84thlife replied to your post: The more I engage with others, the clearer becomes…
I really disagree where you said a selfless life is impossible and altruism is a lie; all people have bouts of selfishness from time to time but that doesn’t mean they don’t have bouts of selflessness, too. I say we agree to disagree. 🙂
I know where you’re coming from with this, but perhaps my jadedness makes me see things differently. To me, we do things for either one of the following key reasons:
- We desire appreciation
- We desire affirmation
- We desire inclusion
- We desire admiration
- We desire respect
- We desire divine reward
There’s probably one or two more reasons that motivate people to do things for seemingly selfless reasons, but that’s all that comes to mind right now. This is what I was referring to in my original post about some of the motivations being honourable, commendable or noble, because there’s always an expectation of something in return, even if that something is not materialistic or socially quantifiable in this lifetime. Point 6 above is probably the most noble of them all because it seeks recognition from other than man. But it still indicates a desire for personal gain of some sort.
If I haven’t convinced you yet, then I’m happy to agree to disagree. 🙂