interesting. I want to make a point that questions the premise of the article. What is wrong if people dont have a quiet ego? What is wrong with the fact that humility is mentioned 43% less. Why is that automatically bad( I am not saying it is good either)? Values of a society change over period of time, many things that were acceptable behavior in the 1900s are not acceptable anymore. In the early 1900s black people…

I understand what you are trying to say. But the author does point out that having a quiet ego is associated with many positive life outcomes. He links to this paper - http://selfdeterminationtheory.org/SDT/documents/2003_BrownR...

I haven't gone through the referenced paper but I think it should answer your question to an extent. Also, I feel that the author has been quite diligent has linked to multiple papers to back up his points.

Re: The Benefits of a Quiet Ego

#35

Post by genofon »

puredemo wrote: post #32
dschiptsov wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is actually Indian philosophy, based on Upanishads, much older that anything Greek/Roman. Basically, they say that it is your "ego" which prevents you, like a veil, from seeing reality as it is, because your mind is constantly busy, preoccupied with petty desires and childish concerns. Think of the ego as a virus processes with results in a high load average load average: 5.38, 5.30, 4.11 The oldest maxim says - l…

The idea of some "ultimate reality" is so annoying to me. There is regular ol' reality which our mind and senses have evolved to perceive as best they can via natural selection over millions of years. The reasons we have a lot of "scripts" running in our mind is because they have historically helped us survive and pass on our genetics. Turning them off doesn't manifest joy but a genetic dead-end, in aggregate.

Not necessarly, now our enviroment evolves much quicker than us, so sometimes our "scripts" don't tell us the best solution to nowadays problems(e.g. overeating because now you have food, tomorrow who knows).

Re: The Benefits of a Quiet Ego

#36

Post by realusername »

learning_still wrote: post #17
leoh wrote: post #2

I really liked this — but how to cultivate a quiet ego?

My 2cents: Dale Carnegie's "How to win friends and influence people" will always hold true. Additionally, many books on business relationships. One that comes to mind is, "What they don't teach you at Harvard Business School." Fake it til you make it is a viable self help strategy. But truthfully, I think the best thing to do is to surround yourself with people who represent the values you want to imitate.

I also highly recommand the Dale Carnegie book. People who are reading this, don't dismiss this book based on its quite bad title, the book is actually really good.

Re: The Benefits of a Quiet Ego

#38

Post by marsay »

Seems like a rebranding of old ideas. We should be expecting new book soon I guess.

All this has been talked about by various western authors and scholars before(Alan Watts, Joseph Campbell, Carl G. Jung etc.) and as far as I understand them, they all agree on one thing: western people are good at being individuals, having an ego, and it would be mistake to start removing this part of ourselves and think about it as something bad. Of course we should be integrating mindfullness and controlling our narcissistic behaviour, but without antagonizing our ego.

Re: The Benefits of a Quiet Ego

#40

Post by jasim »

dschiptsov wrote: post #31
kfk wrote: post #27

It's funny how most of this ideas are in reality very old concepts of Greek/Roman philosophy. Seneca was a big proponent of "quite ego", for instance (his critic to a strong ego/desire: Tamquam mortales timetis, omnia tamquam immortales concupiscitis). Socrates could be too. I think the common denominator was the understanding that we have no access to the Truth and that we might as well spend the time trying to know…

It is actually Indian philosophy, based on Upanishads, much older that anything Greek/Roman. Basically, they say that it is your "ego" which prevents you, like a veil, from seeing reality as it is, because your mind is constantly busy, preoccupied with petty desires and childish concerns. Think of the ego as a virus processes with results in a high load average load average: 5.38, 5.30, 4.11 The oldest maxim says - l…

This unfortunately reads like Deepak Chopra to me. The idea of Endless Joy/Nirvana is quite nice, but there is no documented evidence of anyone attaining it. We can supposedly only journey towards it, but never reach. Or, there's a dragon in my garage.

We're also talking about 'ego' as if there is one universal definition we all agree to. It can mean self-centredness and haughtiness, or it can mean the continuous self that one person goes through from birth to death - essentially our memory. It can be many things to many people, and different thing to the same person, at different times.

But within the context of Upanishads that you've quoted, ego is all that is negative about ourselves. But then - letting go of all that is bad is very logical, although not original.

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