''Everything in my own immediate experience supports my deepest belief that I am the absolute center of the universe, the realest, most vivid and important person in existence. We rarely think about this sort of natural, basic self-centeredness because it's so socially repulsive. But it's pretty much the same for all of all. It's hardwired into our boards at birth. Think about it: there is no experience you have had that you are not the absolute center of. The world as you experience it is there in front of YOU or behind YOU, to the left or right of YOU, on YOUR TV or YOUR monitor. Other people's thoughts and feelings have to be communicated to you, but your own are so immediate, urgent, real.''-David Foster Wallace, 2005, This Is Water
It is almost impossible to think from a perspective other than that of your own. Every thought, well nearly all of them some how link back to you and your life. Yes we do think about other people but not nearly as frequently, with as much focus and intensity as you do when you think of yourself. Think of doing volunteer work you might think its a purely a self-less act, you might think you do it to please and make others happy and why because making others happy makes you feel good about yourself. Perhaps there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.
We live in a time which glorifies self-indulgent, self-gratification and self-advancement. We think that if we achieve those states we will be happy. But happiness is already within us and we don't need money, fame or material assets to awaken it, all it takes is awareness. The awareness that the true purpose of life is not to accumulate stuff but to contribute other people's lives meaningfully, to contribute meaningfully is to give beyond ourselves that's the life lesson that is here.
xoxoxo
Heart Follower
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