There seems to be a lot of conflict when it comes to talking about both selfishness and selflessness. Here is the reality of it though. It doesn’t matter what is being done in the world, it will always be selfish; It is always going to be centered around the self. This will be true up until the point that there is no longer the self, and when this happens, there is ONLY selflessness. It is selflessness because there is no longer anyone there to be selfish, things just happen, there is no longer a doer of things. For example things will happen, but no one making them happen. There will be feeding of the poor but the receiving of food and the giving of food is happening by this same phenomenon. It is all encompassing.
However this is how it is only selfishness, when someone believes that they are being benevolent or charitable. The main thing to be aware of is that there is still the thought that “I am doing this to feel this way, gain this inner or outer status, or satisfaction.” This will always be the case as long as the ego and thought are seemingly taking control of “this action.” Just because the thought is there claiming the action, doesn’t mean it is doing the action, it just thinks it is. It is selfish because the thought of doing these acts whether it be charitable or regular obviously less refined selfish action re-enforces that there is some kind of separation between this “host of thought” and what the action is going towards.
