An entry from my Marvel blog of long ago, this one concerning how ego can cause one to make bad decisions.
October 8, 2009 | 1:00 AM | By Tom_Brevoort | In General
As I continue to ponder the unanswerable truths about life, business, commerce and creativity, I find myself drawn inexorably to certain basic fundamental concepts that are at the root of so many of the difficulties each one of us faces. So I thought I’d elucidate on one of those concepts.
The thing that most often screws up our decision-making processes is ego.
It’s ego that makes us react to a piece of news or a piece of feedback negatively and emotionally. It’s ego that makes us jockey for position and advantage against one another rather than looking at the big picture and doing what’s right, both for the greater good and for ourselves.
Now, ego isn’t intrinsically all bad. You need a healthy amount of ego to be effective in any creative endeavor. You need to believe that you have something to say or communicate that’s worthwhile, and you need a certain amount of self-confidence to be able to bull through all of the people who’ll tell you that you’re no good and to give up.
But ego is also an easy thing to lose control over. You’re in trouble when you start believing your own hype, or thinking that your own fecal matter doesn’t stink. And it’s such a seductively easy trap to fall into.
I’ve been making a concerted effort to expand my thinking, and not react in so knee-jerk a fashion to the contrary ideas and thoughts and approaches put in front of me by all the folks I work with, and to not make a snap-judgment based on ego. I don’t always get it right, but I’m trying.
A little self-examination can be a good thing.
More later.
Tom B
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