It’s a strange brand name but the new ice cream by Magnum is called Ego. I began to wonder what ego is. Why did they call an ice cream ego? In this situation the term is used to conjure up thoughts of decadence and extreme self indulgence. The old Skyhooks classic song ‘ego is not a dirty word’ came to my mind. If ego is not a dirty word then what is ego when referred to our human nature?
You often hear people say ‘that bloke has a healthy ego’ which normally means the person has an very high opinion of their own importance. The word punishing comes to mind. When you consider this trite example it is hard to see that ego could have anything other than negative connotations. But let’s take a look at the word through a much bigger prism. In politics we have at the heart of the capitalist system the individual. Individuals taking initiatives for the own betterment and that of the community. Without an ego, a belief in themselves, people would be hamstrung by the constraints of the collective goal. Every ego is an experiment in what that person thinks is the right thing to do. As a society we make judgements about when people get that experiment wrong. The arguments of good and evil come into play.
The whole topic very quickly becomes a pretty philosophical one. Before you know it your asking what is the meaning of life. Lets not go there.
Maybe its time to look at the our ego from a different perspective. Maybe we should start looking at a song. Lets look and where we see ego mentioned in a song. Songs always have that creative spin on things. Beyonce has a song Ego. The lyrics have the words ‘I like to think that I was created for a special purpose’ That oft forgotten band The Saturdays song ego ‘And now you wanna pretend that you’re a superstar’ I even found the song Kid Ego. Maybe they are tapping into an undercurrent on the same theme. Maybe they have eaten an ice cream and started to wonder what is ego.
Its only speculation but it is worth asking the question don’t you think!
Next time you hear the term egotistical, egocentric and egomaniac maybe rather than think of ice creams you think of much broader questions. Maybe you can think of these things while eating your ice cream. May be one day you’ll have a better understanding of what is ego. Wherever you come to on this thinking make sure you don’t give up your love of ice creams. There’s another topic ‘what is our conscience?.’ We’ll leave this for another day. ‘What is ego’ is enough to ponder.