Selfishness is easy, Caring is hard

[DrZoidberg]

As I reach further and further into my twenties, soon to be thirties, I'm starting to notice a pattern in the people I've known throughout my life. For one, I've had *a lot* of good friends, but two *almost all of my relationships with people have more or less ended once the relationship stopped being beneficial for one, or both, of us*.

I don't intend to state that in a cynical way, but rather that I'm starting to recognize it as another aspect of human nature. In probabilistic terms, people are most likely to care about something when they get a positive return on that thing. When there's only so much time in the day, and so much energy to be spent on getting by, people and things which offer no positive return are less likely to be given attention or concern.

That sounds pretty intuitive at face, but I was thinking about it today and in the context of the little bit of angst I was feeling over the state of my relationships it was a bit more revelatory. I think in these terms a lot of human relationships, even if intimate, are a lot more impersonal than we realize. The forces at play in drawing two people together might not even be conscious a lot of the time, and then the forces that drive them apart aren't always conscious either.

This type of thinking would also have implications to almost every other moral problem: that is people just don't have the time or energy to give much of a shit about anything.

For me it was really simple. I was in my thirtees when I realised that none of my girlfrends had ever given a shit about me. When I went digging I realised that I didn´t really like myself. That was mostly due to my shit parents. My parents where terrible terrible parents. They have lots of great qualities. But they were not ready for parenthood. Which had an impact on my self image. Once I learned to love myself I started attracting great people into my life. Not just girlfriends. But friends. I started attracting people who were good for me. Not just people who wanted stuff. So now it´s good times.

 

[Bronzeage]

Humans are capable of two distinct kinds of relationships. There maybe more, but most fall into one of two types, with sometimes a good bit of overlap.

The first we learn is the devotional type. This is family, fathers, mothers, siblings, children, miscellaneous others. We remain devoted to them, though life, separation, even death. It need not be a blood relative, as most spousal relationships are devotional, for the most part.

The second is the reciprocal. This is where our friends we know through school, work, and other functions of life fit. It's common to leave school and seldom, if ever, see those people again. When one leaves a job, all those relationship, however strong they once were, fade in importance.

One the primary reasons spousal relationships fail is because the reciprocal element breaks down. There may still be devotional love, but reciprocal needs are very important and often two devoted people cannot continue because the reciprocity is gone.

I don't disagree with you, although I find the word 'devotional' interesting.

- profound dedication; consecration
- earnest attachment to a cause, person, etc

I'd almost want to split devotional into 'devotional' or 'obligatory'. I have family members who are dedicated to me, but definitely not out of earnestness. Maybe at that point you get a bit of a grey area between devotional and reciprocal. A sibling, or cousin, for instance, has an interest in maintaining positive ties with you, but it's contingent on so little that they don't need to put in much effort.

Nothing in life is 100% one thing or the other. Your relationship with your cousins and siblings depends upon your young life together, not the family tree. It's different for a parent, who may feel a strong emotional bond to a child they haven't seen since it was an infant. Sometimes a child will feel the same about a parent they have never met. This has nothing to do with the relationship created when they were young, because there was no relationship.

 

[fromderinside]

Selflessness. Come. Kill me? Easy? Not.

Selfishness. Mine. Really? shoot, knife, beat, otherwise depose one from what she holds dear. Easy. Not even.

Caring. Child is born. Hard? Not really. Attachment sets in. You're mostly programmed for that.

Why mention selflessness? Giving of oneself.

 

[arkirk]

People do care about themselves, and what concerns them personally, relatives, friends, nation, culture, entertainment, income, food on the table, house, car...all the investments in one's mental and physical wellbeing.

Are you implying that their entire psyche is so completely occupied with your list of things they do not have the capacity to care about old friends? I do believe this might be going on within our society, but then we are living in a highly competitive environment full of involuntary relationships. It might not actually be a matter of choosing to relate to those you prefer to relate to, but rather those to whom you feel you must. Example: your boss. You relate to him because you need to make a livelihood for yourself and your dependents. I think caring might be happening anyway, but a person simply may not have the resources (time, money) to fully actualize his feelings for his old friends. So in a way, caring actually becomes harder when one cannot express his caring. It does not necessarily mean it stops. It merely becomes more painful.

 

[DBT]

People do care about themselves, and what concerns them personally, relatives, friends, nation, culture, entertainment, income, food on the table, house, car...all the investments in one's mental and physical wellbeing.

Are you implying that their entire psyche is so completely occupied with your list of things they do not have the capacity to care about old friends?

No, I'm not. Family, friends and any cause or interest that is important to the individual is obviously of concern to that individual. We all have a descending order of things that are important to us. Family, friends, various interests and causes being important to us (to various degrees)...as I mentioned in my post.

 

[fromderinside]

Are you implying that their entire psyche is so completely occupied with your list of things they do not have the capacity to care about old friends?

No, I'm not. Family, friends and any cause or interest that is important to the individual is obviously of concern to that individual. We all have a descending order of things that are important to us. Family, friends, various interests and causes being important to us (to various degrees)...as I mentioned in my post.

As I read it everything after me is noise. One can, if one pleases, discuss its color.