Since the moment we are born, we demand our mother’s attention in a total, exclusive and absolute way. We believe that everything is ours, that our toys are only ours, and that everyone is at our disposal. Our nature as humans is kind of selfish and egocentric. Not always do we wish the best for others.
When we were babies, we didn't like to see our mom hugging our older siblings or other kids. When we started going to kindergarten, we hated to see that our mates had "better" toys than ours. In our first years at school, it didn't amuse us at all to see our friend taking imported candies to school.
"Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish." ~ Richard Dawkins
As we grow up, our generosity increases and our ego starts to get left behind - we start to wish well to others and get excited for the triumph of others. Anyways, we know that this is not 100% true; feelings of pettiness, egoism, and envy still haunt us.
This human and natural feelings leads us to wish/want the worst for the others, rather than the best for ourselves. Instead of feeling pleased and happy for other's accomplishments and successes, we tend to feel miserable and jealous; we are not generous with our feelings.
We don't always get happy when our friend gets a high grade in class, less if it is better than ours. We don't get so excited if our best friend is invited to prom, we're not glad if our friend's diet worked, we're not pleased if our neighboors house was beautifully remodeled, we're not satisfied if our cousin's new company was successful, etc.
"A man is called selfish not for pursuing his own good, but for neglecting his neighbor's." ~ Richard Whately
It is terrible that we live in a world in which human's selfishness is much stronger than human's altruism, and altruism seems like an ilusion. It's hard to acknowledge that many times we are petty, selfish and egocentric. Although it is almost unavoidable to feel a little jealous and miserable for others' sucess, we need to learn to avoid this selfish feelings and replace them with positive wishes for the rest, benevolence, generosity, and sympathy.
"Good character consists of recognizing the selfishness that inheres in each of us and trying to balance it against the altruism to which we should all aspire. It is a difficult balance to strike, but no definition of goodness can be complete without it." ~ Alan Dershowitz
After being part of the Innovation Academy for 11 weeks already I've been able to realize the importance of wishing well to others and I've been able to experience how it feels to actually be happy and pleased for others' success and accomplishements. We, the Innovation class of 2016, have been able to create an amazing culture of excellence in which we all trusted to work on our own and follow our passions, which has lead us to achieving greatness and be passionate for our learning. We are a small group of 16 students and a teacher, and this 11 weeks have allowed us to become very close and get to know each other, all while creating beautiful work together. During the crowd sourcing we've held for the past two weeks or so, we were all able to give and receive feedback from each other and it ended up in very deep and powerful discussions - it seemed like psychology sessions. In this sessions we were able to notice the amount of trust we had constructed and how much we already knew each other. Most importantly, we noticed how much we cared about each other's learning and accomplishments, and all of our feedback demonstrated our high level of interest and our desire for each one of us' improvement. For us, one's success means satisfaction and hapiness for all of us.
When we were babies, we didn't like to see our mom hugging our older siblings or other kids. When we started going to kindergarten, we hated to see that our mates had "better" toys than ours. In our first years at school, it didn't amuse us at all to see our friend taking imported candies to school.
"Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish." ~ Richard Dawkins
As we grow up, our generosity increases and our ego starts to get left behind - we start to wish well to others and get excited for the triumph of others. Anyways, we know that this is not 100% true; feelings of pettiness, egoism, and envy still haunt us.
This human and natural feelings leads us to wish/want the worst for the others, rather than the best for ourselves. Instead of feeling pleased and happy for other's accomplishments and successes, we tend to feel miserable and jealous; we are not generous with our feelings.
We don't always get happy when our friend gets a high grade in class, less if it is better than ours. We don't get so excited if our best friend is invited to prom, we're not glad if our friend's diet worked, we're not pleased if our neighboors house was beautifully remodeled, we're not satisfied if our cousin's new company was successful, etc.
"A man is called selfish not for pursuing his own good, but for neglecting his neighbor's." ~ Richard Whately
It is terrible that we live in a world in which human's selfishness is much stronger than human's altruism, and altruism seems like an ilusion. It's hard to acknowledge that many times we are petty, selfish and egocentric. Although it is almost unavoidable to feel a little jealous and miserable for others' sucess, we need to learn to avoid this selfish feelings and replace them with positive wishes for the rest, benevolence, generosity, and sympathy.
"Good character consists of recognizing the selfishness that inheres in each of us and trying to balance it against the altruism to which we should all aspire. It is a difficult balance to strike, but no definition of goodness can be complete without it." ~ Alan Dershowitz
After being part of the Innovation Academy for 11 weeks already I've been able to realize the importance of wishing well to others and I've been able to experience how it feels to actually be happy and pleased for others' success and accomplishements. We, the Innovation class of 2016, have been able to create an amazing culture of excellence in which we all trusted to work on our own and follow our passions, which has lead us to achieving greatness and be passionate for our learning. We are a small group of 16 students and a teacher, and this 11 weeks have allowed us to become very close and get to know each other, all while creating beautiful work together. During the crowd sourcing we've held for the past two weeks or so, we were all able to give and receive feedback from each other and it ended up in very deep and powerful discussions - it seemed like psychology sessions. In this sessions we were able to notice the amount of trust we had constructed and how much we already knew each other. Most importantly, we noticed how much we cared about each other's learning and accomplishments, and all of our feedback demonstrated our high level of interest and our desire for each one of us' improvement. For us, one's success means satisfaction and hapiness for all of us.