03/25/2025
Martin Luther says “our nature is so deeply curved in on itself that it wickedly, curvedly and viciously seeks to use all things even God for its own sake”.
According to my mentor, its like having a computer in the heart that analyzes everything and asks the question- what’s in it for me? Everything is seen through the lens of how it benefits your happiness, your glory, your power, your reputation, your comfort, your control of things; how it helps me or fit my interest or how it makes me happy. Here are some examples:
1. You are being a good parent so people can say you are a good parent or you can feel good about being a good parent, especially when your children turn out well.
2. You are being a good child to your parents or a good sibling/relative to your family member under the guise of supporting family but it's to at least feel good about yourself.
3. You are being a good friend, but is also for a self serving motive of supporting a friend as that friend will not get the support if we have to sacrifice something big.
4. You are volunteering at so many places so people can see and say you support a good cause. You also feel great at being a proud supporter of the community or supporter of a good cause- good on the resume.
Self gratification is a burden and is the biggest reason for our misery. It is deep-seated and most times subtle but a burden that begins hell inside a person and will eventually send that person to hell.
It boosts one’s confidence and ego, making such person feel like they matter. And we all want to feel important. That desire to feel like one matters and to be recognized as being important is the driving force behind everything we do, the end point of which is misery.
It ends in misery because each self-centered act leaves a mark on the soul. It becomes a craving that turns to addiction and if not reigned in, like any addiction one needs more and more to be satisfied; constantly trying to get acclaim, approval, be popular, receive compliments. There’s nothing more miserable and enslaving like self-centeredness.
C.S. Lewis describes it, saying “I’m thinking of the mark which any selfish action leaves on that tiny central self which no one sees but which each of us will have to enjoy or endure forever. One man maybe so placed in his life that his anger sheds the blood of thousands, while another is placed so that however angry he gets, he will only be laughed at. But the little mark on the soul is much more the same in both. Each has done something to himself which unless he repents, will make the rage worse each time, each is in the long run doomed, each person is doomed if he will not repent”.
