What is ego? || Acharya Prashant (2014)

Questioner (Q): You said, “The only way to find yourself is to lose yourself.” So, what to lose then?

Acharya Prashant (AP): Haan to theek hai (Yes, alright then.) What are you doing with this line, then?

Q: Trying to understand.

AP: How? How? Jaldi bolo (hurry, speak up)!

Q: From words, trying to lose myself.

AP: Right! Aur ye koshish kaun kar raha hai? (And who is the one trying this?)

Q: Main (I am trying)

AP: Quotation kya hai (What is the quotation?)

Q: “The only way to find yourself is to lose yourself.”

AP: Koshish kaun kar raha hai? (And who is the one trying this?)

Q: So, it means that I shouldn’t try to understand

AP: Quotation kya hai (What is the quotation?)

Q: “The only way to find yourself is to lose yourself.”

AP: Aur tum kya kare ja rhe ho? (And what are you doing continuously?)

Q: Khoje ja rha hu. (Continuously searching.)

AP: Then pay attention to the quotation. Quotation is saying lose yourself, and you are exerting yourself! Why are you doing the opposite? When you want to understand something, do you understand something by going close to it or by doing its opposite?

Q: Close to it.

AP: You are doing the exact opposite of what the quotation is saying. The quotation is saying “Lose yourself”, and you are strengthening yourself by toiling. How will you ever understand the quote?

Q: Toh samajhne ki koshish hi na karu? (So, I should not try to understand?)

AP: Achcha, koshish kaun nahi karega?? ( Well, who would be the one not trying?)

Q: Jo pehle hi samajh gaya ho. (One who has already understood.)

AP: Tumhare case mein koshish kaun nhi karega? (In your case, who would be the one not trying?)

Q: Main (me)

AP: Quotation kya keh rahi hai (What does the quotation say?)

“Lose yourself.”

So, don’t do anything. Let the quotation be there. Whatever you will do, will take you further away from the quote. This way or that way, you will go further away. There is no need to try, neither is there a need to tell yourself, “I won’t try.” Let it be there. And then see, what happens.

Q: But sometimes, it requires that you have to learn a skill and to learn a skill, it requires to try and try. Then, without trying, how can someone learn that skill?

AP: But he is not trying for a skill, son! He is trying to understand. There is a great difference between acquiring a skill and understanding. That’s why with skill we use the word: acquire. With understanding, we are saying: “Lose yourself”. Don’t you see, they are opposites? Acquiring a skill versus losing yourself. Don’t you see they are opposites?

Q: But now I know about ego. So, the thing that comes to my mind is that am I not actually strengthening the ego by trying to acquire a skill? Because…

AP: No, first of all, don’t use the word strengthening the ego and all! We have repeatedly said that ego means “I am”. This “I am” will always have an attachment to something. It will always find some kind of an object. Don’t say, ‘Strengthening or weakening the ego’; say, ‘Displacing it’. Say, ‘Showing it its right house, right position’.

Ego will be there right till the last moment. The question is not whether ego is strong or weak. In fact, ‘strong ego’, and ‘weak ego’, these are very misleading words. The question is the quality of ego, the position of ego. Where does your ‘I am’ stand? I am what? I am what? Pounds of flesh? Social creature? Religious affiliation? I am what? What am I?

There will always be an answer. Till the last moment, the ego will always have an answer. The question is, what will be the quality of that answer? Ego means your position, your locus! Where are you? Who are you? Ego means your answer to the question “Who am I?” That is what is ego. Now this question cannot have a strong answer or a weak answer. This question can only have a subtle answer or a gross answer. So, don’t say “He is very egoistic”, or “He is less egoistic.” Everybody is egoistic. I don’t know, what you mean by more or less ego.

There are no quantities that can measure the ego, only quality can be associated. You too know that you are there, and I too know that I am there, but there is a difference in the way I look at myself and the way you look at yourself. The one who looks at himself has pounds of flesh has ego. The one who looks at himself as a bundle of ideas has ego. And the one who knows himself as the understanding shining behind everything, he too has ego. Isme smaller or larger ki koi baat nahi hai (There is nothing like smaller or larger in this). Where is the ego located? Where? Where? How far from the source? What are you saying about yourself? That is the right question to ask!

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