„Purely You.” „Have it Your Way.” „Define Yourself.”

If advertising is any indication, there has never been a better time to be You. From customized computers and TV on-demand to dolls designed in your image, never before have you had so many tools at your disposal to express your unique personality. Everywhere you turn, marketers trumpet: Yoy’re special! You deserve the best! Nothing less!

This book is about You. The Royal You. But also the particular you, with your individual thoughts and needs, your unique likes and dislikes, your preffered Starbucks blend, your signature BK burger, your personal ringtone, your personal ringtone, your political blog, your custom Adidas, your Facebook friends, tour deisgner condo, your mix’n match brand of spirituality, and your kid’s American Girl doppelganger. More specifically, it is about how all of these things are symptoms of something much bigger: a force that is reshaping our economies, our communities, our workplaces, and the way we relate to the world around us. This force is called The Ego Boom.

In  this provocative, witty, and engaging new book, awark-winning journalists Steve Maich and Lianne George trace the rise of the ego-centric economy, from its roots in early American individualism, through the „find your bliss” ethos of the sixties and the self-esteem crusade of the eighteies to the modern consumer tsunami called „mass customization”, only to discover that this ever-intensifying mindset affects not only what we buy, but also how we live, love, invest, vote, and pray.

Incorporating the insights of dozens of thinkers, activists, and entrepreneurs, Maich and George take readers on colorful journey inside Dell’s customized-computer factory, the urban condominium boom, and the world of „personal democracy”. They explore why, in the age of unlimited personal choice, the mainstream blockbuster movie is bigger than ever; what was really behind the success of the best-selling, Oprah-endorsed book, The Secret; and why the vocabulary of the Ego Boom is being adopted by everyone from politicians to professors to preachers.

Every year, we spend billions of dollars on products and services with an aim to expressing ourselves on ever more insignificant scales. As this fascinating, thought-provoking book explores, The Ego Boom promises there is nothing more vital than the power to choose, and to express oneself through what we buy and sell. But at what point does self-regard become seld-defeating? (The Ego Boom: Why the World Really Does Revolve Around You by Steve Maich  and Lianne George, Key Porter Books, 2009)

The seductive promise of self-actualization in our consumer society is pure illusion! But to discover that it takes a lot!

The seductive promises of our egocentric culture sound like:

“You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman.“For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves. (Genesis 3:4-7, NIV).

I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies,it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. The man who loves his life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me. (John 12:24-26, NIV)