So much of the quality of our lives is based on truth and selflessness. Imagine what the love of a partner or family member becomes on a diet of lies and selfishness? What about a government based on personal goals rather than representation and the needs of the governed? How about a healthcare industry based on profit rather than healing? In the current era, most of us seemingly face our own versions of professional or personal relationships filled with doubts and mistrust.
On the flip side—imagine a world flourishing in the agreement between everyone’s words and their actions. A place where the best we get comes from what we give.
All ethics move us up the continuum from being selfish to becoming selfless. After all, what ethics are involved in a life alone on a desert island?
Ethics are about how far we want to reach out to those around us. Without empathy, ethics are impossible.
Selfish or selfless? The amygdala’s role
To answer the debate about our true human nature, selfish or selfless, there are robust studies about our capacity for selflessness. While many people believe human nature is selfish, we’re actually genetically programmed for our advance from selfish infants demanding everything ‘me’ (feed me, change me, burp me, pick me up, put me down, soothe me) to adults who recognize, far beyond ourselves, that a better life for others means a better life for us. In essence, we naturally grow into more selfless beings. How?
Not to get too technical, physically, the amygdala (found within the human brain) advances this. The amygdala is a complex set of cells nestled in the middle of the brain that processes our emotions, from fear to pleasure. It helps regulate our emotions as well.
Turns out, the amygdalae of highly altruistic people are larger and more active than those of selfish people. As we become more selfless, the amygdala grows in function and in size, adding to our compassion and empathy.
In essence, as we do more selfless acts, that part of our brain that empowers us to be more selfless grows and becomes more active. For example, the amygdalae of a group of 200 people who’d donated their kidneys to complete strangers were found to be 8 percent bigger than those of the same number of non-donators.
Selflessness has a positive effect on our physical health and mental health. But how do we grow selflessness? We climb the moral ladder!
Let’s start exercising those amygdalae now. Here are three methods for better living, via a more selfless, ethical life.
Repeat this affirmation every day
Make the affirmation every morning that “there is no right way to do the wrong thing.” Better ethics are needed now, more than ever. That mantra—there’s no right way to do the wrong thing—is a life-essential. We bump up against those words constantly. If you repeat that mantra every day and work to imbue it in your actions, it’ll begin to change the quality of your life. So, too, will it act to change the quality of others’ lives.
Climb the moral ladder
Think of making your ethical choices, large and small, from the three steps of a moral ladder. Every ethical choice you’ve ever made, or ever will make, is wittingly or unwittingly made at one of these steps. Each higher step ensures a better ethical choice.
The first step: The outcome of the ethical choice is about you. You want to gain a reward or avoid a punishment or loss.
The second step: The outcome of your ethical choice is about you and the people you care about—your family, your friends, your organization, your church, your community and so on. At this moral level, if they gain, you gain and vice versa.
The third step: The outcome of your choice is about everyone who might be affected by it. Now, this is the highest moral step of the ladder. By their very nature, actions taken from this step are about others—sometimes, entirely about others.
If you think about which step you’ll choose to support your choices, and embrace the climb to higher moral grounds, your ethics will forever change. You’ll also see a difference in those around you.
Respond, don’t react
Oh, how people can push our hot buttons—especially our loved ones. Reacting first is what gets us in trouble. Would you rather be right or be kind? Ethics argue for the latter—be kind. So, it’s far better to take a bit of time and respond thoughtfully, instead of reacting emotionally. You’ll thank yourself later!
We have two choices
The truth is, we have only two choices about climbing the moral ladder. We can stay on the lower rungs, believing in our current situational ethics and thinking that being treated fairly by others who demonstrate honesty and integrity is a luck of the draw. Or, we can believe we have the capacity to create a world that operates on the same truths practiced by everyone, for everyone. A world where ethical choices are those that build trust and trustworthiness.
Each of us has the power to reclaim an ethical world, one choice at a time. In which world do you want to live?
«VERWANDTES LESEN» Wachsamkeit, Mitgefühl, Fürsorge und Ethik: Was wir von unseren politischen Führern brauchen"
bild: Pixabay
