Ego Is the Enemy

by Ryan Holiday

The ego we see most commonly goes by a more casual definition: an unhealthy belief in our own importance. Arrogance. Self-centered ambition.

One must ask: if your belief in yourself is not dependent on actual achievement, then what is it dependent on? The answer, too often when we are just setting out, is nothing. Ego. And this is why we so often see precipitous rises followed by calamitous falls.

Kita dapat belajar dari sherman dalam mengatur ego kita dengan bergerak perlahan, stick to the reality, dan selalu mengevaluasi setiap kegagalan dan keberhasilan kita. Sehingga kita tidak terjebak di dalam ego kita

TO BE OR TO DO?

Think about this the next time you face that choice: Do I need this? Or is it really about ego? Are you ready to make the right decision? Or do the prizes still glitter off in the distance? To be or to do—life is a constant roll call.

Khan’s first powerful victories came from the reorganization of his military units, splitting his soldiers into groups of ten. This he stole from neighboring Turkic tribes, and unknowingly converted the Mongols to the decimal system. Soon enough, their expanding empire brought them into contact with another “technology” they’d never experienced before: walled cities. In the Tangut raids, Khan first learned the ins and outs of war against fortified cities and the strategies critical to laying siege, and quickly became an expert. Later, with help from Chinese engineers, he taught his soldiers how to build siege machines that could knock down city walls. In his campaigns against the Jurched, Khan learned the importance of winning hearts and minds. By working with the scholars and royal family of the lands he conquered, Khan was able to hold on to and manage these territories in ways that most empires could not. Afterward, in every country or city he held, Khan would call for the smartest astrologers, scribes, doctors, thinkers, and advisers—anyone who could aid his troops and their efforts. His troops traveled with interrogators and translators for precisely this purpose.

kita dapat belajar dari pemimpin perang genghis khan yang merupakan salah satu conqueror terhebat sepanjang masa. dia tidak termakan oleh ego dia sendiri walau dia telah menaklukkan banyak sekali wilayah dan kerajaan. namun, genghis melakukan belajar dari setiap pertarungan ataupun peperangan yang telah ia lakukan dan dia belajar budaya, teknologi, kelebihan dari wilayah yang pernah ia jajah. dia tidak meninggikan ego dari diri nya sendiri namun terus menerus menjadi seorang pembelajar

A great destiny, Seneca reminds us, is great slavery.

All of us waste precious life doing things we don’t like, to prove ourselves to people we don’t respect, and to get things we don’t want.

it’s not about beating the other guy. It’s not about having more than the others. It’s about being what you are, and being as good as possible at it, without succumbing to all the things that draw you away from it. It’s about going where you set out to go. About accomplishing the most that you’re capable of in what you choose. That’s

It’s time to sit down and think about what’s truly important to you and then take steps to forsake the rest. Without this, success will not be pleasurable, or nearly as complete as it could be. Or worse, it won’t last. This is especially true with money. If you don’t know how much you need, the default easily becomes: more.

One cannot be an opera singer and a teen pop idol at the same time. Life requires those trade-offs, but ego can’t allow it.

Everyone buys into the myth that if only they had that—usually what someone else has—they would be happy. It may take getting burned a few times to realize the emptiness of this illusion. We all occasionally find ourselves in the middle of some project or obligation and can’t understand why we’re there. It will take courage and faith to stop yourself.

Entitlement assumes: This is mine. I’ve earned it. At the same time, entitlement nickels and dimes other people because it can’t conceive of valuing another person’s time as highly as its own. It delivers tirades and pronouncements that exhaust the people who work for and with us, who have no choice other than to go along. It overstates our abilities to ourselves, it renders generous judgment of our prospects, and it creates ridiculous expectations.

Ego needs honors in order to be validated. Confidence, on the other hand, is able to wait and focus on the task at hand regardless of external recognition.

When it comes to Marshall, the old idea that selflessness and integrity could be weaknesses or hold someone back are laughably disproven. Sure, some people might have trouble telling you much about him—but each and every one of them lives in a world he was largely responsible for shaping. The credit? Who cares.

di chapter ini dijelaskan bahwa bahaya dari the disease of me yang selalu berpikir apabila berhasil di selalu berpikir bahwa dialah yang membuat suatu organisasi/tim/perusahaan itu berhasil. padahal banyak bawahan, orang terdekat, partner, mentor yang membantu dia sampai di titik yang dia inginkan bahkan bisa pula kontribusi dia terhadap suatu tim tersebut kecil namun dia merasa bahwa dia banyak berkorban

let’s ask: Is it really sustainable for the next several decades? Can you really outwork and outrun everyone forever? The answer is no. The ego tells us we’re invincible, that we have unlimited force that will never dissipate. But that can’t be what greatness requires—energy without end?

There’s an old line about how if you want to live happy, live hidden.

“Men of great ambition have sought happiness . . . and have found fame.” What he means is that behind every goal is the drive to be happy and fulfilled—but when egotism takes hold, we lose track of our goal and end up somewhere we never intended.

We know what decisions we must make to avoid that ignominious, even pathetic end: protecting our sobriety, eschewing greed and paranoia, staying humble, retaining our sense of purpose, connecting to the larger world around us.

Kita bisa belajar dari alexander the great yang awalnya hanya ingin menaklukkan eropa tapi dia termakan sama ego dia yang ingin menguasai seluruh benua jadi dia mati di umur 32 tahun oleh orang yang tak terduga yaitu orang2 terdekat dia. Kita harus terseadar, terdireksi, sadar akan tujuan kita sebenarnya, humble, dan ingat atas gambaran besar. sama kayak aku kuliah, aku pengen banget punya banyak kawan, ikut lomba, ikut asisten lab, punya nilai ipk tinggi. Tapi aku yakin walau semua ini tercapai pasti aku ngerasa kosong karena dari awal aku mempunyai tujuan dari kuliah yaitu mendapatkan suatu life task. Tapi aku sangat beruntung mendapatkan life task dari kuliah dan berhasil menekan semua ego aku punya. Aku merasa udah berhasil melakukan hal yang benar walau di prosesnya gaenak banget, selalu tidak dimengerti, selalu diremehkan, banyak kritikan yang mana terkadang ini nyakitin. Aku jujur di titik ini tanggal 1 september 2025 bisa nemu titik bahagia akhirnya. Puas akan pilihan yang aku pilih

Because even if we manage ourselves well, prosperity holds no guarantees. The world conspires against us in many ways, and the laws of nature say that everything regresses toward the mean. In sports, the schedule gets harder after a winning season, the bad teams get better draft picks, and the salary cap makes it tough to keep a team together. In life, taxes go up the more you make, and the more obligations society foists on you. The media is harder on those it has covered before. Rumors and gossip are the cost of renown: He’s a drunk. She’s gay. He’s a hypocrite. She’s a bitch. The crowd roots for the underdog, and roots against the winners.

He will face a battle he knows not, he will ride a road he knows not.

They also aren’t aware of how common this is in history, how many figures took seemingly terrible situations—a prison sentence, an exile, a bear market or depression, military conscription, even being sent to a concentration camp—and through their attitude and approach, turned those circumstances into fuel for their unique greatness.

Malcolm X, Viktor Frankl, Graham Family, David Goggins, Tom Brady, all the same stories different situation

In life, there will be times when we do everything right, perhaps even perfectly. Yet the results will somehow be negative: failure, disrespect, jealousy, or even a resounding yawn from the world.

Well, get ready for it. It will happen. Maybe your parents will never be impressed. Maybe your girlfriend won’t care. Maybe the investor won’t see the numbers. Maybe the audience won’t clap. But we have to be able to push through. We can’t let that be what motivates us.

Like david goggins said, when the ending is unknown, when the distance is unknownthat's when you find out who the F you are

How do you carry on then? How do you take pride in yourself and your work? John Wooden’s advice to his players says it: Change the definition of success. “Success is peace of mind, which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to do your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming.” “Ambition,” Marcus Aurelius reminded himself, “means tying your well-being to what other people say or do . . .

Doing the work is enough.

Dalam chapter ini aku relate banget. Kayak aku belajar keras banget buat latihan dan buat ngoding dimana aku sampai kunci di kamarku sendiri. Aku bemer2 berusaha banget buat dapatin yang aku mau terlebih lagi semester 1 dan 2 aku kejar banget ujian belajar lain. Jadi simply aku kayak gak pernah benar2 gak pernah santai di kuliah tetapi orang2 sekitarku selalu ngomong bahwa aku gak ada kerjaan, dikritik, disrespect, dan disalahpahamin. Reaksiku saat itu kek yaudah aku tau apa yang aku kerjain dan aku tau gimana aku ngelakuin effort yang besar jadi bagiku kerja keras itu udah ngasih validasj ke diri sendiri bukan validasi dari orang lain. Setelah baca chapter ini lebih mengerti sama aware atas kenapasih orang ngomong gitu, kenapasih aku ngerasa puas aja sama yang aku lakuin.

Duris dura franguntur. Hard things are broken by hard things.

In fact, many significant life changes come from moments in which we are thoroughly demolished, in which everything we thought we knew about the world is rendered false. We might call these “Fight Club moments.” Sometimes they are self-inflicted, sometimes inflicted on us, but whatever the cause they can be catalysts for changes we were petrified to make.

The world can show you the truth, but no one can force you to accept it.

But change begins by hearing the criticism and the words of the people around you. Even if those words are mean spirited, angry, or hurtful. It means weighing them, discarding the ones that don’t matter, and reflecting on the ones that do.

“People learn from their failures. Seldom do they learn anything from success.”

Not to aspire or seek out of ego. To have success without ego. To push through failure with strength, not ego.

that training was like sweeping the floor. Just because we’ve done it once, doesn’t mean the floor is clean forever. Every day the dust comes back. Every day we must sweep.

Working to refine our habitual thoughts, working to clamp down on destructive impulses, these are not simply the moral requirements of any decent person.