What's your intention?

Just a quick post about the conversation I had with my dad last night in the car.

I think I have mentioned about this here before - if people do acts of kindness or do volunteer work to make themselves happy or to feel good, then does it downplay the value of their actions?

People say that they volunteer because it is something that they enjoy, because they want a new experience, because they want to give back to society, because they want to feel a sense of accomplishment. And so you realise, eventually it all boils down to their very own self; what they feel happy doing, what they want to achieve, what makes them feel better about themselves.

While I have always believed that helping people or volunteering should be something altruistic, it is a fact that most, if not many, people do so for other reasons. Myself included, of course. For myself, it makes me feel happy when I can help people. I've been having doubts about myself over this though. In the past I thought that oh, if I feel happy helping people, it means that I like being useful and being able to lighten people's burden right? That's good, and so I tried helping people whenever I can.

But in all honesty, deep inside myself, I have been having this doubt that maybe, just maybe, it could be an issue of ego. If I am able to help someone, it means I am useful, it means that I have done something good, it means that I am a good person...? But of course, in order to (seemingly) make my life better, I simply pushed this guilt back inside my heart each time it creeps out.

Yesterday my dad brought up an important reminder about the importance of one's intentions. It's a simple concept yes, and clearly my intention is to help others because it makes me happy. However, what's more important here would be: WHY does it make me happy? Is it simply because of the fact that I am helping others (i.e. the act itself), or is it really because the people I am helping can truly be happier/have less to worry about (i.e. the result). For the former, the intentions revolve around one's self (even if one may not be aware of it), whereas for the latter, the intentions revolve around others.

Right now, I would say that the ratio for my intentions would be 40-60. It was hard to come to the fact that I am still largely self-centred as much as I thought and hoped I am not, but I guess it's human instincts. Basic survival instincts of living things. On the bright side though, I feel that if it were a few years back, this ratio would have been heavier on the left side. The very day where this ratio becomes 0-100 would be the day I would have succeeded as a person.

Heeeeh. Idk why but I'm in a great mood now haha. Just like how my room has become brighter after opening up my curtain which has been closed for the past week HAHA. (If you get me, that is a metaphor hahaha albeit being a lousy one.) Maybe it's because my thoughts have cleared. Perhaps I should have one-to-one conversations with my dad more often (on the appropriate topics of course since he has some rather extreme views I would say haha). I usually don't really like talking about serious topics with him because he's too long-winded LOL and he can be rather subjective. But yeah I suppose if I am able to just be patient and remain objective myself, having more of such conversations would be beneficial.

Oh well, it seems that this post wasn't a very quick post after all haha! If I am not feeling too lazy I will post about my Aussie trip later today :)