Having an ego is not all bad and below I share with you the good side to it. An ego I understand is our identity. So it gives us a scaffolding emerging from the pattern of our habits, thoughts and values. Now this identity might or might not be healthy but it affirms our existence as an individual. While it is important to grow and change by aspiring toward Oneness with the rest of existence it is important to return to this identity. This grounds us and helps in engaging the world using the habits, thoughts and values we have collected. Break a pattern and establish a new pattern but we should be grounded all the time. So yes the ego is not real because it's changing all the time towards Oneness which is real but to not affirm our ego would mean that we let go of the structure it offers to us and that is very disorienting.