Destroying your 'ego' - come again?

'We have to destroy our ego,' I read today. And it's not the first mention of this mysterious entity I've heard. Mainly they were negative. As if ego was something bad which only troubled people and they would love to get rid of.

That word - ego - doesn't have any meaning to me. It doesn't cover any experience I've had in my life. I know ego means 'self' in Latin, so do people refer to everything that is themselves?

But if that is true, I find such a pronouncement quite disturbing. As you may have noticed, I've written several blog entries against not accepting yourself and wanting to fundamentally change, even be someone else entirely!

I can't but shiver at the thought: those who want destroy themselves (their 'ego'), must have very negative self images, or a very bleak vision on what to expect from life. Destroying yourself isn't a good thing in my eyes…

Chances are that I'm mistaken and I don't know what I'm talking about, for I have no idea what is really meant by 'ego'. 

But still the question rises: why does that ego need to be destroyed or suppressed? Can you help me understand why that would be necessary? For I truly do not get it.

If ego is only an unwanted part of yourself, isn't it a wiser choice to integrate that part in the whole? Giving it a place, even a use, which enriches your life and that of others. 

On being wise

Those who search for and aim at wisdom should try not to forget its simple nature. 

Wisdom is essentially the art of making the best choices; acting in a perfectly appropriate way; doing precisely the right thing.

So what is the right thing to do? That vastly depends on an innumerate amount of variables. To start with I'd say it depends strongly on what you want to achieve. What are your goals? And which of those goals is of more importance to you, if you have to choose between them?

Now, an easy mistake is to think wisdom is the same as achieving your goals. That is part of it, but not the whole story. For setting the right goals is also part of being wise, a part that depends on the circumstances. Some of those are environmental, societal or social, others personal.

So it depends on what is possible for a person like you in a situation like the one you are in at the moment.

Being wise is about doing the right thing given your goals, given your personal strengths and weaknesses, given the opportunities and barriers in your surroundings. A part of this includes setting realistic (but not too low) goals.

That is and always has been my project: to create a philosophy of life which grants me an aide to do the right thing in any given circumstance. 

It is not a philosophy that gives solutions to every possible problem or disturbance encountered in life, for many of those are insolvable. Rather it gives me directions for the best possible action, given that specific situation.