What would you sacrifice to change your life or the world for the better?

in #philosophy6 years ago (edited)

There are choices we must make in life in order to accomplish a goal or objective. If we want something enough, we have to do what is required to obtain it. We may need to choose between two or more things and pick one, because we can't have it all, and certainly not at the same time.


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There are short-term desires, and long-term desires. We often choose to go with the short-term immediate gratification, rather than sacrifice for the long-term greater benefit. It can seam like we suffer in the short-term by not getting what we want, like it's a pain to be without obtaining the thing we desire.

We may need to endure some sacrifice, suffering and pain to get better things in life. There is the saying that good things come to those who wait. If we want to obtain greater freedom, independence, prosperity, health, or knowledge, it may require sacrificing things today or in the short-term that we want in order to reap the benefits of those greater things tomorrow.

What are we willing to sacrifice? Are we willing to do what must be done to obtain those long-term benefits? Or do we just want to keep doing things that prevent us from actualizing those goals?

We don't have infinite time. Time is limited. If we don't work on the things we want in the long-term, then we keep putting them off and they likely won't happen. If we want something to happen, we need to invest time, energy, effort, dedication, determination and persistence to make it happen.

Is the pleasure of watching TV not something you're willing to sacrifice to put your time to something more important and beneficial in your life? Is Facebook that much more important that reaching for the more important goal you want to achieve? TV and Facebook take time away from doing something else, like studying for school, or to look for a job you really want.

To actualize more of what we know is better for us, we must be willing to sacrifice what we are now, for what we can become. The instant gratification is strong, and little happen instantly or overnight when we have to work on it to make it happen. But we can choose to take the steps required to achieve out goals.


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We can conquer short-term pain to achieve long-term gain. Our lives can be more fulfilled after a struggle, with a great sense of accomplishment for what we have made happen. We often work hard to get by in life, a job takes up a lot of are time. Day after day we work at a job. And day after day we spend our time on relief from the grind.

We like to go have fun, to enjoy ourselves, and spend our time doing tings that give us pleasure. We want pleasure, gratification, fun, enjoyment, so we spend time and pay attention on that. We go in circles doing the same thing in our effort to achieve immediate, in the "now", short-term pleasure gains.

If we don't get out pleasure fix, then we feel like we suffer, like we are in pain, like we are sacrificing our lives. Pleasure seeking and short-term gratification is ruling us, keeping us from actualizing greater things in our lives. When we choose to put pleasure seeking, fun, partying, enjoyment, happiness, as the pursuit of life, we go nowhere really, we just go in circles. Nothing actually gets done. It's all to feed our desires for pleasure and gratification. Pleasure is a part of life, not the purpose. Happiness is part of life, not the purpose.

Is going around in circles a worthy goal? Is letting others choose where we're headed a worthy goal? We can get out of the cyclical trap we have ourselves in from focusing only on the pleasure, happiness or enjoyment we can derive for ourselves of those around us.


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By putting our time, attention, focus and energy into immediately gratifying activities, we are not table to put our time, attention, focus and energy into actualizing long-term goals that can provide us with greater opportunities, quality living or change for the better.

If we want more meaning, value and change for the we have to trade short-term pleasure to instead get what we perceive as a lack of it as short-term pain and sacrifice in order to get long-term gains. Short-term pain must be tolerated when we're working towards long-term objectives that will give us what we want more.

We have to decide what matters more, truly. Time is limited. Weighing the pain or pleasure we get out of doing something in the present "now" can keep us trapped, going in circles, not actualizing or realizing greater change for ourselves, or for ourselves and others on this planet.


Made by @krnel

Think of all the issues you might be aware of in the world. We're all being affected by things going on that we aren't doing ourselves, that we don't have individual personal control over. Others are doing things, yet we are affected. To get things to change on a large scale, more people need to be on the same page of awareness about it in the first place before acting to change can even happen.

If we want to make the world a better place, we can do it. We just can't do it all alone, because we aren't a "god" that can control reality and others. That doesn't mean we don't have any degree of control whatsoever to influence or bring about change for the better in our own or other's lives. We have to influence and cooperate with others to make a shift in the way the world works. this takes hard work, time, energy, attention and focus.

We need to choose if we want to do this hard greater work to make things better for ourselves and the world. Or if we want to just focus on our own personal lives alone. To just let things be completely out of our control without us influencing and attempting to change things for the better. Do we not really want things to get better? Do we just want to let others in power continue to decide where we and others are headed into the future on this planet? Or do we want to take back the power and try to do something about it?

We need to sacrifice the immediate, short-term pleasure and gain in our personal lives if we want to work towards making things better for ourselves and everyone else. This means our individual wants, whims and desires have to often go second to the higher purpose, meaning and value to achieve something greater for us and others at a universal level.


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If we want to make things change, we need to gain an awareness of the problem, as so too do others. We need the knowledge of the problem (who, what, where, when), and we need to understand the problem at a root causal level, why it has come into existence. Then we can act to change how we live and how the world works.

It takes greater awareness, higher awareness, together. To do this, we need to become more devoted to the pursuit and delivery of truth. This is how we can change, and how we can influence others and the world to change by the same process we undergo. If everyone scarified time, attention and energy to and for truth more (to seek and serve truth), and didn't sacrifice truth (sacrifice seeking or serving truth) for more time, attention and energy spent on personal whims of pleasure gratification or enjoyment, then in one generation the whole world would be different. This is the potential for change we can be involved in actualizing.

We have to choose what matters more, what is really primary: our personal pleasure and gratification in our little bubbles of easy, pleasurable, comfortable living, as we go in circles with nothing really changing for the better? Or to sacrifice a little in order to achieve something greater for ourselves and others in the long-term?


Thank you for your time and attention. Peace.


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Love this x 10000.
These are things I ponder on almost daily.
Your writing is so beautiful btw!

But man so much truth and wisdom in what you wrote.
In this instant world we live today when everything is being a click away, developing self-control is an essential skill to counter this problem.
It's a constant battle between our emotional mind vs our rational mind, as deep down, we know we should sacrifice the short-term pleasure for the long-term gains, yet too often, we find ourselves not able to do so.
And so we eat the oreo cake and end up not losing weight:P

It's a constant struggle, but there are ways to make it work:)

I read an amazing book on the topic called: The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It

I don't know if you ever heard of it, but it's life changing:)
took a lot of notes on it:)

Keep it up.
Love your mindset so much xxx

Thank you :) I'm glad you gained value from the work :)

Life is a struggle, we need to overcome by going through to the truth. Thanks for the book recommendation.

Good post, although not necessarily agreeing with you
(but I do... but I don't.. but I do).
😂

Pursuing the truth in life doesn't have to mean exclude 'living in the moment, though..

From a personal perspective, I have lived a very 'hedonistic' lifestyle, and while that may have meant possibly less time in 'searching for truth', it is by no means at the expense of living truth.

From my own personal viewpoint, it could also be argued that is is the 'never living in the moment' that's it a big contributor to many of the negative aspect of the world as we know it today, and that has caused 90% of the world ill's.
With planing ahead...comes control.

...on a more (slightly flippant note), I have seen many of my peers grow old, planning ahead, and always putting 'the now' off, for this elusive future.. and never living for today..

It would be shame let this fantastic gift of life pass you by just because your eye is always somewhere else, and never in the present...

We all end up in the same place.

Another good post sir!

I mean it more in terms of a focus on that. It's a whole mantra now, be in the moment, enjoy life, positivity, etc. It distracts from going into the shit and mud to figure things out. I also don't mean planning ahead as in focusing on getting X before doing Y in a persona life setting and avoiding doing things and putting them off... ;)

It distracts from going into the shit and mud to figure things out.

I agree with you there, hence the 'but I do... but I don't.. but I do'.

Saying that I do wonder sometimes if all roads lead, not only to the same destination - but if we are always on the same road, somehow, just with different scenery. (such a poor illustration).

I'll try again...

I jumped out of academia at 17. Made my own way, lived my hedonistic life for 3 decades, before 'red pilling' (for want of a better word) My life events brought me to this place.

IF I had chose other routes - whatever they were, academic, professional, blah,blah...
I think arriving at 'red pill station', would have been around the same time.....
...if you see what mean..

...there, that's much better! lol

Even Steem is looking down and throwing everyone under the bus for short term gains. Why are the whales exploiting the system for pennies when they could be banding together and making everyone richer?

It only takes one bad actor for everyone to jump off of the idealist train. Still, I maintain hope for the future. Perhaps I'll sacrifice playing these video games and actually learn JS, Node.JS, and Chrome Extensions.

Yes, give up the games... what a time drain :/

Pleasure is not purpose, our purpose should be producing value to our life and value to life of others. It's easy to fall for the things which we can get easily but which you received easily that will be taken away easily but the thing which you earned through long term hard and sacrifices will stay for long term.

Sacrificing is not difficult, it's just an discipline which we have to implement in our life to get away from those things which are wasting our energy and time and stopping us to find our true purpose.

Most of us try to stay in comfort zone and never try something which can bring change in life. Change will come when you change your actions, when you change your routine and when you change your vision towards life.

So to find the self growth and true growth of people around us, we have to work hard towards the self awareness and we have to spread the awareness because we are wasting our time not because we want to, we are wasting our time because we are forced to waste our time through manipulation, increase in materialistic attraction and lack of truth, and few people take all interest behind the scenes.

Thanks for sharing this post with us and wishing you an great day. Stay blessed. 🙂

Yeah, sacrifice the comfort of wasting time and energy on things that don't serve us for the better in the long run ;)

I think what I'll be the most willing to sacrifice is comfort. Think about it. Everyone wants a comfortable life (besides of an adventurous one) but the same people who want comfort, complain about things not changing.

They expect everyone else to get off their butts and work together to save the world WHILE they're sitting on the couch themselves and judging others for the work they're doing.

Yeah, comfort keeps us wanting to maintain things as they are :/

true, we need to make sacrifices for things to get better. That's why I've "sacrificed" eating animal products. And although it seemed like a sacrifice at first, I don't feel it like that anymore. It was just short term pleasure as you say, but we can live perfectly fine without it. I would also say that I could sacrifice most material things like buying new clothing to fight consumerism, and also some of my comfort. I could live without a car to pollute less and use my bike instead. My husband may not agree with giving up the car though =)

Nothing will benefit human health and increase chances of survival for life on earth as much as the evolution of a vegetarian diet.
---- Albert Einstein

Sometimes we live too far away and can't use a bike or public transpo ;) But we can make the changes we can, and we can all stop eating meat to live healthy lives in our current time of abundance

I think I will wrote on this later but as I see it, the willingness to sacrifice and what is able to be sacrificed has decreased remarkably over the last decades.

It's a numbers game. The system is rigged against us. It's all part of the plan to divide and conquer. Keep people looking down so they don't have the chance to see what's going on around them. Did you see what happened on the Bachelorette last night?

It is a choice to turn on the TV, it is a choice to use it as a babysitter. Yes, it may be compelling but, it is a choice. People are more than willing to make the choice to be entertained than the choice to work. People choose to look down and then find the world is not what they want when they finally raise their heads, so they look down again. Avoidance.

A person has a choice. Controlling the population is a science based on statistics. A few outliers here or there isn't going to change anything on the macro level. People are predictable en masse. There is no choice. A grain of sand cannot stand against a tidal wave.

Leaders lead and followers follow. There's a reason why the Holocaust happened and it doesn't involve Germans being evil.

Perhaps the obvious conclusion is that we need better leaders on the "right" side of history. It's too bad they all end up dead.

The statistics only work because people will predictably choose to follow the herd. Society is made up of unique individuals who decide to do what others do because it makes them feel safe, protects them, helps them feel accepted. We all have choices at this level.

Sacrifice the illusion of safety.

You must be very disciplined. That was never my strong suit:/ I think what I sacrificed was my ambition...but I have no regrets (yet anyway).

LOL, sacrificed your ambition. I don't have one like others for career and what not, I'm ambitious to try to change things through understand ourselves ;)

our work and goals are more important than
our personal pleasures so the thing which is to
sacrifice is our personal pleasure, tv and facebook .I believe on hard work
to change the world and to achieve the goal.

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