Why EGO is Essential

tattoo chains

If your desire is to become the apex artist, you must CHANNEL your ego, and press your ego into your service, instead of striving to destroy your ego.

Don’t do things which offend or hurt your ego

My theory:

Thoughts on compromise, and corner-cutting is offensive to our ego. Yet we compromise and cut corners to please others.

But if we didn’t care to please others, but we simply obeyed our own ego, we would never compromise.

EGO as good for the artist

hopper

There are no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ decisions in life. However there are certain decisions which feel correct to your ego.

Let your ego guide your life.

hopper closeup

Why is the ego seen as evil?

tattoo chains

For the most part, most of us in the Western world are shackled by the “humility” and “humble attitude” of Protestant-Christian morality.

EGO as individualistic

Going back to Christian morality:

To be an individual is evil. To build the individual ‘at the expense’ of the collective is evil.

In most traditional societies, the individual isn’t important. What is more important is the survival (and thrivivial) of the collective/group/community. Therefore when people see you being “selfish” and “self-centered” and focused on yourself, you’re somehow doing a POSITIVE HARM on the collective, because all that extra energy you are putting towards yourself could be used to serve others.

Channeling your EGO to make artistic decisions

My thought:

You must obey your ego when it comes to making certain life decisions.

The hardest thing is to make a decision, and to be responsible and liable for your decision. In today’s “limited liability corporation” world, nobody wants to be liable for anything. Nobody wants to be responsible for taking a risk, and “failing” or fucking up.

triptych

Why this quest to kill the ego?

In modern times, we should know better. We know the ego isn’t bad. Yet there are still MANY non-religious and atheists who think the ego is bad/evil and needs to be destroyed.

My theory:

When we fuck up in life, we can easily blame “our ego”, instead of taking responsibility for our decisions.

It is impossible to know how a decision will turn out. For example, a lot of “skinny-fat” historians (who have never even lifted weights in their life) criticize Napoleon for his ‘hubris’ and his “over-confidence” in the war. But it is so easy to blame Napoleon and his “ego” for his failure.

Reality is this:

You take a risk, then Lady Fortuna does the rest.

low angle halo

Now the question is:

How can we harness and channel our beautiful ego to achieve what we want to achieve in life?

ERIC

Philosophy by KIM

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