Superego on Overdrive

The Nomad Show #2- Superego

Welcome to the Nomad Show!

This is a podcast for you, if you find yourself in a new place, whether geographically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually or otherwise. 

This is a show about philosophy, psychology, spirituality, and motivation. 

Together, we will ponder human nature from the perspective of the nomad, the sojourner, the immigrant, the traveler, the wanderer. 

In this episode, we will be considering the concept of the ego, and its two friends- the id, and the super ego. 

When people talk about the ego, they mostly are referring to a concept of self esteem, self worth, confidence- earned or unearned etc. Today, im gonna explore the concept of the self, and how it leads to domestications and limiting beliefs. 

Id is the only component of the personality that is present from birth. It controls your needs- need for food, need for affection, need for attention, need for sex; all your aggressive and impulsive drives. 

Conflicting desires, emotions, and impulses exist in the id without negating each other- you can love your spouse so deeply, yet feel so much resentment toward them. One can have such lofty goals, ambitions, and ideals; yet be paralyzed by crushing fear of failure. 

The id has no knowledge of good or evil, right or wrong, or morality. It is purely instinctual. 

hang with me here, this will all make sense in a bit. 

The super ego is the combination of the teachings, rules, and regulations that a person is raised with from childhood. It is the conscience that criticizes misbehavior and punishes it with guilt. It strives to balance the id. Freuds theory depicts the superego as the father figure of your psyche. It is the combination of cultural regulations, religious teaching, education and influence of authority that balances your impulsive desires. 

Don Miguel Ruiz, in his book- mastery of self described the concept of domestication. It is a concept based in mesoamerican toltec tradition as a system of reward and punishment that modulates human behavior. your domestication is the image of how you thought the world should be. “During the process of domestication, we form an image of what perfection is in order to try to be good enough. We create an image of how we should be in order to be accepted by everybody. We especially try to please the ones who love us, like Mom and Dad, big brothers and sisters, the priests and the teacher. Trying to be good enough for them, we create an image of perfection, but we don't fit this image. We create this image, but this image is not real. We are never going to be perfect from this point of view. Never !”

 It is also described as the greatest obstacle to personal freedom- an overactive superego, that is. We’ll come back to this later

The ego is the mediator in the trinity. It seeks to pleasure the id, while staying within the supergo’s boundaries. This is where executive functioning lies. The skills that allow you to focus attention, plan, control impulses, remember instructions- also including psychic functions like judgement, tolerance, planning, intellectual functioning and memory. The ego has to bring into harmony, the impulses of the id and the constraints of the superego.

To make things more complicated, the superego also watches over the ego and makes sure its not being partial to the id. 

Aristotle once said, it is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. 

So, let me pose a thought to you:

Are you a perfectionist, wound up, always judging yourself, never able to accept things the way they are, always gifted at finding the things you dont like the most?

Is your superego on overdrive?

Have you been domesticated to think the world should be a certain way?

Do you expect your future to be aligned in such a specific way that you have difficulty accepting the present that is right in front of you?

Have you surrendered to the beliefs of your parents, society, popular culture, childhood dreams and desires so much so that you just want to be yourself but dont know how?

is it possible to reconsider all those old agreements you have made with yourself and the world?

is it possible to drop the thought patterns that do not serve you well? 

is it possible to choose a new relationship with yourself?

is it possible to free yourself from the negative energy that has shackled you to old ways of being and preventing you from being your most actualized highest self?

This has been another episode of the Nomad show. Hope you enjoyed it. 

For show notes, visit thenomadshow.com, follow us on twitter @nomadshowtweets