The UEFA European Football Championship is a perfect example of an ego system. It works like this.
Destroy unity (at least in dreams) by creating artificial distinctions and the illusion of separateness, with separate interests. We call these countries. Then there is a competition to be special. To be special is to be number one. Anything less than that is a disaster. The news commentators this morning, in the country that came second out of dozens of countries, talked about despair and devastation and how the events of the final would mar the lives of the players forever. The failure would never be forgotten!
The ego establishes a blueprint for happiness in which the conditions for happiness are almost impossible to achieve. If they are achieved, the happiness immediately starts to decay, and a new blueprint is required. The winning country will not be happy for ever. It will be happy for a little bit but then face the next challenge. The system cannot be cracked; the house always wins. At some point, the curtain comes down, and the game is over: there are no more blueprints and no more chances.
Anyone on the 'losing' side who is unhappy today does not even have football as their chief interest: they're interested in winning. Anyone solely interested in football would have enjoyed the match thoroughly whoever had won and be experiencing perfect peace and joy this morning. Cakes are still cakes without the single cherry on top. If you're unhappy about the lack of cherry, you don't really like cakes. You're eating cake just in the hope that your slice might get the one cherry.
Such are the activities of the world: in the unhappy dream, they're of interest only as vehicles for specialness. In the happy dream, specialness is laughed at, and the activity becomes engrossing in and of itself.
Fortunately, none of this has happened. Unity has never been destroyed and never could be, except in bad dreams. Wakey, wakey. Come home!