Is one's own happiness more important than serving the collective?

[Butters]

Leo said that maturity is selflessness. However, there are plenty of very selfish people who serve the collective and help millions of people through their business efforts, art, music, film or science. 

So apparently it's not the more selfless you are the more people you serve. But maybe it's the more selfless you are the better you can serve them? Maybe also not because a poorly educated selfless person could still do a bad job at that, perhaps harm people in the process. 

What is the correlation between maturity, selflessness and service to others? 

Is service to others even a priority in this work? If so why / why not? 

[Jannes]

If selfness to care about yourself and develop yourself so that in the end you are strong enough to help others. 

[LastThursday]

It does take great maturity to be devoted to others' needs above your own. Most parents know this for example. The maturity comes because we are naturally selfish and to overcome this takes effort and learning. Maturity is seeing the bigger picture and supressing your own desires in support of that. 

But, you are a person too and so to exclude yourself and not serve yourself as well as others is imbalanced. Ideally, we would all serve each other, that would be real maturity. Realistically, you can only ever serve a limited number of people, so you still only serve the self-interest of the group, the selfishness isn't ever completely gone.

Edited April 29 by LastThursday

[Butters]

@LastThursday but what about starting a business? Aren't very successful people those who put others first. I'm still confused about this. 

[Schizophonia]

On 27/04/2024 at 2:11 AM, Butters said:

Leo said that maturity is selflessness. However, there are plenty of very selfish people who serve the collective and help millions of people through their business efforts, art, music, film or science. 

So apparently it's not the more selfless you are the more people you serve. But maybe it's the more selfless you are the better you can serve them? Maybe also not because a poorly educated selfless person could still do a bad job at that, perhaps harm people in the process. 

What is the correlation between maturity, selflessness and service to others? 

Is service to others even a priority in this work? If so why / why not? 

You want to be altruistic because it gives you pleasure, if you are not a sociopath you will have (selfish) gratification in being altruistic.
Even from a "sociopath" point of view, you better be kind to others to get things in return.

But in all cases you are stuck with yourself, fundamentally self-sacrifice is an illusion, or rather the egoism/altruism duality. What is objectively immature, on the other hand, because it is literally a primitive/childish point of view, is to have a particularly divided vision of the world and of others.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Splitting_(psychology)

In other words JUDGE people of "IMMATURE" or whatever according to x criterion, in general putting people in categorical boxes.
When you become a normal man and you anticipate cleavage (and embrace the phalic stage in general) ultimately all that matters is that no one steps on your toes. There are no more bad guys/good guys, not even particularly dumb/smart people, there are just people who follow their interests in one way or another, the balance of power between humans (libidinal entities) and a law, explicit or not (taboos, collective unconscious) to lubricate the power relations in question.

Edited May 11 by Schizophonia

[Butters]

@Schizophonia so everyone is kind to others most of the time? Ive always been a loner but I think to be more successful I need to think more about others interest before my own.

[Ishanga]

First BE---.then DO--->then HAVE..Most do it backwards and either DO then HAVE and never get to BEING, and suffer it..

BEING means You Know how to BE, how do you want to experience life within Yourself? Happy or Sad, Excited or Bored, Intensely or Chill, we have that choice... When Your BEING is established, You know how to BE, then going out and DOING/HAVING is no problem, if it doesn't work out you have no stress or suffering from it, as You know how to BE within yourself, so this is the best way to help the collective imo!

[Schizophonia]

21 hours ago, Butters said:

@Schizophonia so everyone is kind to others most of the time?

Yes, unless you're stupid, or really sadistic, but that's very rare.
Also, physiological stress can make you crazy and sadistic. 

 

[Butters]

39 minutes ago, Schizophonia said:

Yes, unless you're stupid, or really sadistic, but that's very rare.
Also, physiological stress can make you crazy and sadistic. 

 

I think were talking about different things. I didn't mean do bad things onto people, I meant like I'm a loner and I feel that to get more out of life I need to give more, which goes against the "help yourself first" philosophy. That feels more like help others to help yourself. 

Edited May 12 by Butters

[Basman]

On 27/04/2024 at 2:11 AM, Butters said:

What is the correlation between maturity, selflessness and service to others? 

Is service to others even a priority in this work? If so why / why not? 

The saying that you have to fill your own cup first comes to mind. In my experience, service to others in a way that aligns with your strengths and passions is inherently more fulfilling and should be a long-term goal.

But this is a chicken and egg situation. And selfishness came first. Existentially, everything we want to do we do because it feels good to us personally even if we are doing something for someone else. Like, people donate to animal conservation because koalas and pandas are cute but don't give a fuck about spiders or frogs.

I think it is an issue of maturity, like a previous comment pointed out.

[puporing]

On 2024-04-26 at 6:11 PM, Butters said:

very selfish people who serve the collective and help millions of people through their business efforts, art, music, film or science. 

You're prob not looking closely enough at that, and what is your definition of being helpful? Ok sure you can argue Jeff Bezos give you seemingly cheap products with basically free deliveries, but at what cost to their workers and their lives? And as well to potential small business owners?

I'm not saying there aren't situations where it's like a "win win", but those aren't common is what I'm trying to say.

Edited May 13 by puporing

[LastThursday]

On 5/11/2024 at 2:53 PM, Butters said:

@LastThursday but what about starting a business? Aren't very successful people those who put others first. I'm still confused about this. 

You have to be clear about what you mean by "success".

Capitalism is a form of gambling. You put in capital upfront - money, work, effort, hours, infrastructure, stuff, investment - in the hope that you are rewarded with excess money in the long run (profit). That is primarily what running a business is about. You are successful if you are profitable.

So in this model the profits come first. It's unsustainable if you keep putting in capital without any reward and so the business will collapse eventually.

There are a million different ways to increase your likelihood of making profit and that's what makes business so complex. One of those ways is to provide great value to other people. In other words if your business provides something that other people need or that improves their lives, then they will buy your products and services. Not only that, they will pay more than it cost you to create the product, and you will make profit.

Therefore making profit and providing value to other people are two sides of the same coin. But you aren't serving the collective necessarily, you are only convincing people to buy your products or services to make profit.

[Butters]

@LastThursday OK very insightful thank you. 

I know someone who is very outwardly successful and always seems to put others first, making them look better next to him, but it's just narcissistic smokeshow.