"What you see is what you get." We've all heard someone say this, and/or have said it ourselves. It's usually said with some pride. It implies full disclosure and honesty...."I'm not hiding anything....I'm a straight shooter".
Let's take a closer look. Which is just what the person who makes this claim doesn't want us to do. The real meaning of this statement goes like this: "What you see about me that does not fit my picture of myself, I will not get." A person who really believes that what they see about themselves is all there is, is a person who is possessed by their ego. They think their ego is who they are.
The ego is best identified by its job description: The ego's job is to show to others (and myself) what I think is 'good' about me and to hide from others (and myself) what I think is 'bad' about me. The ego is the manager of our image of ourselves. It has a mind of its own and it takes its job very seriously. It has a powerful arsenal of 'sticks' and 'carrots' to keep us in 'acceptable' ways of being and behaving. It has the power to totally blind us to 'unacceptable' qualities and characteristics about ourselves that are completely obvious to the eyes of others.
So "what you see may not be what I get" and in fact may be something I have a powerful need not to get, not to see. So I will fight to keep my 'blind spot' blind by invalidating your perception of it in one way or another. Most folks truly have no idea this is going on. Most of us can see other people's blind spots but we freak when our own is pointed out. And acceptable conversation, both socially and in the work place, does not include a discussion of each other's blind spots.
The problem is that any dynamic, meaningful, and creative conversation is going to regularly poke our blind spots, about ourselves, our world views, and about others. So the current norm is for our conversations to stay limited, cautious, and superficial (mutually avoiding our blind spots), or to become accusatory, defensive, and destructive (pointing fingers at the blind spots of others and disowning my own). The negative impact of this way of operating conversationally shows up in the limit it sets on the access to the collective intelligence, creativity, wisdom, and will we so desperately need for the complex problem solving required of us today.
We have reached a point in our collective evolution where we can no longer afford these kinds of limited or destructive conversations. Our dependency on each other in creating our future and that of our planet is making it compelling that we understand, and own, our egos, individually and collectively. We must decriminalize the possession of an ego. We need to investigate with genuine curiosity how our egos actually work and what their purpose is. We must learn not to deny their presence but how to prevent them from ruling our thinking and our behavior. Otherwise our egos will keep us blind and disconnected from each other and from the realities that are pressing for attention in our lives and around the globe.
This blog will be devoted to that investigation. Comments regarding your discoveries about your own ego, as well as what lies beyond it, are welcome. Dr Lou
