Ego
I have concluded that ego gets in the way of a lot of good things, a lot of the time.
Now, I have to differentiate here between ego and identity. Identity is awareness of who you are and what you’re capable of and what you’re trying to achieve and whatnot. Ego is being emotionally invested in identity – I.E. feeling bad when you don’t succeed. Beyond that, ego is a lot of other complicated things that I haven’t defined yet. Among other things, it’s comparing your identity the the perceived identities of other people around you.
Now, I have both positive and negative ego, and they both cause me considerable grief. My negative ego is very convinced that I suck in every way it’s possible to suck in, that I’m the worst of all possible humans, etc. I know that this isn’t true, but there’s still a part of my mind that really thinks that it is. My positive ego is also all invested in the idea of me being the best, among other things. Both of them get me into trouble, although what really causes havoc is when they get into wars with each other and intrude into my conscious experience while I’m trying to do other, unrelated things like recording tracks or coding or fixing problems with servers or whatever.
What I’m really trying to do is null them out – to not be comparing myself against other individuals at all, to be unconcerned with failure and enjoy the adventure rain or shine. I have not thus far figured out how to do this, but it’s a project I chip away at.