Why are so many people in the world in the mode of service-to-self? Take-take-take vs. Give-give-receive? Actually I know why, it is known as 'the tragedy of the commons' or 'the prisoners dilemma'... So my question really is... Why do humans allow themselves to fall into these traps? Are we collectively that stupid? If so, are we doomed? Do you think this will always be the case for us? Was it always going to be this way? Because let's face it... If everyone is in the mode of service-to-self, we each have 1 person looking out for us, ourselves. If everyone is in the mode of service-to-others, we each have what like, 8 billion people looking out for us potentially? Not to mention the ability to create sustainable and mutually beneficial systems.
This is a competitive, capitalistic society.. at least here in the US. Everything from sports to school pushes you to be better than the next person, so why should we be surprised when what we get is egoic, self - serving individuals. But truth be told, it is getting so bad that alot of people don't even want help. I've tried to offer my help to people time and time again but they view me as competition and they would rather do it themselves and get better than me on their own. It is what is.
Yes youll find that attitude in most big cities... I stay where the grass is greener and plentiful. Imagine when it isnt plentiful, where and what will all those big city people do? If you ask me people will start helping people when they realize they need help themselves. They'll see the forward momentum then. If only it was help from the heart eh? Who knows maybe itll turn into that. Struggle and struggle can form bonds
What we really actually want is love, community, feeling wanted/important. So, we've skewed these natural desires to become increasingly self absorbed. Kind of a natural course for what is to come, I believe.
This mentality is engrained in most of us, at least in the U.S. from childhood. I dont know if its deliberate social engineering or a natural outworking of evolution. Certainly it our society there is a component of social engineering. It is up to the parents to raise their children to be the best human beings they can be, but with our busy lifestyles i dont think people put as much time into it. My mom used to volunteer me and my brothers to do things like play bingo with the old folks, clean up trash around town etc. I dont have kids and wont have kids, even at 27 i dont think id be ready anyway. At the pace of society and technological advancements i dont think its all that easy. The world that my parents grew up in is vastly different that what i grew up in or the current generation is growing up in.
Service to self is non-recognition of our self. Service to others is understanding the way and the natural result of understanding the self.
What do you mean here? The selfish compulsion ignores the idea that we are in fact one organism so being selfish harms the whole which in turn harms the individual parts of the whole?
That's it essentially. Once the ego is dissolved in all of humanity you will see a natural harmony in which all components exist in synergistic unity. If we have self interest, that self is an illusion in the first place, we don't recognize the spring of these desires that arise from this conception of self, thus we live our life in ignorance and don't understand what we do and what impact it has. One who has not truly understood the self, cannot understand the all, and cannot understand the true nature of the self as being the all. Thus we seed disharmony in this world as we don't recognize our self in others.
lmao it's a safflower plant. It's supposed to symbolize impermanence as the safflower has a wonderful colour but the colour fades. O self-willed manmukh, devoid of the Naam, do not be misled upon beholding the color of the safflower. Its color lasts for only a few days-it is worthless! Attached to duality, the foolish, blind and stupid people waste away and die. Like worms, they live in manure, and in it, they die over and over again. O Nanak, those who are attuned to the Naam are dyed in the color of truth; they take on the intuitive peace and poise of the Guru. The color of devotional worship does not fade away; they remain intuitively absorbed in the Lord. ||2||
I think he means the equivalent of helping others beside you is the understanding of who we are in terms of 'one'
i couldnt tell in the iphone app, anyway. Nice pie. We think alike. I dont look so deep in the forest as it seems you do though, its all here right in front of me. Youve got that whole entire explanation on point though. I couldnt possibly explain it as well as you can lol.
Thats essentially what i was getting at. The thought of self as a disconnected entity is an illusion. " When we speak of man, we have a conception of humanity as a whole , and before applying scientific methods to the investigation of his movement we must accept this as a physical fact. But can anyone doubt to-day that all the millions of individuals and all the innumerable types and characters constitute an entity, a unit? Though free to think and act, we are held together, like the stars in the firmament, with ties inseparable. These ties cannot be seen, but we can feel them. I cut myself in the finger, and it pains me: this finger is a part of me. I see a friend hurt, and it hurts me, too: my friend and I are one. And now I see stricken down an enemy, a lump of matter which, of all the lumps of matter in the universe, I care least for, and it still grieves me. Does this not prove that each of us is only part of a whole? For ages this idea has been proclaimed in the consummately wise teachings of religion, probably not alone as a means of insuring peace and harmony among men, but as a deeply founded truth. The Buddhist expresses it in one way, the Christian in another, but both say the same: We are all one. Metaphysical proofs are, however, not the only ones which we are able to bring forth in support of this idea. Science, too, recognizes this connectedness of separate individuals, though not quite in the same sense as it admits that the suns, planets, and moons of a constellation are one body, and there can be no doubt that it will be experimentally confirmed in times to come, when our means and methods for investigating psychical and other states and phenomena shall have been brought to great perfection. Still more: this one human being lives on and on. The individual is ephemeral, races and nations come and pass away, but man remains. Therein lies the profound difference between the individual and the whole." Nikola Tesla
I see... the ego does have a way of negatively projecting itself onto the environment. I feel the more I view my environment negatively the more I being to look at my life as a whole negatively, because the two are one in the same. If you hate everything and everyone around you, you will soon began to hate your own self, in a sense.