Emotional pain can come in many forms but the result is usually devastating. Whether it’s rejection, failure, loneliness, grief, depression or shame, you feel like life as you know it is over and there’s no getting back.

But here’s the thing about emotional pain - it’s connected to your ego. Someone hurt your ego and now you feel like you aren’t worth it, you lose motivation to try again, you feel disappointed in yourself and want to hide from people so they can’t judge you anymore.

If you manage to control that ego of yours and eventually let it go, you can find peace. You’ll then see that pain is just a temporary phase in your life, one that can lead to many lessons and a lot of growth. In fact, pain is necessary in order for us to evolve, adapt and become better versions of ourselves.

To tame your ego is not to avoid pain, because that would be wrong. Instead, it’s the ability to never let pain bring you down. You can learn how to deal with it and then other people - whether they criticize you, leave you, or make you feel guilty - won’t have power over you. You are going to stop being jealous and dependent on others.

Let’s see how you can tame your ego so you can live freely and happily:

1. Allow the pain to teach you.

The hardest part is to recognize your pain, define it and embrace it while you’re suffering. But that’s exactly what you have to do in order to let go of it.

Doing this once will help you get to know yourself better, see that one painful event doesn’t define your whole existence and personality, and feel that you’re stronger than this.

Suffering is a great teacher but only if you are open to its lessons, and that can happen by learning them without your ego standing in the way.

From a psychological point of view, your ego is suffering and not your body or mind. Once you separate these from each other, you’ll be able to take a better look at the pain you are going through after a break up or whatever event happened to you, and then understand it. Once it’s outside from you and the anger or other initial response is gone, you can also free yourself from it.

2. Stop pretending.

Often, our first response to a hurt ego is to pretend like we aren’t in pain. But when your mind, body and soul are not in harmony, lying to yourself about being okay can only cause more discomfort.

Admit that someone or something hurt your ego and be okay with that. It happens to all of us but how you deal with it is what can make you stand out from average people.

Instead of avoiding the thought of anything related to the source of suffering and distracting yourself with other activities, feel the pain and admit it’s there. That’s a big step on the way to letting it go.

3. Ditch the ‘what if’s’.

An interesting process begins in our brains when we’ve experienced emotional pain. We start trying to figure out what went wrong, who’s to blame, what we could have done differently, etc.

None of this can change the situation. It’s important to stay calm in stressful times until the initial anger/stress/anxiety is gone and then start managing your emotional rationally.

These what if’s, however, can only hurt your healing. Don’t fall into the trap if imagining what could have been different or blaming yourself.

4. Put yourself in the other person’s position.

Here comes another hard step to take. As unbearable as it may sound, besides all your self-esteem and ego standing in the way, you need to look at things from another perspective. And in particular, from the other person’s perspective even if that’s the one who caused you pain.

If you manage to do that well, you’ll be able to find answers to most of the questions you have. You’ll stop taking things so personally and see that maybe without your reaction (feeling hurt/rejected/alone/etc.) this can’t even be called suffering. So if you let go of the emotional hurt, things get back to normal and you and the other person can continue your lives.

5. Keep your priorities in mind at all times.

In painful moments, we tend to forget what really matters. If a loved one hurt you, you lost someone close to you, were lied to by someone you trusted, or else, this becomes the center of your universe. However, just because it happened now doesn’t mean the rest of the things in your life are out of control too.

Remind yourself that this is just one of the many things that you have going on. Don’t give it too much power because the rest can suffer too.

Knowing what’s important to you (such as those who support you in moments when someone else left) allows you to let go of the rest. You figure out you paid too much attention to unimportant things and once you let go of them, you’ll be free. Then your days will be filled only with what matters and that’s how a happy life looks like.

6. It’s not about winning.

Most ego problems are related to pride, wanting to be right and perfectionism. However, the ‘winners’ in life quickly understand that these higher levels they wish to reach are unattainable and it’s a competition their ego is part of.

Outside of it is reality - where all people are equal and winning and losing don’t really matter.

When you understand that and stop trying to prove yourself, to show your superiority to others or to do something better than them, you might reach balance in life that will allow you to truly become your best self without that much effort.

7. Recognize the ego’s voice.

You’ll often hear your ego talking and it’s up to you whether you’ll listen to it or not. Any time you assume others don’t like you or that what someone did is because of you not being good enough, this is the voice of your ego. But it’s not right. If you believe it though, it can become right.

Whatever emotional pain you’ve experienced so far, it’s not over. You can come out stronger than before and in control of your life. Just follow the tips above to tame your ego.

About the author:

Sarah Williams is a passionate self-development writer and avid yoga practitioner, passionate about healthy lifestyle. She always tries seeing things from a different perspective, avoids small talk, and makes her interactions more satisfying and meaningful. She shares her thoughts on personal growth at Wingman Magazine.