The Selfishness of “I”

Hope in self leads to disillusion. Is it possible that this is why so many walk around with serious addictions, and although they try everything to break their bad habits, they remain unsuccessful? Is it possible that this is why unhappiness and even suicide are on the rise? Is it possible that this is why so many children and spouses are abandoned?

Because the search for self-happiness takes precedence? Is this why so many of us can never be truly satisfied? Because material pursuits cannot truly bring happiness? Is it possible that focus on the “I” will only cause us pain, will only cause us to say “Ouch!”?

“It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on,” Galatians 5:19-21, The Message.

So is there a cure?

You bet! And it’s a simple one! Instead of looking at ourselves with the “eyes” of the “I”, let’s start focusing on real, unselfish love—the kind that that excludes the disenchanting “I”!

“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself,’” Matthew 22:37-39, NIV.

“Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends,” John 15:12-13, NIV.

Jesus is our guide to real happiness!

“I’m just as happy with little as with much, with much as with little. I’ve found the recipe for being happy whether full or hungry, hands full or hands empty. Whatever I have, wherever I am, I can make it through anything in the One who makes me who I am,” Philippians 4:12-13, The Message.

Happiness can only be found in One, Jesus Christ. And the act of interaction with His beloved creation allows us to access that happiness. Only when we begin to fall heads over heels in love with our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ will this get evened out. My motto has become: “He must increase, but I must decrease,” John 3:30, NKJV.

Too many of us accept Jesus as our Savior, but too few of us accept Him as our Lord and Master as well! No wonder we are headed for so many catastrophes!

As long as I try to satisfy my “I”, I will never be truly satisfied! As long as I try to find my own freedom, I will never be truly free!

Reality is: “So the last will be first, and the first will be last,” Matthew 20:16 NIV; and “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full,” John 10:10 NIV. The “I” interferes far too often, and it is the primary cause of us missing out on real happiness!

“I wonder…”

Here I go again with my “I”!

How do you battle the selfishness of “I”?