If you think about all the people in your life, and then I ask you to think about the one who you would consider to be the most egotistical person of them all, who would that be? Most likely someone came to mind fairly easily. When you think of that person, what types of character traits come to mind? You would very likely come up with descriptive terms like “selfish,” or “self-absorbed” or “arrogant.” Our ego is what helps define our own idea of our self-importance. 

You’ve probably heard of the id, ego, and superego – maybe from high school psychology class. The id is our needs and wants, and our passions. The id is what drives us towards the things in life that we want and, left unchecked, would just cause us to run around doing anything we wanted, grabbing what we wanted, and living in any way that we wanted.  The ego and superego work together to take those impulse needs and wants, and fit them into guidelines like society’s expectations, rules, and the law. If you know someone who thinks they are above every rules, or who thinks they are better or more deserving than other people and shouldn’t have to deny themselves any of the things they want, then that person has an unhealthy ego. Their sense of self-importance will cause them to do things that put themselves before others. 

Having a healthy ego means knowing that there are always people who are better at things than we are, and there are people who could learn from us. It means understanding that, when we want something, there are rules and guidelines that everyone should follow, and that includes us. An unhealthy ego is an imbalance in the amount of value a person sees themselves as having. 

If you are in a position of authority – let’s see you are a manager – a healthy ego would let you know that you do have value, and then it would also help you understand that others have value as well. Narcissism is an extreme form of an unhealthy ego where a person thinks they can do no wrong, thinks they are more important than everyone else, and thinks they have nothing left to learn. As a person of authority, this means no one would be allowed to question you or argue with you, because you are always right (at least in your own mind). If you are in a position of authority an unhealthy ego also means you may think everyone else should follow rules, but that you are an exception and should be given special privileges. 

A healthy ego, on the other hand, would guide you towards leading by example, by building relationships with those around you, and by looking for ways to value and/or help others. An unhealthy ego does the opposite, tearing down others and breaking relationships. 

If you picture arrogance and humility on a spectrum; a sliding scale where humility is on one end and arrogance is on the other, the more you value others around you, the closer you get to the “humility” end. The more you value yourself, the closer you get to the arrogance end. The healthiest way to be would be somewhere in the middle, but not on the extreme point of either end. If you don’t value yourself enough, you’re not going to make good decisions for yourself because you will probably be putting someone else’s needs too far in front of your own. If you value yourself too much, then you see yourself as self-important and better than others, and you will make poor decisions and have negative interactions with others. 

When someone questions you or doubts you, what is your immediate reaction? Do you get mad, defensive, and immediately prove you are right, or even just demand that you are and try to force them to agree? This is an unhealthy ego, with the focus being on the self-important and arrogant end of the scale. If someone questions or doubts you and your first reaction is to agree with them, and begin apologizing for not being good enough, then you’re too far on the humility end. In both cases your ego is not doing its proper job because it’s not creating the right balance. 

Question yourself this week – watch how you respond to others, and what your own thoughts are related to yourself. Where are you on that scale, between humility and arrogance? When someone questions you, do you take it as an opportunity to build rapport and connection, and to even possibly teach them? Or do you get defensive and immediately just do everything you can to prove that you’re right and they’re wrong?  If you see yourself being too far toward one end of the scale, try working on assigning the value in the right direction, and make the goal to build relationships rather than to be defensive or right. An unchecked ego can tear others down and do long-term damage to relationships.