Ensayo

Daniel Lopez
February/21/2012
PHIL/2306/Natividad
Egoism vs. Altruism
Can we define ourselves as an egoist or and altruist person? We usually think that we are an altruist person but how we can notice that it is true or false, how we can tell everybody that we are an altruist person if everybody thinks in different way as we do. A person can be defined as selfish or altruistic or even bothas I define myself, I have found a balance between this two and even if it is not a completely perfect one I believe that a balance is the better option for a person’s wellbeing. First of all we need to define both terms so we can understand what are their meaning and why my decision of defining myself as an intermediate between them. Being selfish is being devoted to caring only for one self,concerned primary on own interests, benefits regardless of what others feel or believe. On the other completely different side being altruist is being concerned on others and their wellbeing, their goals, feelings and essentially everything that surrounds them. So for me defining myself as one of this terms would be hypocrite since what I really am is a little bit of both. I think that is toodifficult to say that we are only altruist or an egoist person. We always do or think in an egoist way even though you think that you are the most unselfish guy or girl in this world. I think that everybody do things because they are going to receive something in return, I do not believe in altruist people who could do just think in everybody else’s life without think a little bit in themselves?
Outparents taught us how to treat others how to act how to be a good person, share all that we have and help people; but they also taught us to fight for what we want, and what we deserve, to expect from others to “treat people as you want to be treated”. This last phrase being the highest combination of altruism and selfishness, “treat people how you want to be treated”, so you treat people right andthink of them but at the same time you are only thinking in yourself? How can I define myself into one or the other since my values and personal way of being is to expect from others what you give them. So the real question here is, are we prepared to share everything without expecting something in return, or do we share everything because we want something in return? We are a balance between anegoist and an altruist person. We are always waiting for something in return, some things that we do for love is for being loved by the other person, but even if we are doing it for the other person or for the right reasons, we are still waiting for something in return. If the entire world would be altruist it would be a good place to live, the perfect one; but is that even possible? To eventhink that everybody could be an altruist person. Like I said before I consider myself as a part of both an egoist and an altruist person, I think that I use to do things because I wanted something in return but every single day I consider myself a little bit more altruist than an egoist person, life has been changing in the past months, which have made me find this balance between this to adjectivesor ways of living.
These months had been really difficult to me, change can be the simple description of what had happened to my life, I have always been an egoist person or that what I believed, I was always think in myself and then in others, but then someone came to my life and made me think differently and created this new me. This person changed the way I used to think, and how I acted in agood way, he told me that I am a good person and I started to believe in his word even though I always have thought that I was the worst person in the world. He gave me everything, talking from love and material things but specially love. Before, I have never believed in love may be because I could it understand it or simply because I had never felt it before, but then he arrived into my life...