People are getting on each other’s nerves. Not everyone of course. But this pandemic has put a lot of people too close together and a lot of other people too far apart. And it’s making a lot people on either end…well, cranky. The crankiness can really get in the way of caring about others, which then only makes things worse. So how can people take care of themselves without being selfish?
This question reminds me of my trek along The Camino de Santiago in Northern Spain, when my companion on the pilgrimage said one of the nicest things I’ve ever heard, which was, “I like how you take care of yourself and the other person too.”
I thanked him and told him what I had learned about narcissism from the masters on this subject. That is, we are all on a continuum. At one extreme would be exclusive tending to the needs and interests of others. At the other extreme, would be exclusive tending only to the needs and interests of oneself.
Randy, in Scott Turow’s book and movie Presumed Innocent, comes to mind as an example of someone consumed with himself. If I remember correctly, there was a line in the book that went something like: It took everything in him to get through the day just being Randy. So not a whole lot left over for thinking about anyone else.
Most of us are further along than Randy, somewhere in between the two extremes. And depending upon what’s going on internally and externally for us, we can slide back and forth.
We probably slide around within a range, just as a lot people do with their weight, a few pounds this way and that from one day to the next.
The truth is that there were times on our Camino trek when each of us was entirely self-absorbed with our blisters, our fatigue, thirst, hunger, or whatever it was.
So how did we take care of ourselves without being selfish?
The short answer is: By staying alert and aware enough to make sure that we had our hands on the dials. That way we could calibrate and recalibrate what and how we were doing—so we never got stuck at either end. I liked how he took care of himself and the other person too.
Warm wishes,
Madelaine
I think we need to both recognize and act on this idea: self care is not selfish. We mistake one for the other. In the absence of self care, we can’t care for others. Another point: the Pandemic has frozen us in a sense; we are disconnected and lacking touch. One cure: get our empathy engines going. That’s because caring for others is beneficial to helping oneself. Ah— a circle!
Ah yes, good point, how right you are, it is a circle. Everything connected to everything else. Other point: there was a study on pets and their owners. Oxytocin levels found to be impacted by dogs and owners gazing into each other’s eyes. Not kidding. Mentioned to a friend once who she said that dogs don’t make eye contact. Mine does!
Existentialists posited human consciousness defined as pure being-for-itself set against all else that is being-in-itself. In this philosophical tradition argument, being-for-others is seen as a burden of being-for-itself. Although trying to achieve distance from limitations and ambiguities flowing from the subject-object dichotomy, ironically what emerges is arguably a still ruggedly individualistic and “self-centered” stance. This was famously captured by Jean-Paul Sartre in his book Nausea with the disclosure (assertion? revelation? conclusion?) that “Hell is other people.” I am touched by the observation of your admiring companion on the Camino de Santiago when he commented, “I like how you take care of yourself, and the other person, too.” Reconciliation need not be impossible, and complementary is perhaps a choice.
Actually, glad you brought up Sartre. I did a little digging once and found an interpretation suggesting that other people are hell, not because of what’s wrong with them, but rather because what we can see through their eyes is wrong with us. I put this in my book. The other quote that you will know and like is, Kahneman’s, “We all care intensely for the narrative of our own life and very much want it to be a good story, with a decent hero. Becker like, isn’t it Dr, N.