(January 18, 2012 at 7:04 am)Pel Wrote: I was wondering. Is everything we do, even good brave deeds self serving. Like I am thinking about good things we do, even those where it seems like we are geting nothing in return. Like giving money to a person that is beging, like someone in a wheelchair who you might never see again.
Is even that in a way self serving? It makes you feel good about yourself if you are a non believer. If you are a believer than you either score points with God or you end up good wich leads to peace in next life. I suppose those things depend on what you believe.
At wich point are shure that you are good enough and all you do is maintain good because that's what you have become. At wich point are you certain that all you are doing is because you don't want nothing in return because you already have what you want?
I think that it takes a lot of work on arriving at that point and once you are there you still can't rest but you know that you have either come close to or have fully disolved your ego.
Thanks
I'm not sure how to answer this. I don't consider many things that appear to be self-serving to be actually self-serving. For example, simply "makes you feel good" is not enough to make an action self-serving. Drugs make you feel good, but if you take them you certainly aren't doing yourself any favors.
Similarly, I'm not sure that an actions such as "sacrificing something for someone else for nothing in return" can or should count as self-serving, no matter how good they make you feel.
However, that is not the main point of your question. Your question is "Can we truly be good if we can never give up our self-interest?"
And my answer to that is - the question is wrong. The assumption you are making here is being self-serving is evil and it is only when an action does not benefit you at all, either in matter or in spirit, can it be called purely good. That assumption is wrong. And not just wrong, it is evil because any attempt to practice it on this earth would make your life unlivable.
