Do not be akin to self-satisfaction (being smug at the cost of others)

It should never be your goal

No matter how much you get things to work for yourself, you want to make more. This is growth which has no end to it. Partly I feel why not grow when your pursuit is noble, for a cause conducive to your kind of life, your life. And self-satisfaction according to me is a barrier to actually grow, to overcome discomfort. Here’s how:

Self-satisfaction hampers satisfaction. I suggest, it should not be the driving force for us to achieve anything. A human’s want expands if he is on the path of growth and also there is no end to nobility. We cannot become the most self-satisfied spiritual beings or the most self-satisfied entrepreneur who does not need anything but self-satisfaction. Keeping the way things are as it is for substantial number of years may knock you down by external forces if you do not think of an innovation or change your style. Self-satisfaction is a continuous process, it is goal dependent. If one goal is reached, another is ready. I have to double check each time to feel satisfied with my work. If I am self-satisfied, my self-expression through writing would be limited but if I have faced adverse or rich and mind-boggling events, I shall be more clear in providing solutions.

So self-satisfaction is something like death. There are many spiritual lessons that say one should be self-satisfied, but practically its not possible. You keep going deeper in the quest for spirituality challenging yourself for a bit more difficulty until you are little more ahead towards self-satisfaction and when there is a disturbance in your path, you lose your cool, all spirituality put aside, and you become unbalanced in seeking the wrong goal, self-satisfaction. This virtue is a vice. It is an addiction.

“Maniac is someone who does a lot, wants a lot of money, love, lust, more freedom from responsibility, and self-satisfaction.”

Just ponder over,

1. The root cause of uneasiness is that you want to satisfy yourself no matter what. The day you do not get clapped for or followed, you become less satisfied. This is vulnerability, double check this vice. It’s not why you should become uneasy.
2. Reality is difficult to digest. There are billions of beings with different goals, no one is out there to satisfy you or help you become self-satisfied, we as individuals are against those billions if we put ourselves first. If a goal is self-satisfaction then it’s never achievable unless you shut your doors to the world and internalize deep. Even that doesn’t help you to become satisfied. We are here because of others. This attitude of gratefulness will help and not self-satisfaction. True satiety, fruition, accomplishment happens when you also keep other people in perspective. This joy of gratefulness is more important than self-satisfaction. Become sacrificial and then you see that your success will know no boundaries.
3. It is OK to be never finished, never complete because the quest for self-satisfaction creates even more incompleteness within. This virtue is a bias, a myth.

There is always someone better, more intelligent, more happening, and more competent. The moment you meet a developed being (your judgment), you feel wounded in envy. You want to become better than them, learn from them, and then you meet yet another soul, whom you want to be better than…reason, you want to satisfy yourself. Some of you resort to unfair means to pass exams, capture a position or become opportunists. This is false gratification, a false joy.

We try to become better in the eyes of others, which is only our perception, without really working towards building our skill, momentum, plans. We can feel self-satisfied even with falsehood, unfair means or acting against our values most of the time. Layers of dissatisfaction are generated this way only to satisfy ourselves.

“ Get to gain knowledge, and that’s it. Get the work done, and that’s it. Enjoy, that’s it.”

And not,

“ Get to gain knowledge to attain self-satisfaction. Get the work done until self-satisfied. Enjoy until you are self-satisfied.”

We are trying to attain satiety, that actually never exists. There is no comfort because our goal is wrongly, self-satisfaction. So, buy both comfort and discomfort as ideally as possible, to grow your skill that brings joy to you and your people who saw you working hard. Upgrade yourself daily. Understand that no person is complete, there is always something left till death. Still, we are close to complete if we die. This is the irony of life, change your outlook, things seem new and better than before.

Never think that joy and comfort will satisfy you rather, neither love and affection. It is OK to live dissatisfied, let self-satisfaction not become your foremost agenda. Be at peace with dissatisfaction and keep going. While performing yoga, you are dissatisfied with your performance but there is no end to flexibility. There is no end to productivity.

When self-satisfaction is not your goal, satiety arrives. Then you do not compare with others. Peace and joy decorates your life, joy reaches your soul and you feel good and that’s it. Carry forward, we need to do things lined up, we embrace that kind of work with enthusiasm and right intentions. Peace and joy indeed.