Ego...whats the big deal??

Alright, big topic tonight....the infamous, all consuming, glutton for judgement EGO.  It seems that no matter where we are in life, we are never quite good enough - our ego is either too small or too big (sounds a lot like the weight loss industry).  This obsession with acting, thinking, and speaking "right" has turned out a generation of people saying: "She is too into herself", or "He is so insecure", or "She is too confident", or "He just needs to love himself more."  Is it just me, or is there a gap here?  It seems to me that people are either too low on themselves, or we (in all of our glory) have the obligation to knock them down a peg if they get too confident. 



Right now in my life I am working on recovering from an eating disorder and healing from a destructive failed marriage.  Before treatment, I hated myself, I wasn't happy and everyone told me "Haley, you just need to see the beauty that we see, you are worth it..etc, etc."  Now that I am on the other side of this eating disorder and more healed from the divorce, I am saying "I can see the beauty you see, and I am worth it."  The interesting thing now, is that I have heard the following said sarcastically to me by the very people that told me to love myself: "Wow, don't YOU just love yourself...wow."  Now, this is not an attack on anyone who has ever said these things to me, I have done the same thing.  It just seems that our ego is never in the right spot (according to the people around us).


What I am illustrating is societies tendency to judge anything and everything as wrong, regardless of what is said, done, or thought.  By and large, we all look for what is wrong with things, and in appropriate situations it is a good quality.  Looking for red flags is very important in deciding who you want in your life and keeps us from danger in some instances.  I am talking about looking for the bad when it is not necessary.


I am wondering what would happen if we stopped being so critical.  Instead of quietly formulating a rebuttal during a conversation, we just stop, listen, and consider where the person is coming from - especially if we know the other person well.  Imagine how the conversation might have gone if the judges were thinking about my background and the amount of work I have put in to get to where I am.  Before I was convinced that I was ugly, unworthy, and less than everyone else, and now I see myself as beautiful, worthy, confident, and loved.  Rather than feeling the need to knock me down and 'keep my feet on the ground', what if the response was, "Oh my gosh, I am so glad you see what we see now, I am so happy you feel that way, wow, you really do love yourself!"  (disclaimer:  I have heard this a lot, I just used it as a clear example of my point.) The response from me would have been very positive and I greatly appreciate it when this happens.  


Now, some people would be afraid that a complement such as the one above would cause my 'head to get too big' or for my ego to inflate to ginormous hubongous proportions and I may not fit out the door!!  What a terrible thing!!!  GOOD NEWS!: There was no issue of the compliment 'going to my head' because it was a heartfelt sentiment from someone I care about and trust.  You have to have a pretty strong case of narcissistic personality disorder for a simple compliment to enlarge an ego to monumental proportions (and most likely they were like that long before you complemented them).  So to think positively and react with favor really has no down sides when you think about it.


We all inaccurately assess people to a degree even when we know the character of the person we are judging, and a lot of times, our understanding of the person's character doesn't match our judgment but we hold on to the assessment regardless of what we know to be time tested truth.  Logically this makes no sense and causes a lot of problems such as broken relationships among many others.  Do we do this to make ourselves feel better?...Think about it, does that even work??


~What do you think goes through our heads before we make a judgement - both positive and negative?  
~Have you ever been on the bad end of someone judging you regardless of what they already know to be true about you? 
~What do you think you can do to be more positive in your assessment of the people around you?


You are loved,
Haley :-)