Selfishness

[flamingsword]

Random question: on the Gottman Feelings Wheel, it lists selfish as a feeling. Is it really? I thought selfish was a way of being, and the “I feel selfish” thing is a story people tell themselves as a value judgment about their actions - which is not the same thing. Or is this one more “normal” thing I don’t have?

Comments

[wingedcatgirl]

Hmm. "I just want something for me, for once" is... feeling-ish?

[flamingsword]

See, it’s the -ish that’s getting to me. Also, that you defaulted to a story to describe it is kinda what I mean. “I’m afraid” means you are having the emotion/reaction of fear. “I’m selfish” means that you are describing a state of being over time, and is a value judgment based on relative worth and has connotations of desire vs expectation. It sounds to me like it might be a story, but I don’t know if that is just because I don’t do/have that reaction, and thusly misjudge it.

[princessofgeeks]

Hmm.

When I think about selfish, it's kind of a compendium of feelings -- petulance, self-aggrandizement, that feeling of being puffed up artificially, like a rooster...a bit of jealousy, annoyance.

I guess it's a feeling.

But it's very much also a way of being.

Also I've never thought "normal" was a very good touchstone for judging onesself, honestly...

I read somewhere that when you get right down to it there are only two emotions: love and fear. And definitely selfishness is a very immature kind of response to the fear of not having enough, of being elbowed aside, of self-medicating by wanting ALL THE GOOD STUFF and fearing that someone else is getting MY SHARE and certainly I should have extra just in case.

To me it's a very four-year-old kind of reaction or response. Many of the generous and trusting emotions have to be learned, I have noticed.

Most of what I know about emotions I learned from watching my kids grow up, as I myself grew up in a household were emotions were rigidly controlled and Not Generally Allowed Unless Mom Approved.

ETA: Also I think it's a matter of temperament too. My kids were sweet and kind from a very young age. I was selfish and callous as a child and had to learn to appreciate the people who loved me, which took a long time. I wasn't cruel or sadistic to the level of hurting animals or anything -- nothing that extreme. But I was an extremely selfish and inconsiderate child. My sister got the brunt of it.

[flamingsword]

If you grew up in an Emotion Disapproving home, then you were taught that callous disregard for the feelings of others. It was modeled directly to you, and you probably internalized it before you could talk. A lot of people whose emotional needs don’t get met in early life are very resource insecure, and they have to unlearn the bullshit and shame they were raised with and stop projecting that competition and insecurity onto others as adults. I know I did.

But I never had the story in my head that I deserved anything more than what was fair, even if I had a warped view of what fairness encompassed. Since my mom tried to split material resources scrupulously fairly, I was never modeled “selfishness” as a way of being when I was young, so I never internalized it as a desirable thing.

Hmm. This may be a nature or nurture question.

[princessofgeeks]

I think it's a very complex question for sure.

My sister, who grew up in the same environment, has a totally different personality/temperament than I do and her response was to be unselfish and self effacing to a fault. She never put her emotions on ice like I did, either, and would fight with mom about it when mom invaded her autonomy or tried to tell her what to feel.

Somehow before I could talk I let them tell me what to feel and how to feel it. It took a long time to unlearn that.

The family probably treated me differently than they treated her, too. Chicken/egg -- I have no idea how it all got rolling.