Getting detached from our selfish interests quite
often is not very difficult; regularly creating refined shows of detachment is
difficult. Most of us are not very comfortable with our selfishness, because it
makes us coming face to face with the thief in us. But, our self-image is
important to us. Hence, our refined shows of detachment are essentially meant
for us and not the others.
When
we grow up, our selfishness and our selflessness are more or less evenly
balanced. However, as we are being continually trained by the society to live
with a constant feeling (which may not always be untrue) of being deprived of something
or the other, we learn to retain and maintain much more selfishness in us than
what we can conveniently manage. From this point on, a sophisticated game
begins, whereby we try to convince us (and the others) that we do more for the others
than what they do for us. There also are people who have much more than what
the others have, but who imagine themselves to be more deprived than the others.
Such people even cook up imaginary stories about the harm caused to them by
others.
Only
those who do not live with a constant fear of being deprived can be found more
often to be in a ‘natural’ state of detachment. Such people contribute more to
their surroundings than what they receive from it; and their contributions are
real. They are free from the compulsion of having to convince themselves
through their refined, but somewhat farcical shows of selflessness that they
are not selfish.
Selfishness
and greed are not related to what one does not have, but is related to one’s
perception of having less than the others and the perception of being deprived
of what one is entitled to have. Selflessness and detachment come from the
satisfaction one derives from whatever one has and the lack of imaginary perception
of being deprived of the necessities of life.
The
perception that the man is basically selfish is not backed by the reality.
Perhaps, that is the reason why we often fail in pushing things that are
beneficial for the man.
PROMOD KUMAR SHARMA
[The writer of this blog is also the author of “Mahatma A
Scientist of the Intuitively Obvious” and “In Search of Our Wonderful Words”.]
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