At this point it is essential to make clear concepts such as the «ego» to really understand what it is and avoid confusion arising from mixing concepts often very unclear.
From a technical perspective we will call «memeplex» the highest level memeplex within the memetic ecosystem that a specific individual carries.Ego is defined as the memeplex or union of memes that are involved with the concept of possession, or, in other words, with the particles «I», «me», «mine».
Thus, it is not the same ‘a car’ as ‘my car’, ‘a team [of football]’ that ‘my team’, ‘an idea’ that ‘my idea’ or ‘a money’ that ‘my money’.
Memes are information packages with replicative capacity, which form the basis of culture. They are born, grow, replicate and die like any living being and their evolution is totally Darwinian, so that their success lies in their replicative capacity, not in their utility or benefit.
The memes need the attention of the guest to be noticed and to be communicated to other individuals. For this they are grouped in unions of common interests, called «memeplexes», or complex memes.
A memeplex is the religion, which groups together all the memes that share this theme, so that when a meme takes time to process the guest’s attention, it pulls other memes associated with it in the form of a chain.This is how they gather and leave the darkness of memory and appear in the consciousness of the individual getting refreshed and not forgetting and trying to use the transmitting capacity of the host towards other possible guests to achieve replication.
Memes work like viruses.
And its success depends on its popularity, its contagiousness.
Memes have the ability to be communicated, that is their main value. The problem is that they look after their own interests.
The memeplex «ego» or «I» has the amazing ability to get the guest to identify with him: «I’m José Manuel Martínez Candela», «I’m from Cáceres», «I’m a telecommunications engineer», «I’m a university professor» , «My daughters are …», «my car is».
An individual can not be a meme: it can not be replicated in the minds of people, not in books, or in any information medium. And that the individual identifies with a complex meme is the result of the degree of infection he suffers from his parasite.
The mind of an ordinary person is constantly being invaded by these parasites. One after another. One comes out, attention is paid to him and immediately he calls his friends who parade in chain in the focus of attention of the victim.
If you want to know how infected you are, just relax and close your eyes.Now try not to think about anything. After a few seconds you will begin to parade all your parasites, chained, in a totally involuntary way precisely because your mind does not belong to you, belongs to these parasites that in many occasions determine your behavior.
If you are your mind, and your mind is infected and your mind does not control it, you are completely alienated. You are nothing more than a puppet in the hands of these parasites with their own lives and those who dominate them.
However, the ego is our own image, it is the image that we give to the outside and it is necessary because the experiences can only be transmitted through conceptualization and every concept has a qualia composed of all the recognizable contents on the part of the issuer and a meme that it is a transmissible concept, like a word or group of them, a sound, an image, a gesture, etc. which must have been previously known by the receiver so that when it is received, it is correctly assigned to a qualia similar to that of the issuer. This is achieved through learning, through imitation: this qualia corresponds to this word. Without that, communication is difficult, impossible or incomprehensible.
The image itself is made up of all the memes related to oneself, that is, their possessions. The more and better possessions, the greater the image.
This arises as a result of community life. To differentiate ourselves from others, the «I» is used. And the other one is «you» or «he». The things I control are «my» things, as opposed to «your» or «your» things. A single person, absolutely alone, does not have possessions because he does not need them. Who owns the world, does not need anything. Who does not need anything, owns the world. But as it is not the case, the ego is introduced to divide the world into plots. As John Lennon said, ‘possession is 9/10 of the problem.’
In an earlier chapter we already discussed how the «I» is born as the one that helps us when we are alone. That to which we order him to do things and do them. And the more capacity to do things, the more things you control and possess, the bigger that ego is.
But we do not stay at the origin. Ordinary people live in imbued and the lie of a conceptual world that has nothing to do with reality. As dealing only with concepts is very economical and does not require much thinking, people do it, which leads to the loss of encephalic mass that the human species suffers.
The fool identifies with the ego. Because all his world are conceptual dolls, and the doll that represents him is him for all its effects.
The wise man, on the other hand, knows that this does not exist, that it is not true, but he is unable to make himself understood with the people of the dolls. Therefore, it uses ‘I’ or ‘I am’ or ‘mine’ only with practical utility of communication as this sutta suggests:
Saṃyutta Nikāya 1 
Discourses Connected with Devatas 
25. The Arahant
«If a bhikkhu is an arahant,
Consummed, with destroyed spots,
One who carries his final body,
Would you still say, ‘I speak’?
And would he say, «Do they speak to me?»
«If a bhikkhu is an arahant,
Consummed, with destroyed spots,
One who carries his final body,
He can still say: ‘I speak’,
and I could say: ‘They talk to me’.
Skillful, knowing the language of the world,
use terms as mere expressions. «
«When a bhikkhu is an arahant,
consummate, with destroyed spots,
one who carries his final body,
it’s because he has come to the presumption of
what would he say, ‘I speak’,
What would he say: ‘They talk to me’? «
«There are no knots for one with abandoned conceit;
For him, all knots of vanity are consumed.
Although the wise man has transcended the conceived,
He could still say: «I speak.»
You could also say: «They talk to me».
Skillful, knowing the language of the world,
use terms as mere expressions. «
No conceit is the conventional use of language, because for the sage, the arahant, the ‘I’ is nothing more than an instrument of communication and is not a subject, an agent of possession.
There is another passage, in this very mysterious case, in Bodhirajakumara Sutta himself, MN 85, Prince Bodhi. In it, when the prince invites the Buddha to eat, both he and his followers are given an anecdote that is somewhat mysterious.
The text, in most translations, reads as follows:
Majjhima Nikaya 85 
Bodhirajakumara Sutta 
Prince Bodhi
This I have heard: On one occasion the Blessed One was dwelling in the grove of Sumsumaragira of the deer park, in the country of the bhaggas named Sutinsumaragira.
It was then that a palace of Prince Bodhi, called Kokanada, was recently built, which was still inhabited by an ascetic, brahmin or any human being.
Then, Prince Bodhi addressed the student of Brahmin Sanjikaputta thus: «Come, dear Sanjikaputta, go with the Blessed One and pay him homage in my name with your head bowed at his feet and ask him if he is free of illness and affliction, if he is healthy and comfortable, saying this: ‘Venerable Lord, Prince Bodhi pays him homage with his head bowed at his feet and asks him if he is free of sickness and affliction, if he is healthy and comfortable’. Then, say this: ‘Venerable Lord, may the Blessed One, together with the Sangha of the monks, consent to accept a meal of Prince Bodhi tomorrow.’ «
«Yes, sir,» answered Sanjikaputta and went with the Blessed One and exchanged cordial greetings with him. When they concluded their courteous and friendly talks and words of welcome, he sat down to one side and said: «Master Gotama, Prince Bodhi pays homage with his head bowed at the feet of Master Gotama and asks him if he is free of sickness and affliction, if you are healthy and comfortable. And he also told me: ‘May the Blessed One, together with the Sangha of the monks, consent to accept a meal of Prince Bodhi tomorrow.’ «
And the Blessed One accepted in silence. Then, knowing that the Blessed One had accepted, Sanjikaputta rose from his seat, went with Prince Bodhi and told him what had happened, adding: «The ascetic Gotama has accepted.»
Then, after the night, Prince Bodhi exhibited several kinds of good food prepared in his own residence, also decorated the Kokanada Palace with a white cloth putting it as a carpet that covered every step of the stairs. Then Prince Bodhi addressed the student of Brahmin Sanjikaputta thus: «Come, dear Sanjikaputta, go with the Blessed One and inform him that it is time, in this way: ‘It is time, Venerable Lord, the food is ready'» .
«Yes sir,» answered Sanjikaputta and went with the Blessed One to announce that it was time like this: «It’s time, Venerable Lord, the food is ready.»
Then, early morning, the Blessed One got dressed, took his bowl and outer habit, and went to the residence of Prince Bodhi.
On that occasion Prince Bodhi was waiting for the Blessed One in the outer court. When he saw the Blessed One approaching from a distance, he went out to receive him and pay homage to him; Then, allowing the Blessed One to precede him, they went to the Kokanada Palace. However, the Blessed One stopped at the first rung of the ladder. Then, Prince Bodhi said to him: «Venerable Lord, may the Blessed One step on the cloth, may the Sublime step on the cloth, this will lead to my well-being and happiness for a long time.» But when this was said, the Blessed One remained silent.
And for the second time … for the third time Prince Bodhi said to him: «Venerable Lord, may the Blessed One step on the cloth, may the Sublime step on the cloth, this will lead to my well-being and happiness for a long time.»
Then, the Blessed One looked at Venerable Ananda and Venerable Ananda said to Prince Bodhi: «Prince, the cloth must be removed. The Blessed One will not step on a strip of cloth; the Tathagata has compassion for future generations. «
This of the » the Tathagata has compassion for the future generations » appears in the translations of many languages, but it is nonsense. In Pāli what it says verbatim is: Pacchimaṃ janataṃ tathāgato anukampatī, which means literally:
«The Tathagata has consideration for the people who follow him «
And this is so. The Buddha can not step on a white cloth that is placed only for him to step on. Doing so would be an absurd act of arrogance. The Buddha is who he is, but he is nobody. Nobody to step on a white cloth, clean, and less, before the crowd that follows him.
The ego expands when others humble themselves before one, or is exalted in front of others. There you will never find a fully enlightened arahant.