Relationship Between Ego And Neurosis ?

[nick96]

With ego I mean self concept.

With neurosis I mean mental illness based on not completely feeling an emotion and building a part of the self that aims to avoid any possibility for the repressed emotion to rise. 

Does having an ego necessarily imply that you are neurotic ? 

Is it possible to have an ego and not be neurotic ?

What do people mean when they refer to healthy ego ?

[ajasatya]

@nick96 i'm going to use practical terms. you know you're neurotic when:

• you meet people to get something from them (social approval, sex, money etc)
• you can't simply stay still and do nothing... you feel impatient for no reason
• you worry about what people think of you
• you live to satisfy your senses, usually depending on porn, excessive food, loud music and/or other forms of excitement
• you live in a cycle of attempts to purchase happiness

spiritual practices exist to help us getting rid of those by inviting us to look inside and find the root cause of our sense of poverty.

we become healthy when we extinguish the cause of those symptoms.

ignore spiritual terms like ego, self etc. just do the job of looking inside and finding the source of your suffering. why can't you just be? why can't you be at peace at this moment? be radically and brutally honest. there's nothing else to do.

Edited August 7, 2017 by ajasatya

[egoeimai]

Great reply @ajasatya

[WaterfallMachine]

It reminds me of Karen Horney's research in neurotic needs.

Quote

1. The Neurotic Need for Affection and Approval

This need includes the desires to be liked, to please other people, and meet the expectations of others. People with this type of need are extremely sensitive to rejection and criticism and fear the anger or hostility of others.

2. The Neurotic Need for a Partner Who Will Take Over One’s Life

This involves the need to be centered on a partner. People with this need suffer extreme fear of being abandoned by their partner. Oftentimes, these individuals place an exaggerated importance on love and believe that having a partner will resolve all of life’s troubles.

3. The Neurotic Need to Restrict One’s Life Within Narrow Borders

Individuals with this need prefer to remain inconspicuous and unnoticed. They are undemanding and content with little. They avoid wishing for material things, often making their own needs secondary and undervaluing their own talents and abilities.

4. The Neurotic Need for Power

Individuals with this need seek power for its own sake. They usually praise strength, despise weakness, and will exploit or dominate other people. These people fear personal limitations, helplessness, and uncontrollable situations.

5. The Neurotic Need to Exploit Others

These individuals view others in terms of what can be gained through association with them.

People with this need generally pride themselves in their ability to exploit other people and are often focused on manipulating others to obtain desired objectives, including such things as ideas, power, money, or sex.

6. The Neurotic Need for Prestige

Individuals with a need for prestige value themselves in terms of public recognition and acclaim. Material possessions, personality characteristics, professional accomplishments, and loved ones are evaluated based upon prestige value. These individuals often fear public embarrassment and loss of social status.

7. The Neurotic Need for Personal Admiration

Individuals with a neurotic need for personal admiration are narcissistic and have an exaggerated self-perception. They want to be admired based on this imagined self-view, not upon how they really are.

8. The Neurotic Need for Personal Achievement

According to Horney, people push themselves to achieve greater and greater things as a result of basic insecurity. These individuals fear failure and feel a constant need to accomplish more than other people and to top even their own earlier successes.

9. The Neurotic Need for Self-Sufficiency and Independence

These individuals exhibit a “loner” mentality, distancing themselves from others in order to avoid being tied down or dependent upon other people.

10. The Neurotic Need for Perfection and Unassailability

These individuals constantly strive for complete infallibility. A common feature of this neurotic need is searching for personal flaws in order to quickly change or cover up these perceived imperfections.

—https://www.verywell.com/horneys-list-of-neurotic-needs-2795949

 

[JoeyB]

2 hours ago, WaterfallMachine said:

9. The Neurotic Need for Self-Sufficiency and Independence

These individuals exhibit a “loner” mentality, distancing themselves from others in order to avoid being tied down or dependent upon other people.

I have exhibited this one a lot.

Maybe someone further along can give me some insight here:

I consider myself far along my journey, but I still get neurotic around my girlfriend. I have had many girlfriends, and usually it is the same thing. I get blocked. Only now I have awareness of it. Ego = effort = trying to take something. I know I am trying to take her validation. I know the freedom from ego when around strangers but when around loved ones I feel like suffocating.

I used to be neurotic all around. A complete self improvement junkie and loner until just a few months ago. Leo's you tube channel, Jordan Peterson's past authoring program, along with shadow work has helped me sort out my past and made me feel awesome and accepting towards all sensations I feel throughout the day.

I can talk to anyone, do speeches on stage un-phased, yet I still seem to have intimacy problems. 

I have no doubt that if I keep chasing my dream and work on elevating my consciousness I will sort this out but if anyone has any pointers I would be happy to get some direction.

[Andrew]

@nick96 Hey Nick 

A good book to read is "Neurosis and Human Growth" by Karen Horney. She presents a brilliant outline of the neurotic personality structure/s and how it comes to be 

Thanks