Wilson's then-wife Marilyn attributed an autobiographical quality to the piece. Like most songs on "Pet Sounds", she believed that Wilson was writing about his frustrations relating "to life and how people think ... musically or intellectually or whatever". Asked if "Hang On to Your Ego" was based on his struggles in maintaining his ego, Wilson responded: "Yeah. I had taken a few drugs, and I had gotten into that kind of thing. I guess it just came up naturally." He later said that it had been "an inappropriate lyric. ... I just thought that to say 'Hang on to your ego' was an ego statement in and of itself, which I wasn't going for, so I changed it. I gave it a lot of thought."