Selfishness

"Selfishness must always be forgiven you know, because there is no hope of a cure." - Jane Austen

Yesterday's quote of the day inspired me to write a little something about a trait in people I am constantly analyzing. I looked it up and I guess its a quote from her novel Mansfield Park. The only book I've read from Jane Austen is Pride and Prejudice, so I'm not quite sure exactly why she wrote it or how she really feels about selfish people. Obviously from the quote though, selfishness is constant and unchanging.

It is a theory of mine that the human race is motivated wholly by self interest - the view of a cynic. While it may appear that some folks are selfless, their actions in some way or another are going to benefit them. It is only human to be selfish, it's in our nature. It may be considered a selfless act to help someone in need, but how I see it is this: either they are helping someone else to make themselves look good, or to make them satisfied emotionally. Either way, they themselves are going to benefit. It's also human nature to be compassionate - though not everyone carries this trait. An example would be like the one I just described, or a simple as a mothers unending worry about her offspring. It's part of the reason the human race is so productive.

I suppose this is also a semantics issue. A stigma has been attached to the word selfish. When one person tells another person that they are selfish, what they are really saying is that the person is not compassionate, or respectful.

I have no problem admitting that I am a selfish, egocentric being. I am, and always will be the most important person in my life. A couple sentences into this blog, I looked up and saw an empty milk carton on the counter, next to my trash. Most people I know don't recycle. So I'm sitting here thinking, if all of my actions are really motivated by self-interest alone, why do I recycle? Nobody sees that I recycle, I don't get any money back from doing so, why do I do it? This is the point where I introduced compassion. I think most people have some sort of degree of compassion. Compassion, although beneficial for others, is just another way to make oneself feel better. And that's fine.