Robert Thurman's Idea Of Selflessness

What truly entails “selflessness”? Is it the complete absence of a sense of self? Or does the word “selflessness” act as an oxymoron; in which there is a better understanding of what our “self” is comprised of. Robert Thurman, along with Azar Nafisi, believes that selflessness is in fact quite the opposite. Robert Thurman is a Buddhist monk who is also a Professor of Indo-Tibetan at Columbia University. In his book Infinite Life, the chapter “Wisdom” speaks about selflessness, and how selflessness is, in fact, enlightening and opens the doors to a more fluid sense of self. Azar Nafisi was once a Professor at the University of Tehran in Iran, after leaving her teaching job she began holding small private classes to discuss Western Literature
Stout shows that the only way to fix this form of selflessness is through a conscious decision made by an individual. Dissociation is when an individual’s mind separates from the physical body, in a way that the individual can be psychologically absent (Stout 426). This idea of dissociation relates to Thurman’s idea of selflessness in that there is no fixed sense of self because the psychological self can become absent, at times for days on end. In a sense individuals who experience dissociation have a fluid self because their self can switch from being either present or absent. However, unlike the happiness and freedom Thurman would expect from the individual’s Stout mentions, there is an overwhelming sense of isolation and depression. This is because of how the individuals formed the selflessness they experience. In the case of Julia, she began dissociating at an early age because her mind developed the reaction to dissociate, or become selfless, because of constant abuse from her parents (Stout 426). Without Julia’s knowledge, she began to develop a fluid self that was carried with her in her adult life. Similarly to Julia, a patient named Seth describes how dissociation feels: “I’m completely alone, more alone than you can imagine” (Stout 434). Why does Seth feel isolation from his selflessness instead of freedom and happiness? It is due to the fact that both Seth and
Thurman shows that the only way to discover selflessness is to “discover their real natures for themselves” (Thurman 443). The importance of a conscious discover of selflessness over experiencing selflessness alone is show in all three authors: Nafisi, Stout, and Thurman. Nafisi’s students experienced the freedom of their own self’s only after they had consciously pursued the search for a fluid self that could be expressive in the class, and obey the laws of the regime outside of the class. Peter Sellers did not feel happiness from the selflessness he experienced because it had been obtained subconsciously through his acting career, not from his own conscious decision. Finally, Julia did not feel freedom nor happiness from the selflessness she obtained subconsciously by dissociating from abuse; in order to embrace her selflessness she would have to consciously choose to discover it through therapy. All three authors show that selflessness is not the key to happiness, but rather it is the conscious decision to pursue the discovery of selflessness that opens the door to freedom and