Ken Wilber on the Ego (and he should know). Plus, funny photos.

by Waylon Lewis, elephantjournal.com on Mar 9, 2009

Ken Wilber, Integral Icon, on the Ego. Plus, a few funny photos.

Ken Wilber is one of today’s greatest philosophers, a towering man built like an athlete whose brain is bigger than elephantjournal dot com’s 68K monthly readers combined. Because I’ve had the honor of knowing him a bit since way back in my days slaving away at Shambhala Publications, and have interviewed him re: his Integral philosophy for elephant, folks often ask me about him. They always start with this question (always): is Ken Wilber really as arrogant as he seems?). And I always answer,

“Definitely. But at least he has something to be arrogant about. Me, I’m at least as arrogant as Wilber, but I have no excuse—I’m no genius.”

So I had me a little smirk today when I came across this spot-on quote via Mr. Big Brains himself:

If we are going to insist on identifying with just the little self in here, then others are going to bruise it, insult it, injure it. The ego, then, is kept in existence by a collection of emotional insults; it carries its personal bruises as the fabric of its very existence. It actively collects, hurts and insults, even while resenting them, because without it’s bruises it would be literally nothing. ~ Ken Wilber

This quote ably describes the smallness of my usual state of mind—like one of those fish that puffs up whenever it’s poked.