Selfishness and selflessness are the same?

[XYZ]

Here I want to explore the relationship between self-centeredness and compassion for others, broadly speaking, and how I am starting to see both of these as complimentary virtues that come full-circle when fully actualized. 

When allowing oneself to become unabashedly selfish, self-centered, self-concerned, they inevitably come to realize that the well being of other people and of the Earth as a whole is in their own best interest. A simple example would be the golden rule treat others as you would like to be treated. The selfish person may not have any moral principles, but clearly sees the utility in it for themselves, that it will make their lives easier and more enjoyable to get along with others.  And on a grander scale, contributing to anything which harms the natural environment, which inevitably comes back to harm you as an individual, is also against your own self-interest. Furthermore, a selfish person with any self-awareness will see that other conscious beings have selfish desires as well, and in this way be able to feel compassion for those who are feeling exactly the same as them.

When allowing oneself to let go of self-centeredness and dedicate themselves towards embodying compassion for all living things, they can see that maintaining their own well being is beneficial to this end, that when being the the best one can be physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, they are best equipped to help heal others, and have an impact towards reducing suffering on the Earth as a whole. Conversely, self-sacrifice under the guise of being compassionate often causes more suffering than it alleviates, or is a display of virtue signaling rather than directed action.

So these are my budding thoughts on the matter, selflessness and selfishness may be 2 sides of the same coin. I may be onto something deeper, or I may just be trying to rationalize my own self-centeredness. An interesting thing to note is that while I watched the series on Spiral Dynamics, I recognized myself as having mostly reached stage Yellow personality, but with the exception of retaining a self-absorbed mentality, being primarily concerned with my own happiness, health, safety and comfort above all else. This tendency is indicative of stage red thinking I never grew out of, despite advancements in all other areas of development. Being an extreme introvert with very little life experience but rich imagination, constantly running intricate thought experiments, constructing scenarios in my own head which usually never see the light of day, may have a lot to do with this. Contemplating further the similarities between selfishness and selflessness may be the way to more fully integrate, or maybe not. 

Would like to hear thoughts on this.

[Sbilko]

@XYZ

My opinion on this is split in half:

On the one hand selfishness and selfnessness are one and the same, because they are both in relation to "I" and the "others". When in truth there is no "I", because we all are just a bunch of matter put together (in fact, we are just energy, because of E=mc^2), which makes these two words be one and the same. 

On the other hand arrogance, anger and selfishness are ugly things. Everything that is angry and arrogant is repelling (even if it doesn't look physically ugly). And everything that has kindness and compassion looks better than if it didn't have them.

Moreover, anger, frustration, greed and such are all unwholesome states, meaning that they fade away as soon as you become aware of them. Like, has it ever happened to you that you were upset and your friend asked you to lower your voice, and then you became aware of it and you weren't angry anymore even if it was just for a moment? Instead, compassion, kindness, generosity and such are wholesome states and don't disappear when you become aware of them. 

Edited August 23, 2018 by Sbilko

[XYZ]

 

Have you watched this recent video yet? 

 

[XYZ]

@Sbilko

Maybe things like arrogance, anger, frustration, and greed. Are the result of misunderstanding one's own selfishness and being incompletely selfish, believing one is acting in self-interest, while overtly acting in ways that are self-sabotaging.

Fully actualizing one's own selfishness would bring them all the way to the other side, to being selfless.

Not saying I'm necessarily correct, I just want to push the limits of this topic until more clarity is found. I could just contemplate it deeply myself, but then am likely to get stuck in my own head and miss the obvious errors in reasoning others could point out to me.

[Sbilko]

@XYZ

Your reasoning is correct: selfishness pushed to the extreme turns into selflessness, because as one wants to get everything for oneself, thinks only of oneself, and guarantees only oneself's own safety, they realize that they can get for themselves much more (including more safety) if they were selfless and thus gained the favour of the people surrounding them. 

Let's show this with an example: Nazi Germany wanted to rule all of Europe and (almost) achieved it, but didn't last long because they were selfish and wanted themselves to be the only rulers (for 1000 years). Even if they had lasted, they would have turned into something unstable, like Yugoslavia. People don't want to be taxed but not represented into the power holders of the political entity. 

Now let's compare them with the EU: the founding countries (including Germany) agreed to form an union, each sharing a fraction of the total power.

The motives were no longer the same kind of selfish, the sort of "I want to rule all of Europe." Instead, they turned into another sort of selfish: "I want my rightful fraction of power over the EU." You may even consider them selfless: they no longer want to be the sole rulers of Europe; instead, they agree to share that power with the other countries of the EU, and they even would call up their army if some other country attacked any EU country. Their motives are still selfish, though, and they always will be: they do it all thinking about their own safety. Can you see how the border between selfish and selfless starts to become less clear?

We have evolved to have selfishness so as to improve our odds to survive: the more material goods we have, the better are our chances to survive. However, the more we are selfless and thus improve our relationship with the people around us, the better are our odds to survive too. 

This selfish selflessness can be seen even more clearly in this other example: natives of Papua New Guinea used to exchange gifts with members of other tribes near to them. Those other members, in turn, return them the favour. However, both parties have only one objective in mind behind their apparent selflessness, and it is a selfish motive: if I give gifts to members of that other tribe and they do the same, then it is less likely for a fight to break out between us and probably kill me. 

There is no selfishness or selflessness, all is one; there is just a tool to seem like the good boy in the eyes of other people, which is deep down us justifying our own actions to ourselves.

The only information needed to correctly understand and use that tool is: killing, stealing, lying and sexual misconduct are seen as something evil by everyone (unless it's used to "punish" a "criminal"); all ancient societies and religions condemned these acts, in order to bring the order and stability which they need in order to function properly. 

Edited August 24, 2018 by Sbilko

[Empty]

No,  they are not, my friend : ).  A jnani does not live for himself. 

[XYZ]

 

On 8/23/2018 at 10:05 PM, XYZ said:

 

 

 

How are a jnani and selfishness similar?