There are more than seven billion people living on this planet which means more than seven billion personalities, opinions and ways of seeing the world. With so many diverse and varying ideologies and socio-cultural milieus, someone is bound to act in a way, or say something that upsets another.

The question is: Do we always have to take everything so personally? If not, how do we make what seems personal, impersonal?

Ego: Why We Take Things Personally
From the time we are young, usually before we’re even ten years old, situations or moments in life occur where we feel unsafe or insecure, or someone says something that makes us feel unlovable. When this happens, we begin to develop a second self, or a false self. That false self is often the “ego,” which I like to call the “protective personality” because no one likes to have an ego, but people don’t seem to mind having a “protective personality.”

At that early stage in life, our protective personality represents our best effort to deal with situations and emotions that are unfamiliar to us. In these situations, we experience ourselves from a sense of lack, because the ego, or the protective personality, is based upon the feeling that our authentic self isn’t enough. We feel we have to create another version of who we are in this world to be okay, accepted and loved.

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