Rational compassion. And Ayn Rand and Organic Intelligence®
Rational compassion. And Ayn Rand and Organic Intelligence. I’m Dr. Bach Ho
You’ve arrived at a friend’s house for poker night. You’ve set aside a bankroll of $1,000
As you’re about to start enjoying, two things happen
First, your girlfriend calls, asking for emotional support
Second, a humanitarian knocks on the door and asks for money to save starving children
What should you do?
Ayn Rand supports pursuing your long-term happiness rationally, which involves using your mind to figure out what values will promote your long-term happiness, pursuing and enjoying them, not sacrificing higher values to your long-term happiness for lesser or non values to your long-term happiness
Playing poker instead of helping your girlfriend or starving children could be rational; helping your girlfriend and/or the starving children could be rational. Whatever serves your long-term happiness; maybe all options do so and you can take your pick
If your feelings of compassion, concern to alleviate suffering, rob you of enjoying life, change
If your acts of compassion are sacrifices, surrenders of higher values to your happiness for the sake of lesser or non values to your happiness, change
Your feelings and actions should benefit, not harm, you
OK, so Ayn Rand says pursue your long-term happiness rationally
Now an idea from Organic Intelligence® is that for some or many people, compassion for others is easier than compassion for themselves. You’re more motivated to cook a warm meal for another than for yourself, to offer emotional support to another than to yourself, to buy things for others than for yourself
In this case, feelings and acts of compassion for others can be used to build compassion for yourself. When you offer someone support, notice if there’s any desire or ability to offer yourself support as well. Nurture this desire and ability over time
Ayn Rand says help others if you want to and don’t regard self-sacrifice as a moral virtue
If you are self-sacrificing and want to move towards self-care, Organic Intelligence says: see if you can start noticing self-concern in your compassion, and build from there
Thank you for reading.
Organic Intelligence® is an approach to capacity growth developed by Steve Hoskinson.
Dr. Bach Ho independently explores and discusses Organic Intelligence®, and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or a representative of the Organic Intelligence® organization.
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