Some relevant offtopic. Ego and fear are also described in the eastern philosophy as the two biggest obstacles on your way. Ego is the illusion of separateness, the great seed of all human evils, that takes a monumental effort to get rid of. Next comes the fear of making the next step, "taking on more responsibility" as we would say here, because that new responsibility feels so overwhelming. Those who fail to make the leap of faith (or "to challenge themselves" in corpspeak) fall, and have to climb up again.