Selfless Living

by Guy Finley

Question: It's so easy to lapse into complacency. Even when things (inevitably) don't go smoothly, I tend to forget that I want to put God first in my life. My wish just seems to get carried away in this huge wave of events, people, and the thoughts and feelings that comprise my world. How can I help myself wake up more often and remember (even though it may make things more "difficult") what it is that I really want?

Answer: Something has always lived within us that has accomplished every Good we have ever known, but this Presence has been blocked from our understanding by the choked, cloudy vision we have accepted as the substance of our fulfillment. We have been blinded to this exquisite, life-giving Nature through our involvement with what presently comes first in our lives: the selfish thinker and its legion of attending thoughts and images. Some of us, however, have asked for the awakening of a Higher, Finer Nature to occur, a Nature now placed second in our lives. This Nature brings, as Its first act, a quaking in the soil of the selfish nature in which we now live. Dissatisfaction, discontentment and increased inner tension announce the coming of Its New Life through these groundbreaking movements, which the thought-devoted self cannot comprehend. But for those who have truly asked and been heard, the transformation now begins.

This life-transforming action takes place through the essence of our willingness to see the truth about our adopted, selfish nature. As we strive to merge with awareness, it becomes increasingly clearer that this ugly nature has completely disrupted any possibility of communion with Truth. We also come to see that this selfish nature will never share, it will never love, and it will only live to continually conjure images of its greatness. Awareness of this further reveals that "what can't be shared may never be known, and what can't be known will never be understood as having been lost," and that "we will never know what we've lost if we continue to know only 'me' in this moment."

There is another kind of mind within us that becomes aware of this new, emerging Nature and begins to consciously shift to Its Higher World by forsaking the tight, aching life of self-absorption. This awareness that allows us to see and properly, consciously suffer the negativities of the selfish nature will correct and guide our step until understanding within breaks free, and we at last place that which was first (ourselves) as second. We will then gladly serve the vast, unbounded Nature that has literally saved our life by giving us Its Own; freeing us forever from the futile pain of selfish wanting. Its only intention is to offer Its Beauty in place of the painful craving that we have identified with until now. The last has now become the first.

We are meant to take part in this Higher Nature through awareness of the Freedom It continually reveals. We move toward this Freedom through the stages of initially wanting to learn how to share our lives with it. Then, as the truth is more deeply appreciated and understood, we come to see that beauty, and the "me" that experiences that beauty, are both encompassed by the heightened awareness we now enjoy, and we find that we absolutely want to share our lives with This. Finally, we enter Perfect Communion where God is our life.

To help get us started on this Higher Path to true selfless living, following is a short list of unconscious ways in which we are secretly selfish. Study this list and see where the conditions outlined apply to your own present behavior. For extra benefit, make a list of your own!

Ten Secret forms of Selfishness:

1. Being self-enclosed.
2. Dominating (or hiding out in) a conversation.
3. Inflexibility
4. Being impatient
5. Running chronically late
6. Self-loathing or self-pitying
7. Not listening
8. Complaining about anything
9. Gossiping
10. Daydreaming