I know this from my past. I was wandering through life with a cynical acceptance about everyone else and their motives until I allowed myself the opportunity to become more educated about the world around me. My initial mindset was that people were only out for themselves and those who proclaimed an honorable alliance with improving poverty conditions were only using poverty to improve themselves. Cynical being the operative word here. No one was altruistic. Everyone had an angle to take and not give. I turned to religion to find some new way of thinking about how we should be instead of how I was seeing us. That worked for a time and then I saw those within the church utilizing the same techniques of selfishness that I saw outside the church. Disillusionment was my ever close companion. Then I went back to finishing my higher education and I came to see that there actually were people on this planet who gave of themselves with no expectation of a return. I realized that just because I couldn't see it then, I was wrong to assume that everyone was selfish. I now apply the principle of selflessness as best I can since I am the only one who can make it happen from me. I cannot look at what you are doing and say that is the normal. I must instead do as I know is right and know that that is the normal. Those that continue to act out in selfishness and blame even those who do not of being false are fools doing a fools errand. It is sad to see but I keep reminding myself that I was one of them not that long ago. I need to be who I want everyone else to be.
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