"The greatest con the ego ever pulled was tricking you into thinking that it is you." Any thoughts?

I’m schizophrenic and agree.

That is quite metaphysically profound from a Guy like Richy, Ritchie, i suspect Madonna had some part to play in that. She’s amazingly spiritual and even richer than her former Husband.

Philosophical.

I think it’s easy to fall into the trap of believing the ego always has your overall best interests at heart. The ego is the ego and probably quite happy without you interfering thank you very much.

Whatever you think of as ‘you’ doesn’t actually exist… So quit asking questions, i’m trying to meditate.

It’s the same concept as A New Earth.

It’s kind of hard to wrap my head around the fact that I’m not “me”, but I find the exercises that go along with it (meditation, deep relaxation, etc.) can be quite a nice release.

I’d like to see Hollywood toss out a few more mantras like that for the masses. lol

Absolutely true, the backbone of ‘enlightenment’ the deep and profound recognition that you are not what you think you are.
You are not your mind, thoughts, body, things, personality.
You are pure consciousness, a manifestation of the one consciousness that shows up in it’s expressions as a person, a rock, a tree, an animal.

The recognition that everything you see in the world of form is an illusion, it is all one and same, just wearing a different costume. ;-)

Pretentious bullshit. Well you did ask.

It can go that way, sure. I liked the movie. As far as actual life correalation, I understand it having “become” what I always wanted to be and then having to step away from that and figure out how to “be” someone else, something else. It’s good to be able to find yourself outside of your wants and expectations but it hurts for a bit.

I think it is silly. I hints of that issue of who you are, as if you don’t know perfectly well who you are. But some of us like to play that game that we might not be who we think we are, just so we can have weird thoughts.

Am I a man dreaming I’m a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming I’m a man? As if.

You are you because that’s how you experience things. Even if you think you are not you, you are still you thinking you aren’t you. Parse that!

Isn’t the original quote (so to speak) about the devil from The Devil’s Advocate…about how the greatest con the devil ever pulled was that he made people think he isn’t real.

Read Imperial Bedrooms by Bret Easton Ellis, i’m sure everyone could find some allusions between the quote and the book..

I will begin by saying it’s quite sad to read such dismissive answers over an idea that’s worth more that a second’s thought.

- making a parallel to “you’re not who you think you are” and considering it a cheap truism is false from the start. The statement clearly makes a distinct between the self and the ego (I’ll get to this later) so something like “you’re not who you think you are” has no connection to the quote from the movie. Even if you manage to clear out the ego like the character in the movie, it doesn’t mean you get to know the self. Even if you don’t manage (or don’t want to) to clear out the ego, it doesn’t mean you can’t tell them apart. There are people who simply stick to their ego, but very much able to differentiate. There are too many cases to list here and to me it’s obvious that while the movie is simplistic and somewhat pretentious, the quote and the idea behind it are not.
The quote itself is quote straightforward and emphasized just one psychological pitfall, that you might identify yourself with your ego and that will hinder your development. The idea is not new, you can also see it in (you may laugh now) “Top Gun” (remember the quote: “your ego’s writing cheques your body can’t cash” – the main character gets carried away by his ego and only with his partner’s death he manages to shed the ego and become better).
This is a common occurrence, but shedding the ego is also common, so the quote is more like an observation. Guy Ritchie issues a warning, not a pretentious lesson of life in a bid to look wiser than he is. Like telling you “watch out, there’s a red light ahead” – you would eventually see it, the chances are you would stop by yourself, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.After all, this is important only to the extent it applies to you: if you’re not heading towards a red light, then the warning is moot (eg: people which don’t have an ego – yes, they do exist). The real pretentiousness is what “Coloma” said above, that “you’re not who you think you are” is some sort of absolute truth which always applies (truism) which aside from being outside the scope of the question, it is false and moot – it assumes the person who says it knowns me enough to tell not only who I really am but also who I think I am (enough to be able to make the very distinction I would apparently be unable to make).
Completely knowing oneself is not impossible, just improbable, but this is irrelevant since we’re talking about individuals. Maybe I don’t fully know myself, but YOU as an external observer, while having a chance to see the “real” me, you can’t really tell what I really think of myself.

To deal with the self and the ego, in psychology the ego is the self. That’s the definition of it: the ego is a characteristic that encompasses the metaphysical characteristic of a living being, where the pinnacle is consciousness or awareness. The religious discrimination of the ego resulted in today’s mundane use that bears a negative connotation

@austerus

The ego ( in spiritual terms ) is the false self.

Taming ego and knowing oneself is an ongoing process.

Ego evolved as a defense of ‘self’, and reacting appropriately to threats is one of it’s beneficial features for survivals sake.
But..ego becomes problematic when one over identifies with the external as truth.

To recognize ego as separate from ones true self is healthy psycho/spiritual development.

This is why highly defensive types react with such intensity, because they feel anything that mimics a threat places them in a space for potential annihilation.

The death of ego does not mean the death of self, but this is where it gets tricky for most.

They see something as simple as a disagreement to be a real threat to their survival, which is really ego survival and not self survival, if you follow.

They do not recognize that a blow to their ego is not on the same continuum as being attacked by a bear. lol

If I disagree with you, you will not die, but ego takes all hint of threat as a potential death.

This is where many issues with insecurity and depression and other mental un-wellness arises from, the mind believing the egos stories, their own and others, and identifying with thought and opinion as ultimate truth.

It is easy to tell how identified one is with their false self when a crisis of sorts is experienced.
A relationship loss, job loss, loss of status etc.

Those that are over identified with the external as a barometer of self will crash hard, those that have attained some measure of ‘enlightenment’ will not feel utterly destroyed as a self by the loss of some ego identifying external bookmark of their self worth or even, the feeling they no longer exist with the loss of that defining external prop.

Completely knowing oneself takes lots of self awareness work and due diligence, and is a lifelong process.
I believe self awareness is the most important work human beings have to do if they wish to live lives of inner peace and disassociate from over identification with false self that left unexamined is the cause of all suffering. :-)

The true self is eternal, and cannot be harmed.

To ‘die unto yourself’ is the death of ego, that liberates one from their false identifications of what ‘self’ really is.