helping others often involves great sacrifice essay

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The power of compassion – how helping others can transform lives.

There is a unique sense of fulfillment that accompanies the act of lending a helping hand to others. In a world that often prioritizes personal success and individual accomplishment, it is crucial to remember the significance of aiding those around us. Whether it is a simple act of kindness or a larger commitment towards a charitable cause, helping others not only enriches their lives but also brings about a sense of purpose and happiness in our own.

Assisting others is an essential aspect of being human; it showcases the values of empathy, kindness, and compassion that connect us all. When we extend our support to others, we create a positive ripple effect that spreads kindness and goodness throughout our communities and beyond. Moreover, helping others allows us to step outside of our own lives and gain perspective on the struggles and challenges that others face. It reminds us that we are all interconnected, and together, we can create a world that is more supportive and understanding.

There are numerous ways in which we can make a difference in the lives of others. It can be as simple as offering a listening ear and providing emotional support to a friend in need, or as significant as dedicating our time and resources to volunteer work. The act of helping others does not require grand gestures; it can be as small as performing random acts of kindness that brighten someone’s day. Whether we choose to assist someone in need or contribute towards a larger social cause, the impact that we make has the power to inspire and motivate others to do the same.

The Importance of Helping Others: Why It Matters

Assisting and supporting individuals in need is an essential aspect of fostering a compassionate community. Offering a helping hand to others manifests empathy, kindness, and generosity. It demonstrates our shared humanity and promotes positive social change. Being of service to others not only benefits those in need but also enriches our own lives through the fulfillment we experience when making a difference.

Helping others allows us to connect on a deeper level with our fellow human beings. It enables us to cultivate meaningful relationships and build a sense of belonging. When we extend a helping hand to someone, we create a bond based on compassion and understanding. By showing care and concern, we become active participants in creating a more supportive and compassionate world.

Furthermore, assisting others can contribute to personal growth and development. Engaging in acts of service enables us to develop essential skills such as empathy, problem-solving, and communication. Through these experiences, we gain a broader perspective on the challenges faced by others and the importance of collaboration in finding solutions.

Supporting others can also have a profound impact on our own well-being. Helping someone in need can boost our self-esteem and enhance our sense of purpose. Knowing that our actions have positively influenced someone’s life can bring us immense joy and satisfaction. Additionally, contributing to the well-being of others can help alleviate feelings of stress and depression, as we shift our focus away from our own concerns and towards the needs of others.

In conclusion, the significance of helping others lies not only in the positive impact it has on individuals in need but also in the transformative effect it has on our own lives. Through acts of service, we can foster connections and build a kinder and more compassionate society. By dedicating our time and resources to help others, we contribute to our own personal growth, happiness, and overall sense of fulfillment. Therefore, it is crucial to prioritize and prioritize acts of kindness and support for others in our daily lives.

The Benefits of Assisting Others for Personal Growth and Happiness

Understanding the profound impact that helping others can have on our own personal growth and happiness is crucial. Assisting those in need not only benefits them, but it also leads to numerous positive outcomes in our own lives. By offering a helping hand, we create an interconnected web of compassion and support that fosters personal growth and a sense of fulfillment.

1. Enhanced Empathy and Understanding: When we engage in acts of kindness towards others, we develop a deeper sense of empathy and understanding. It allows us to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes and see the world from their perspective. This increased understanding helps us become more compassionate individuals and strengthens our interpersonal skills.

2. Stress Reduction: Studies have shown that helping others reduces stress and improves our overall mental well-being. When we focus on the needs of others and engage in selfless acts of kindness, it takes our mind off our own worries and concerns. This shift in focus creates a sense of purpose and fulfillment, leading to reduced stress levels.

3. Expanded Social Connections: Assisting others often involves working with or being in the presence of like-minded individuals who share a similar passion for helping. This presents an opportunity to expand our social connections and create lasting friendships. Being part of a supportive community not only enhances our social well-being but also provides a network of individuals who can offer guidance and support in our own personal growth journey.

4. Boosted Self-Esteem: Helping others has been linked to increased self-esteem and a positive self-perception. When we are able to make a difference in someone’s life, it reaffirms our own capabilities and worth. These positive experiences contribute to a healthier self-image, which is essential for personal growth and overall happiness.

5. Sense of Purpose: Engaging in acts of service gives us a sense of purpose and meaning in our own lives. When we feel like we are making a positive impact on the world around us, it fuels our motivation and drives us to become better individuals. Having a sense of purpose is vital for personal growth and fulfillment.

By recognizing and embracing the benefits of assisting others, we can actively seek opportunities to make a positive impact in the lives of those around us. Through these acts of kindness, we not only contribute to the well-being of others but also foster our own personal growth and happiness.

Ways to Help Others in Your Community and Beyond

There are countless opportunities for individuals to make a positive impact on the lives of others, both within their own communities and beyond. Engaging in acts of generosity and kindness not only benefits those in need, but also fosters a sense of fulfillment and purpose in the giver. By extending a helping hand to others, individuals can create a ripple effect of positivity that spreads far and wide.

One way to help others is by volunteering your time and skills. Many non-profit organizations and community groups rely on the support of volunteers to carry out their important work. Whether it’s serving meals at a local homeless shelter, tutoring children in need, or participating in environmental clean-up projects, there are plenty of opportunities to lend a hand. By dedicating some of your time to these activities, you can directly contribute to improving the lives of others.

In addition to volunteering, another impactful way to help others is by donating to charitable causes. Financial contributions can make a significant difference in the lives of those who are less fortunate. Whether it’s donating to a local food bank, supporting medical research, or funding educational programs, there are numerous organizations that rely on individual donations to continue their important work. By contributing financially, you can help provide resources and support to those who need it most.

Furthermore, another way to help others is by spreading awareness about important social issues. Through the power of communication and information sharing, individuals can raise awareness about issues such as poverty, inequality, and environmental sustainability. By using social media platforms, writing articles or blog posts, or engaging in community discussions, individuals can spark conversations and inspire others to take action. By amplifying the voices of those in need, individuals can help bring about positive change.

Lastly, a simple but impactful way to help others is by practicing kindness and empathy in your everyday interactions. Small acts of kindness can have a profound effect on someone’s day and can create a ripple effect of positivity. Whether it’s offering a helping hand to someone in need, listening attentively to a friend who is going through a tough time, or simply greeting strangers with a smile, these small gestures can make a world of difference. By embodying compassion and empathy in your daily life, you can inspire others to do the same.

Ultimately, there are numerous ways to help others in your community and beyond. Whether it’s by volunteering your time and skills, making financial contributions, raising awareness about social issues, or practicing kindness in your daily interactions, every action counts. By taking a proactive approach in helping others, individuals can create a more compassionate and supportive world for everyone.

Simple Acts of Kindness That Can Make a Difference

Kindness can have a great impact on both the person giving and receiving it. It is not necessary to do grand gestures or spend a lot of money to make a difference in someone’s life. Sometimes, it is the simple acts of kindness that can make the biggest impact. There are numerous small things that anyone can do on a daily basis to spread kindness and make a positive difference in the lives of others.

In conclusion, simple acts of kindness have the power to make a difference in the lives of others. Whether it’s giving a sincere compliment, offering assistance, listening with empathy, spreading positivity, or showing appreciation, these small gestures can create a positive impact on individuals and communities. Kindness is not limited to grand gestures; it is the everyday acts of kindness that can change the world for the better. So, let’s embrace kindness and make it a part of our daily lives.

Overcoming Obstacles in Assisting Others: How to Conquer Challenges

In the pursuit of extending aid and support to those in need, individuals often encounter various obstacles that can hinder their efforts. However, with determination and innovative approaches, these challenges can be overcome to ensure effective assistance and make a positive impact on the lives of others.

Tips for Dealing with Resistance and Building Empathy

When it comes to helping others and making a positive impact on their lives, it is important to understand that not everyone may be receptive to our efforts. There may be resistance and barriers that prevent us from truly connecting with those we wish to help. However, by employing certain strategies, we can overcome these challenges and build empathy in the process.

One tip for dealing with resistance is to approach the situation with an open mind and a non-judgmental attitude. It is essential to empathize with the feelings and experiences of others, even if we don’t fully understand or agree with them. By suspending our own biases and preconceived notions, we can create a safe space for open dialogue and establish a foundation for mutual understanding.

Another strategy is to actively listen and validate the emotions and concerns of those we are trying to help. Instead of dismissing or disregarding their feelings, we should make an effort to truly hear and acknowledge them. By doing so, we demonstrate respect and compassion, which can help break down barriers and foster a sense of trust between us and the individuals we are assisting.

Building empathy also requires us to educate ourselves and develop a deeper understanding of the challenges faced by the people we want to support. By learning about their experiences, cultures, and backgrounds, we can gain insight into their perspectives and foster a stronger connection. This knowledge not only enhances our ability to provide effective assistance but also helps us tailor our approach to be more culturally sensitive and respectful.

Lastly, it is crucial to approach helping others with humility and a willingness to learn. We should acknowledge that we don’t have all the answers and that the individuals we are assisting are experts of their own lives. By collaborating and involving them in the decision-making process, we empower them and allow their voices to be heard. This inclusive approach not only promotes shared ownership but also helps us build genuine relationships based on trust and equality.

In conclusion, dealing with resistance and building empathy are essential aspects of helping others. By approaching situations with open-mindedness, actively listening, educating ourselves, and practicing humility, we can overcome barriers and establish meaningful connections. These tips not only enhance our ability to make a positive impact on the lives of others but also pave the way for collective growth and understanding.

How Helping Others Can Create a Positive Ripple Effect

One of the most powerful acts a person can do is to lend a helping hand to others. The act of giving selflessly can have a profound impact not only on the individuals directly involved, but also on the larger community and society as a whole. When we choose to extend kindness and support to others, we set in motion a ripple effect that has the potential to create positive change.

Helping others creates a sense of unity and connection among people. When we come together to help those in need, we build relationships and bridge the gaps that often divide us. This sense of unity can lead to a stronger community, as people are more likely to work together towards common goals when they have experienced the power of collective action.

Furthermore, helping others can inspire and motivate those who witness the act. When others see someone selflessly giving their time and resources to help those in need, it can serve as a reminder of the impact we can all have when we choose to make a difference. This inspiration can create a domino effect, where more and more individuals are compelled to extend a helping hand to others.

Additionally, the act of helping others can have a profound effect on our own sense of well-being and happiness. Studies have shown that when we engage in acts of kindness, our brains release endorphins and oxytocin, which are neurotransmitters that promote feelings of happiness and positivity. By helping others, we not only make a positive impact on their lives, but also enhance our own mental and emotional well-being.

In conclusion, the act of helping others creates a positive ripple effect that extends far beyond the individuals directly involved. It fosters unity and connection, inspires others to make a difference, and promotes personal well-being. So, let’s not underestimate the power of a helping hand, as it truly has the potential to create a world filled with kindness and compassion.

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Behavior is normally described as altruistic when it is motivated by a desire to benefit someone other than oneself for that person’s sake. The term is used as the contrary of “self-interested” or “selfish” or “egoistic”—words applied to behavior that is motivated solely by the desire to benefit oneself. “Malicious” designates an even greater contrast: it applies to behavior that expresses a desire to harm others simply for the sake of harming them.

Sometimes, however, the word is used more broadly to refer to behavior that benefits others, regardless of its motive. Altruism in this broad sense might be attributed to certain kinds of non-human animals—mother bears, for example, who protect their cubs from attack, and in doing so put their own lives in danger. So used, there is no implication that such adult bears act “for the sake” of their young (Sober and Wilson 1998: 6).

This essay will discuss altruism in the former sense, as behavior undertaken deliberately to help someone other than the agent for that other individual’s sake. There is a large and growing empirical literature on altruism, which asks whether there is an evolutionary or biological basis for human altruism, and whether non -human species exhibit it or something similar to it. These issues are addressed by the entries on empirical approaches to altruism and biological altruism .

It is commonly assumed that we ought to be altruistic at least to some extent. But to what extent? And is altruism necessarily admirable? Why should one act for the sake of others and not only for one’s own sake? For that matter, do people in fact act out of altruism, or is all behavior ultimately self-interested?

1.1 Mixed motives and pure altruism

1.2 self-sacrifice, strong and weak altruism, 1.3 moral motives and altruistic motives, 1.4 well-being and perfection, 2.1 psychological egoism: strong and weak versions, 2.2 an empirical argument for psychological egoism, 2.3 an a priori argument for psychological egoism, 2.4 hunger and desire, 2.5 desire and motivation, 2.6 pure altruism and self-sacrifice, 2.7 does egoism exist, 3. self and others: some radical metaphysical alternatives, 4.1 eudaimonism, 4.2 impartial reason, 4.3 nagel and the impersonal standpoint, 4.4 sentimentalism and fellow feeling, 5. kant on sympathy and duty, 6. sentimentalism revisited, 7. conclusion, other internet resources, related entries, 1. what is altruism.

Before proceeding, further clarification of the term “altruism” is called for.

Altruistic acts include not only those undertaken in order to do good to others, but also those undertaken in order to avoid or prevent harm to them. Suppose, for example, someone drives her car extra cautiously because she sees that she is in an area where children are playing, and she wants to insure that she injures no one. It would be appropriate to say that her caution is altruistically motivated. She is not trying to make those children better off, but she is being careful not to make them worse off. She does this because she genuinely cares about them for their sake.

Furthermore, altruistic acts need not involve self-sacrifice, and they remain altruistic even when they are performed from a mixture of motives, some of which are self-interested. The driver in the preceding example may have plenty of time to get where she is going; slowing down and paying extra attention may not be contrary to her own good. Even so, her act counts as altruistic if one of her motives for being cautious is her concern for the children for their sake. She may also be aware that if she injures a child, she could be punished for reckless driving, which she of course wants to avoid for self-interested reasons. So, her caution is both altruistic and self-interested; it is not motivated by only one kind of reason. We should not be confused by the fact that “self-interested” and “altruistic” are opposites. A single motive cannot be characterized in both ways; but a single act can be undertaken from both motives.

If someone performs an act entirely from altruistic motives—if, that is, self-interested motives are entirely absent—we can describe her act as a case of “pure” altruism. We should be careful to distinguish purely altruistic behavior from self-sacrificing behavior: the former involves no gain for oneself, whereas the latter involves some loss. If someone has a theater ticket that he cannot use because he is ill, and he calls the box office so that the ticket can be used by someone else, that is a case of pure altruism, but it involves no sacrifice.

Consider someone whose deliberations are always guided by this principle: “I shall never do anything unless doing so is best for me”. Such an individual is refusing ever to sacrifice his well-being even to the slightest degree. But in view of the terminological points just made, he could have altruistic motives for some of what he does—or even for much or all that he does! On any given occasion, he could have mixed motives: he is careful always to do what is best for himself, but that allows him also to be motivated by the perception that what he does is also good for others.

It would be odd or misleading to say that such an individual is an altruistic person. Many people would criticize him for being insufficiently altruistic. It is part of common sense morality that one should be willing to compromise with other people—to cooperate with others in ways that require one to accept what is less good for oneself than some other alternative, so that others can have their fair share.

These reflections lead to a peculiar result: each act undertaken by such an individual could be altruistically motivated, and yet we are reluctant, and reasonably so, to say that he is an altruistic person. The best way to accommodate both ideas, which seem to be in tension, would be to make a distinction between two uses of the word “altruism”. An act is altruistic in the strong sense if is undertaken in spite of the perception that it involves some loss of one’s well-being. An act is altruistic in the weak sense if it is motivated, at least in part, by the fact that it benefits someone else or the fact that it will not injure anyone else. The individual described two paragraphs above is someone who never acts altruistically in the strong sense. That policy seems objectionable to many people—even though he may act altruistically in the weak sense on many occasions.

Some of what we do in our interactions with other people is morally motivated but not altruistic. Suppose A has borrowed a book from B and has promised to return it within a week. When A returns the book by the deadline, his motive might be described as moral: he has freely made a promise, and he takes himself to have an obligation to keep such promises. His motive is simply to keep his word; this is not an example of altruism. But if A gives B a book as a gift, thinking that B will enjoy it and find it useful, he is acting simply out of a desire to benefit B . His motive in this case is altruistic.

Similarly, suppose a mother refrains from giving her adult son advice about a certain matter because she thinks that it is not her place to do so—it would be interfering too much in his private affairs. Even so, she might also think that he would benefit from receiving her advice; she respects his autonomy but fears that as a result he will decide badly. Her restraint is morally motivated, but it would not normally be described as an act of altruism.

As these examples indicate, the notion of altruism is applicable not to every morally motivated treatment of others, but more narrowly to what is done out of a concern for the good of others—in other words, for their well-being. Altruistic acts might be described as charitable or benevolent or kind, for these words also convey the idea of acting for the good of others, and not merely rightly towards others.

Often the individuals who are the “targets” of altruistic behavior are selected for such treatment because of a personal tie between the benefactor and the beneficiary. If A was extraordinarily kind to B when B was a child, and at a later time B is in a position to help A out of a difficult situation, the help B gives to A is altruistically motivated, even though their common past explains why it is A that B has chosen to help (rather than a stranger in need). Here it is assumed that B is not promoting A ’s well-being as a mere means to his own ( B ’s) own well-being. If that were so, B would not be benefiting A for A ’s sake, but only for B ’s sake. (A further assumption is that B is not motivated simply by a sense that he owes repayment to A ; rather, he not only feels indebted to A but also genuinely cares about him.) The people whom we treat altruistically are often those to whom we have a sentimental attachment, or towards whom we feel grateful. But that is not the only possibility. Some altruistic acts are motivated simply by a recognition of the great need of those who benefit from them, and the benefactor and beneficiary may be strangers to each other.

That an act is altruistically motivated does not entail that it is justified or praiseworthy. A may mistakenly think that she is enhancing the well-being of B ; B might also mistakenly think that she is benefiting from A ’s efforts. We could say that in such cases there is something admirable about A ’s motive, but nonetheless judge that she ought not to have acted as she did.

As noted above, altruistic acts are guided by assumptions made by the agent about the well-being of some other individual or group. What well-being consists in is a disputed matter, but it is uncontroversial that a distinction must be drawn between (i) what constitutes well-being and (ii) what is a necessary means towards or a pre-condition of well-being. This kind of distinction is familiar, and is applicable in all sorts of cases. For example, we distinguish between what a breakfast consists in (cereal, juice, coffee) and the things one needs in order to eat breakfast (spoons, glasses, mugs). There is no such thing as eating breakfast but not eating anything that breakfast consists in. In the same way, well-being must be sought and fostered by seeking and fostering the good or goods in which well-being consists. Rival theories of well-being are competing ways of answering the question: what are its constituents? After we have answered that question, we need to address the further question of how best to obtain those constituents. (Contemporary discussions of well-being can be found in Badhwar 2014; Feldman 1994, 2010; Fletcher 2016; Griffin 1986; Kraut 2007; Sumner 1996 Tiberius 2018.)

Well-being admits of degrees: the more one has of the good or goods in which it consists, the better off one is. It would be an awkward manner of speaking to say of someone: “she has well-being”. A more natural way to express that idea would be to use such terms as these: “she is faring well”, “she is well off”, “she is flourishing”, “her life is going well for her”. The constituents of well-being can also be spoken of as benefits or advantages—but when one uses these terms to refer to well-being, one must recognize that these benefits or advantages are constituents of well-being, and not merely of instrumental value. Benefits and advantages, in other words, fall into two categories: those that are good for someone merely because they foster other goods, and those that are good for someone in that they are constituents of that individual’s well-being.

A distinction must be drawn between being good at something and having what is good for oneself. It is one thing to say, “he is good at acting” and another to say “acting is good for him”. Philosophers speak of the former as “perfectionist value” and the latter as “prudential value”. That is because when one tries to be good at something, one hopes to move closer to the ideal of perfection. Prudential value is the kind of good that it would be in someone’s interest to obtain—it is another term that belongs to the group we have been discussing: “well-being”, “welfare”, “benefit”, and so on.

Even though perfectionist and prudential value must be distinguished, it should not be inferred that that being good at something is not a constituent of well-being. To return to the example used in the preceding paragraph: if someone has great talent as an actor and enjoys acting and every aspect of theatrical life, it is plausible to say that his well-being consists, at least to some extent, in his enjoyment of these activities. There are two different facts in play here: (i) he is an excellent actor, and (ii) being an excellent actor is good for him (not as a mere means, but as a component of his well-being). The value referred to in (i) is perfectionist value, and in (ii) prudential value. It would be prudent of him, in other words, to continue to excel as an actor.

These points about well-being and excellence are pertinent to a study of altruism because they help guard against a too narrow conception of the sorts of goods that an altruist might promote in others. Altruists do not aim only at the relief of suffering or the avoidance of harm—they also try to provide positive benefits to others for their sake. What counts as a benefit depends on what the correct theory of well-being is, but it is widely and plausibly assumed that certain kinds of excellence are components of a good life. For example, someone who founds a school that trains children to excel in the arts and sciences, or in sports, simply so that they will enjoy exercising such skills, would be regarded as a great public benefactor and philanthropist. Similarly, teachers and parents who foster in their students and children a love of literature and the skills needed to appreciate it would be viewed as altruists, if they are motivated by the thought that by themselves these activities are benefits to those students and children.

However, it is possible for someone to be dedicated to excellence and at the same time to be utterly indifferent to human well-being—and when this happens, we have no inclination to say that such a person is motivated by altruism. Someone might be devoted to a subject—mathematics, or philosophy, or literature—rather than to the well-being of those who study and master that subject. For example, imagine a student of literature who cares deeply about James Joyce’s Ulysses , because he takes it to be one of the supreme achievements of the human mind. He does not want that novel merely to gather dust on library shelves—it deserves readers who love and understand it, and so the skills needed to appreciate it must be kept alive from one generation to another. This kind of devotion to perfectionist value is not a form of altruism.

For an act to be altruistically motivated is for the benefactor —not the beneficiary—to have a certain attitude towards it. A child who acquires from a tennis instructor the skills of a good athlete and a love of the game may simply think of tennis as great fun—not as something that benefits him or as a constituent of his life going well. The child does not need to practice his skills because he believes that doing so is good for him: that is not a necessary condition of his being the beneficiary of an altruistic act. Similarly, someone might deny that physical suffering counts as something that is bad for him. (He should deny this, according to the Stoics.) But on any plausible theory of well-being, he is wrong about that; someone who aims to diminish the pain of another individual, out of a concern for that individual’s well-being, is acting altruistically.

To take another example, consider someone who develops a love of philosophy and immerses herself in the subject. When she asks herself whether she is doing this for her own good, she may reply that her reasons are quite different. She may say, “philosophy is worthwhile in itself”. Or: “I want to solve the mind-body problem and the free will problem because these are deep and important issues”. If we suggested to her that her philosophical struggles are a component of her well-being, she might regard that as a strange way of looking at things. But her view is not authoritative—whether she is right depends on what the best theory of well-being is. Others who care about her could plausibly believe that her love of philosophy is a component of her well-being, because it constitutes an enrichment and deepening of her mind, which is of value to her in itself, whether or not it leads to some further result. If they help her pursue her philosophical interests simply for her sake, their motives would be altruistic, even if she herself does not care about philosophy because she thinks it is good for her.

2. Does altruism exist?

According to a doctrine called “psychological egoism”, all human action is ultimately motivated by self-interest. The psychological egoist can agree with the idea, endorsed by common sense, that we often seek to benefit others besides ourselves; but he says that when we do so, that is because we regard helping others as a mere means to our own good. According to the psychological egoist, we do not care about others for their sake. Altruism, in other words, does not exist.

Since we have distinguished several different ways of using the term “altruism”, it will be helpful to make similar distinctions between different varieties of psychological egoism. Recall that an act is altruistic in the weak sense if it is motivated, at least in part, by the fact that it benefits someone else (or the fact that it will not injure anyone else). Psychological egoism, as defined in the preceding paragraph, denies that altruism in this sense exists. That is the strongest form of this doctrine; it is usually what philosophers have in mind when they discuss psychological egoism. But we can imagine weaker versions. One of them would deny that altruism is ever pure; it would say, in other words, that whenever we act, one of our motives is a desire for our own good. Another weaker form of psychological egoism would hold that we never voluntarily do what we foresee will sacrifice our well-being to some extent. This third form of psychological egoism would admit that sometimes one of our reasons for acting is the good we do for others for their sake; but it claims that we never act for the good of others when we think that doing so would make us worse off.

Someone might arrive at one or another of these forms of psychological egoism because she takes herself to be a keen observer of the human scene, and her acquaintance with other people has convinced her that this is how they are motivated. But that way of justifying psychological egoism has a serious weakness. Others can say to this psychological egoist:

Perhaps the people you know are like this. But my experience of the world is rather different from yours. I know many people who try to benefit others for their sake. I myself act altruistically. So, at most, your theory applies only to the people in your social world.

The psychological egoist can respond to this criticism in either of two ways. First, she might claim that his doctrine is supported by experimental evidence. That is, she might believe that (i) the subjects studied by psychologists in carefully conducted experiments have been shown to be not purely altruistic, or (more strongly) that these subjects ultimately care only about their own good; and (ii) that we can infer from these experiments that all human beings are motivated in the same way.

This is a disputed matter. There is experimental evidence that casts doubt on psychological egoism in its strong and in weaker forms, but the controversy continues (see Batson 2011; Stich et al. 2010).

A second response on the part of the psychological egoist would consist in an a priori philosophical argument for one or another version of that doctrine. According to this line of thinking, we can see “from the armchair”—that is, without seeking empirical confirmation of any sort—that psychological egoism (in one of its forms) must be true.

How might such an argument go? Drawing upon some ideas that can be found in Plato’s dialogues, we might affirm two premises: (i) What motivates us to act is always a desire; (ii) all desires are to be understood on the model of hunger (see Meno 77c; Symposium 199e–200a, 204e).

To elaborate on the idea behind (ii): When we are hungry, our hunger has an object: food (or perhaps some particular kind of food). But we do not want to ingest the food for its own sake; what we are really after is the feeling of satisfaction that we expect to get as a result of eating. Ingesting this or that piece of food is something we want, but only as a means of achieving a sense of satisfaction or satiation.

If all desire is understood in the same way, and all motivation takes the form of desire, then we can infer that psychological egoism in its strong form is true (and therefore its weaker versions are also true). Consider an action that seems, on the surface, to be altruistically motivated: I give you a gift simply because I think you will like it. Now, since I want to give you this gift, and all desire should be understood as a kind of hunger, I am hungering after your feeling pleased, as I hunger after a piece of food. But just as no one wants to ingest a piece of food for its own sake, I do not want you to feel pleased for your sake; rather, what I am seeking is the feeling of satisfaction I will get when you are pleased, and your being pleased is simply the means by which I achieve satisfaction. Accordingly, we don’t have to be keen observers of other people or look within ourselves to arrive at psychological egoism. We can recognize that this doctrine is correct simply by thinking about the nature of motivation and desire.

But the assumption that all desires are like hunger in the relevant respect is open to question. Hunger is not satisfied if one still feels hungry after one has eaten. It seeks a certain kind of consciousness in oneself. But many kinds of desires are not like that. Suppose, for example, that I want my young children to be prosperous as adults long after I have died, and I take steps that increase to some small degree their chances of achieving that distant goal. What my desire is for is their prosperity far into the future, not my current or future feeling of satisfaction. I don’t know and cannot know whether the steps that I take will actually bring about the goal I seek; what I do know is that I will not be alive when they are adults, and so even if they are prosperous, that will give me no pleasure. (Since, by hypothesis I can only hope, and do not feel confident, that the provisions I make for them will actually produce the good results I seek for them, I get little current satisfaction from my act.) It would make no sense, therefore, to suggest that I do not want them to be prosperous for their sake, but only as a means to the achievement of some goal of my own. My goal is their well-being, not my own. In fact, if I allocate to them resources that I myself need, in the hope that doing so will make their lives better, I am doing something that one form of psychological egoism says is impossible: sacrificing my own good, to some degree, for the sake of others. If the psychological egoist claims that such self-sacrifice is impossible because all desire is like hunger, the reply should be that this model does not fit all cases of desire.

Recall the two premises used by the armchair psychological egoist: (i) What motivates us to act is always a desire; (ii) all desires are to be understood on the model of hunger. The second premise is implausible, as we have just seen; and, since both premises must be true for the argument to reach its conclusion, the argument can be rejected.

It is worth observing, however, that first premise of this argument is also open to question.

This thesis that what motivates us to act is always a desire should be accepted only if we have a good understanding of what a desire is. If a desire is simply identified with whatever internal state moves someone to act, then the claim, “what motivates us to act is always a desire”, when spelled out more fully, is a tautology. It says: “the internal state that moves us to act is always the internal state that moves us to act”. That is not a substantive insight into human psychology, but a statement of identity, of the form “ A = A ”. We might have thought we were learning something about what causes action by being told, “what motivates people is always a desire”, but if “desire” is just a term for whatever it is that motivates us, we are learning nothing (see Nagel 1970: 27–32).

Here is a different way of making the same point: As the words “desire” and “want” are often used, it makes good sense to say: “I don’t want to do this, but I think I ought to”. That is the sort of remark we often make when we take ourselves to have an unpleasant duty or obligation, or when we face a challenge that we expect to be difficult and stressful. In these sorts of situation, we do not hunger after the goal we move towards. So, as the word “desire” is often used, it is simply false that what motivates us to act is always a desire. Now, the psychological egoist who seeks an a priori defense of this doctrine might say:

when I claim that what motivates us to act is always a desire, I am not using the word “desire” as it is sometimes used. My usage is much broader. Among desires, in this broad sense, I include the belief that one ought to do something. In fact, it includes any internal state that causes someone to act.

Clearly, the thesis that what moves us is always a desire, when so understood, is empty.

The common sense terms we often use to explain why we help others do not need to refer to our own desires. You are in a public space and come across someone off-putting in appearance but who seems to need your help. He appears to be in pain, or confused, or needy in some way. Recognizing this, you take yourself to have a good reason to offer him your assistance. You think that you ought to ask him whether you can help—even though that will delay you and may cause you some trouble and discomfort. These ways of describing your motivation are all that is needed to explain why you offered him your help, and it is not necessary to add, “I wanted to help him”. Admittedly, when “desire” is used to designate whatever it is that motivates someone, it is true that you wanted to help him. But what does the explanatory work, in these cases, is your recognition of his need and your judgment that therefore you ought to offer your help. Saying, “I wanted to help him” would be misleading, since it would suggest that there was something pleasant that you expected to get by offering your assistance. After you have given him your help, it is true, you might think back on this encounter, and be pleased that you had done the right thing. But you might not—you might be worried that what you did actually made him worse off, despite your good intentions. And in any case, if you do look back with pleasure at your good deed, it does not follow that feeling good was your goal all along, and that you merely used him as a means to that end. That would follow only if desire by its very nature is a form of hunger.

Of the three forms of psychological egoism distinguished above, the one that is least open to objection is the weak form that holds that altruism is never pure. It claims that whenever we act, one of our motives is a desire for our own good. There is no good a priori argument for this thesis—or, at any rate, the a priori argument we have been considering for the strongest form of psychological egoism does not support it, because the two premises used in that argument are so implausible. But it might nonetheless be suggested that as a matter of fact we always do find some self-interested motivation that accompanies altruistically motivated behavior. It is difficult to refute that proposal. We should not pretend that we know all of the considerations and causes that underlie our behavior. Some of our motives are hidden, and there is too much going on in our minds for us to be aware of the whole of our psychology. So, for all we know, we might never be pure altruists.

But what of the other weak form of psychological egoism?—the one that admits that sometimes one of our reasons for acting is the good we do for others for their sake, but claims that we never act for the good of others when we think that doing so would make us worse off. It says, in other words, that we never voluntarily do what we foresee will sacrifice our well-being to some extent.

The first point to be made about this form of psychological egoism is that, once again, there is no a priori argument to support it. The two premises we have been examining—that all action is motivated by desire and all desire is like hunger—are implausible, and so they do not support the thesis that we never sacrifice our well-being to any degree. If this form of psychological egoism is to be sustained, its evidence would have to be drawn from the observation of each human being’s reasons for acting. It would have to say: when our motives are carefully scrutinized, it may indeed be found that although we do good to others for the sake of those others, we never do so when we think it would detract even slightly from our own well-being. In other words, we count the good of others as something that by itself gives us a reason, but it is always a weak reason, in that it is never as strong as reasons that derive from our self-interest.

We have no reason to suppose that human behavior is so uniform in its motivation. A far more plausible hypothesis about human motives is that they vary a great deal from one person to another. Some people are never altruistic; others are just as this weak form of psychological egoism says: they are altruistic, but only when they think this will not detract from their own well-being; and then there is a third and large category filled with people who, to some degree or other, are willing to sacrifice their well-being for others. Within this category there is wide range—some are willing to make only small sacrifices, others larger sacrifices, and some extraordinarily large sacrifices. This way of thinking has the great advantage of allowing our experience of each individual to provide us with the evidence by means of which we characterize him. We should not label everyone as an egoist on the basis of some a priori theory; rather, we should assess each person’s degree of egoism and altruism on the basis of what we can discern of their motives.

One further point should be made about our reasons for supposing that there is such a thing as altruism. Just as we can ask, “what entitles us to believe that altruism exists?” so we can ask: “what entitles us to believe that egoism exists?” Consider the possibility that whenever we act for our own good, we are not doing so only for our own sake, but also for the sake of someone else. On what grounds are we entitled to reject that possibility?

Once again, the egoist might reply that it is an a priori truth that all of our actions are ultimately motivated only by self-interest, but we have seen the weakness of the premises that support that argument. So, if the hypothesis that sometimes one acts only for one’s own sake is true, it must recommend itself to us because close observation of human behavior supports it. We must find actual cases of someone promoting his own good only for his own sake. It is no easier to be confident about such matters than it is easy to be confident that someone has acted out of purely altruistic motives. We realize that much of what we do for ourselves has consequences for other people as well, and we care to some degree about those other people. Perhaps our ultimate motivation always includes an other-regarding component. It is more difficult to find evidence against that suggestion than one might have thought.

To take matters to an extreme, it might be suggested that our ultimate motivation is always entirely other-regarding. According to this far-fetched hypothesis, whenever we act for our own good, we do so not at all for our own sake, but always entirely for the sake of someone else. The important point here is that the denial that altruism exists should be regarded with as much suspicion as this contrary denial, according to which people never act ultimately for their own good. Both are dubious universal generalizations. Both have far less plausibility than the common sense assumption that people sometimes act in purely egoistic ways, sometimes in purely altruistic ways, and often in ways that mix, in varying degrees, the good of oneself and the good of others.

An assumption that many people make about egoistic and altruistic motives is that it is more difficult to justify the latter than the former, or that the former do not require justification whereas the latter do. If someone asks himself, “Why should I take my own good to be a reason to do anything?” it is tempting to respond that something is amiss in the very asking of this question—perhaps because there can be no answer to it. Self-interest, it might be said, can be given no justification and needs none. By contrast, since other people are other , it seems as though some reason needs to be given for building a bridge from oneself to those others. In other words, we apparently have to find something in others that justifies our taking an interest in their well-being, whereas one need not seek something in oneself that would justify self-regard. (Perhaps what we find in others that justifies altruism is that they are just like oneself in important respects.) It is worth asking whether this apparent asymmetry between justifying self-interest and justifying altruism is real or only apparent.

One response to this question is that the asymmetry is illusory because the very distinction between oneself and others is artificial and an obstacle to clear thinking. One can begin to challenge the validity or importance of the distinction between self and others by noticing how many changes occur in the inner life of what is, conventionally speaking, a single “person”. The mind of a newborn, a child, an adolescent, a young adult, a middle aged person, and an old person approaching death—these can have at least as many differences as do those who are conventionally counted as two distinct individuals. If a young man of twenty years sets aside money to provide for his retirement in old age, he is saving for someone who will be quite different from himself. Why should that not be called altruism rather than self-interest? Why does it matter whether it is called acting for his own good or for the good of another? (See Parfit 1984.)

Another kind of challenge to the validity of the distinction between self and others derives from the observation made by David Hume that when we look within and make an inventory of the contents of our mental life, we have no acquaintance with any entity that would provide a reference for the word “self”. Introspection can tell us something about sensations, feelings, and thoughts—but we do not have any experience of some entity that is the one who has these sensations, feelings, and thoughts. That point might be regarded as a reason to reject the common sense view that when you refer to yourself, and distinguish yourself from someone else, there is something real that you are talking about, or some valid distinction between yourself and others. It might be thought, in other words, that the ordinary distinction between altruistic and egoistic motives is misguided because there are no such things as selves.

A third metaphysical possibility is this: human beings cannot be understood one by one, as though each were a self-sufficient and fully real individual. That way of thinking about ourselves fails to recognize the profound way in which we are by our nature social beings. You and I and others are by our nature mere parts of some larger social unit. As an analogy, one might think of the human body and such parts of the body as fingers, hands, arms, legs, toes, torso, and so on. They cannot exist, much less function properly, in isolation. Similarly, it might be said that individual human beings are mere fragments of a larger social whole. Accordingly, instead of using the concepts expressed by the terms “self-interested” and “altruistic”, we should see ourselves as contributors to the success and well-functioning of the larger community to which we belong (see Brink 2003; Green 1883).

The remainder of this essay will set aside these unorthodox alternatives to the common sense metaphysical framework that we normally presuppose when we think about self-interested and altruistic motives. It would take us too far afield to examine them. We will continue to make these assumptions: First, a single individual human being persists over time from birth to death, even when the mental life of that individual undergoes many changes. Second, there is someone one is referring to when one talks about oneself, even though there is no object called the “self” that we detect introspectively. And the fact that we do not encounter such an object by introspection is no reason to doubt the validity of the distinction made between oneself and others. Third, although certain things (arms, legs, noses, etc.) are by their very nature parts of a whole, no human being is by nature a part in that same way. Rejecting these ideas, we will continue to assume, with common sense, that for each human being there is such a thing as what is good for that human being; and that the questions, “what is good for me?”, “what is good for that other individual, who is not me?” are different questions. Accordingly, it is one thing for a reason to be self-interested, and another for it to be altruistic (although of course one and the same act can be supported by both kinds of reasons).

Assuming, then, that the distinction between these motives is real, the questions we asked at the beginning of this section remain: Why ought one to be altruistic? Does one need a justification for being motivated in this way? Is egoistic motivation on a sounder footing than altruistic motivation, in that it stands in no need of justification?

4. Why care about others?

Radically different ways of answering these questions can be found in moral philosophy. The first makes self-interested motivation fundamental; it holds that we should be altruistic because it is in our interest to be so moved. That strategy is often attributed to the Greek and Roman philosophers of antiquity—Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, and the Epicureans (see Annas 1993).

In the modern era, a second approach has come to the fore, built on the notion that moral thinking is not self-centered but impartial and impersonal. Its basic idea is that when we think morally about what to do, reason takes a god’s-eye perspective and sets aside the emotional bias we normally have in our own favor, or in favor of our circle of friends or our community. Here Kant 1785 is a representative figure, but so too are the utilitarians—Jeremy Bentham 1789, John Stuart Mill 1864, and Henry Sidgwick 1907.

A third approach, championed by David Hume (1739), Adam Smith (1759), and Arthur Schopenhauer (1840), gives sympathy, compassion, and personal affection—rather than impartial reason—a central role to play in the moral life. It holds that there is something extraordinarily valuable in the sentimental bonds that take hold among human beings—a feature of human life that is overlooked or distorted when morality is understood solely or primarily in impersonal terms and from a god’s-eye point of view. In favorable conditions, we naturally and emotionally respond to the weal and woe of others; we do not and should not look for reasons to do so. (The assorted ideas labeled “sentimentalism” in this entry are an amalgam of ideas derived loosely from the writings of Blum 1980; Noddings 1986; Slote 1992, 2001 2010, 2013; and others. The term is sometimes applied to a family of meta-ethical views that ground the meaning or justification of moral propositions in attitudes rather than response-independent facts (Blackburn 2001). Here, by contrast, sentimentalism is a ground-level thesis about what is most valuable in human relationships. It could be combined with meta-ethical sentimentalism, but need not be.)

These three approaches are hardly an exhaustive survey of all that has been said in the Western philosophical tradition about altruism. A fuller treatment would examine the Christian conception of love, as developed by thinkers of the medieval period. To a large extent, such figures as Augustine and Aquinas work within a eudaimonistic framework, although they are also influenced by the Neoplatonic picture of the visible world as an outpouring of the bountifulness of divine goodness. To the extent that rewards of heaven and the sufferings of hell play a role in a theocentric framework, there are instrumental reasons, for those who need them, to care for others. But there are other reasons as well. Other-regarding virtues like charity and justice are perfections of the human soul and are therefore components of our earthly well-being. Christian philosophy rejects Aristotle’s doctrine that divine being has no ethical qualities and makes no interventions in human life. God is a person who loves his creation, human beings above all. When we love others for themselves, we imitate God and express our love for him (Lewis 1960).

The term “eudaimonism” is often used by philosophers to refer to the ethical orientation of all or the major philosophers of Greek and Roman antiquity. “ Eudaimonia ” is the ordinary Greek word they apply to the highest good. As Aristotle observes at the beginning of the Nicomachean Ethics , whenever we act, we aim at some good—but goods are not all at the same level. Lower goods are undertaken for the sake of more valuable goals, which are in turn pursued in order to achieve still better goods. This hierarchy of value cannot continue endlessly—a life must have some ultimate goal, something that is valuable in itself and not for the sake of anything still better. What that goal should be, Aristotle acknowledges, is a much disputed matter; but at any rate, everyone uses the word “ eudaimonia ” to designate that highest good. (“Happiness” is the standard translation, but “well-being” and “flourishing” may be closer to the Greek word’s meaning.)

Aristotle does not say that one’s ultimate goal should be one’s own well-being ( eudaimonia ) and no one else’s . On the contrary, he holds that the common good (the good of the whole political community) is superior to the good of a single individual. Nonetheless, it has become common among scholars of ancient ethics to attribute to Aristotle and the other major moral philosophers of antiquity the assumption that one’s ultimate goal should just be one’s own well-being.

Is this an implausible assumption? That is the accusation of many systems of modern moral philosophy, but one must be careful not to attribute to Greek and Roman ethics an extreme endorsement of selfishness. One way to see that this would be unfair is to recognize how important it is to Aristotle that we love others for their sake . That is a key ingredient of his lengthy discussion of friendship and love in Books VIII and IX of the Nicomachean Ethics . There he argues that (i) friendship is an ingredient of a good life, and (ii) to be a friend to someone (or at any rate a friend of the best sort) one must not treat him as a mere means to one’s own advantage or one’s own pleasure. He elaborates on (ii) by adding that in friendships of the best sort, each individual admires the other for the excellence of that other person’s character, and benefits him for that reason. It is clear, then, that he explicitly condemns those who treat others as mere means to their own ends. So, even if it is true that, according to Aristotle, one’s ultimate goal should be one’s own well-being (and no one else’s), he combines this with the denial that the good of others should be valued solely as a means to one’s own.

It is crucial, at this point, that we keep in mind the distinction, drawn above in section 1.4 , between (i) what constitutes well-being and (ii) what is a necessary means towards or a pre-condition of well-being. Aristotle argues that one’s well-being is constituted by the excellent use of one’s reason, and that such virtues as justice, courage, and generosity are among the qualities in which one’s good consists. When one acts with justice and generosity towards one’s family, or friends, or the larger community, that is good for oneself (one is achieving one’s ultimate goal) and it is also good for others—in fact, one’s action is motivated in part by the desire to benefit those others for their sake. If treating others justly and in accordance with the other ethical virtues were merely a means towards one’s own well-being, Aristotle’s framework for ethics would be objectionably self-regarding—and it would be difficult for it to endorse, without inconsistency, the thesis that we ought to benefit others for their sake.

We should recall a point made in section 1.1 : altruistic acts need not involve self-sacrifice, and they remain altruistic even when they are performed from a mixture of motives, some of which are self-interested. For Aristotle, altruism should always be accompanied by self-interested motives. His system of practical thought could be dismissed out of hand if one begins with the assumption that moral motivation must be purely altruistic, free from all taint of self-regard. Otherwise, it would not count as moral . That idea has some currency, and it is often attributed (rightly or wrongly) to Kant. But on reflection, it is open to question. If it is the case that whenever one has a good reason to benefit someone else for that person’s sake, there is also a second good reason as well—namely, that in doing so one will also benefit oneself—it would be implausible to suppose that one should not let that second reason have any influence on one’s motivation.

Nonetheless, if another point made earlier is correct, there is a serious problem for Aristotle’s eudaimonism. In section 1.2 , we noted that someone is open to criticism if he is always guided by the principle, “I shall never do anything unless doing so is best for me”. Such a person seems insufficiently altruistic, insufficiently willing to make compromises for the good of others. He is (to use the term introduced earlier) never altruistic in the strong sense. Aristotle, it might be said, would have been on firmer ground if he had said that ultimately one should act for one’s own good and that of others . (To be fair to him, he does not deny this; on the other hand, he does say that treating others well never makes one worse off.)

If the project undertaken by Greek and Roman moral philosophy is to begin with the unquestioned assumption that one should never act contrary to one’s own good, and that one’s ultimate end should be only one’s own eudaimonia, it faces the serious objection that it will never be able, on this basis, to give proper recognition to the interests of others. The idea underlying this objection is that we should be directly concerned with others: the fact that an act one performs benefits someone else can already provide a reason for undertaking it, without having to be accompanied by a self -interested reason. There is no argument to be found in ancient ethics –none is offered—that purports to show that the only way to justify having other-regarding motives is by appealing to the good it does oneself to have them.

At the same time, that gives us no reason to dismiss out of hand the efforts made by these authors to show that in fact one does benefit by having altruistic motives. There is nothing morally offensive about asking the question: “is it good for someone to be a good person?” once it is understood that being a good person might be a component of well-being, not a means to further private ends. As noted earlier ( section 1.4 ), certain kinds of excellence are widely assumed to be components of a good life. The examples used there were excellence in the arts, the sciences, and sport. But excelling at ethical life is also a plausible example, since it consists in developing and exercising cognitive, emotional, and social skills that we are pleased and proud to have. In any case, it would be sheer dogmatism to close our minds and refuse to listen to the arguments found in Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics that ethical virtue is of great value because it is a component (and for the Stoics the sole component) of one’s well-being.

We turn now to the idea, central to one modern approach to ethics, that when we think morally, we reason from an impartial or impersonal perspective. Moral thinking is not self-centered. Of course we all have an emotional bias that attaches special weight to self-interest, and we are often partial to our particular circle of friends or our community. But when we look at the world from a moral point of view, we try to set aside this self-centered framework. Taking a god’s eye perspective on things, we ask ourselves what one ought to do in this or that situation—not what would be good for me or my friends. It is as though we forget about locating ourselves as this particular person; we abstract away from our normal self-centered perspective and seek the solution to a practical problem that anyone similarly impartial would also arrive at.

We can find anticipations or analogues of this idea in ancient ethics—for example, in Plato’s and Aristotle’s recognition that the political community serves the common good rather the interest of some one class or faction; and in the Stoic belief that the cosmos is governed by a providential force that assigns to each of us a distinctive role by which we serve not just ourselves but also the whole. In the ideal city of Plato’s Republic , the family and private property are abolished within the elite classes, because these institutions interfere with the development of a common concern for all individuals. It is not clear how these ideas can be made to fit within a eudaimonistic framework. How can the good of the community serve as the highest standard of evaluation if one’s own good alone is one’s highest end? One way of looking at the history of ethics would be to say that modern ethics salvages the impartialism that occasionally appears in ancient ethics, and rightly abandons its attempt to derive a justification of altruism from a prior commitment to self-interest. Contemporary eudaimonists, of course, would tell a different story (see, for example Annas 1993; LeBar 2013; Russell 2012).

The notion of impartiality has thus far been described in highly general terms, and it is important to see that there are different ways of making it more concrete. One way of doing so is adopted by utilitarians, and more generally, by consequentialists. (The utilitarianism of Bentham 1789, Mill 1864, and Sidgwick 1907 holds that one is to maximize the greatest balance of pleasure over pain—treating pleasure and the absence of pain as the sole constituents of well-being. Consequentialism abstracts away from this hedonistic component of utilitarianism; it requires one to maximize the greatest balance of good over bad. See Driver 2012.) In their calculus, no individual’s good is given greater weight or importance than any other’s. Your own good, therefore, is not to be treated by you as having greater weight as a reason than anyone else’s, simply because it is your own good. The well-being of a human being (or of a sentient creature) is what provides one with a reason to act: that is why one has a reason to take one’s own good into consideration in practical thinking. But the same point applies equally and with equal force to the well-being of anyone else.

But that is not the only way of taking the general notion of impartiality and making it more specific. The general idea, as stated earlier, is that moral thinking, unlike prudential thinking, is not self-centered. One can make this idea more concrete by taking it to mean that there is a single set of rules or norms that apply equally to all human beings, and so the standard by which one answers the question, “what should I do in this situation?” is the standard by which one answers the question, “what should anyone do in this situation?” Someone whose practical reasoning is guided by this condition is abiding by an ideal of impartiality. He makes no special exceptions for himself or his friends.

Suppose, for example, that you are a lifeguard and one afternoon you must choose between swimming north to rescue one group and swimming south to rescue another. The northern group includes your friend, but the southern group, full of strangers, is much larger. The ideal of impartiality described in the previous paragraph does not by itself determine what one should do in this situation; what it requires is simply that it should make no difference that the lifeguard faced with this dilemma is you (and the northern group includes your friend). What you should do, if you are the lifeguard, is what any lifeguard ought to do in that situation. If it is right to take friendship into consideration, when making this decision, then it would be right for anyone to do so. (What would be right, in that case, would be for each individual to choose the good of his or her friend over the good of strangers.)

The consequentialist has a more radical interpretation of what impartiality means and requires. His ideal of impartiality does not allow the lifeguard to take into consideration the fact that by swimming north he will be able to save his friend. After all, the well-being of his friend is not made more valuable simply because that person is his friend. Just as my good is not made more valuable than the good of others simply because it is my good, so too the well-being of my friend deserves no extra weight because he is a friend of mine . So, the lifeguard, according to the consequentialist, must choose to save one group rather than the other solely on the basis of the greater balance of good over bad.

The consequentialist will correctly point out that quite often one is in a better position to promote one’s own good than that of others. As a rule, I have more knowledge about what is good for me than I have about what is good for strangers. It often requires fewer resources for me to benefit myself than to benefit others. I know immediately when I am hungry without having to ask, and I know what kind of food I like. But additional steps are needed to find out when others are hungry and which food they like. These sorts of facts about one’s special relationship to oneself might allow the consequentialist to justify giving somewhat more attention to one’s own well-being than that of anyone else. Even so, there is only one individual who is me; and the number of other individuals whom I can benefit, if I make the effort, is very large. When all of these factors are taken into consideration, it will often be the case that self-interested reasons ought to give way to altruistic motives.

Consequentialism evidently does not recognize certain ways in which each human being has a special relation to her own well-being—a relation different from the one she has to the well-being of others. When each of us becomes an adult, we are normally charged with the special responsibility of having to look after our own welfare. Young children are not expected to be in command of their own lives; they are not yet competent to occupy this role. But the point of their education is to train them so that as adults they can be responsible for themselves. A fully mature person is rightly expected by others to care for someone in particular—namely herself. She is given room to make decisions about her own life but is not given the same kind and degree of authority over the lives of others. If she would like to devote herself to others, she cannot simply do so without receiving their permission, or without taking other steps that make her entry into their lives permissible. Consequentialism, by contrast, regards all adult human beings as equally responsible for the well-being of all. It does not take seriously the idea that our social relations are governed by a division of labor that charges each with a special responsibility for herself—and certain others as well (one’s children, one’s friends, and so on.)

According to the weaker interpretation of impartiality described above, moral rules reflect this division of labor. (By the “weaker interpretation” is meant the thesis that moral thinking avoids being self-centered because it upholds a single set of rules or norms that apply equally to all human beings.) Consider, for example, the duty we normally have to help others, even when they are strangers. If someone is in need, and asks for your assistance, that gives you a reason to help him, and you should do so, provided that compliance with such appeals is not overly burdensome . Notice the escape clause: it builds into the duty to aid others a recognition of the importance of each person having a significant degree of control over his own life. Common sense morality assumes that what we owe to others might call for some sacrifice of our own good, but also that in the ordinary business of life the degree of sacrifice should fall within certain limits, so that we can make good use of the responsibility we have been given as adults to seek our own good. The balance struck by moral rules between the claims of self-interest and the claims of others is what makes it possible for those rules to be recognized and accepted as appropriate. These rules leave us free to volunteer to make greater sacrifices; but such greater sacrifices are not required of us except in extraordinary circumstances (wars, disasters, emergencies).

The three approaches to altruism that we have examined thus far give three rather different answers to the question: “why should one act for the sake of others and not only for one’s own sake?”

Eudaimonism replies that those who act for the sake of others are benefited by having an altruistic disposition.

The consequentialist’s answer begins with the claim that one’s own well-being ought to be of concern to oneself simply because it is someone’s well-being; it should not be of importance to oneself simply because it is one’s own well-being. There is, in other words, no reason why a benefit should go to you rather than someone else just because you are the one who would be receiving it. Accordingly, if one assumes, as one should, that one should act for one’s own sake, then one has no less a reason to act for the good of anyone and everyone else.

If we adopt a weaker interpretation of impartiality, we see the justification of altruism simply by seeing that we have a duty to aid other people in certain circumstances. The moral rule that requires us to help others is a rule that calls upon us to help them not as a means to our own good, but simply in virtue of their need. And we see the rule as justified by recognizing that it strikes a proper balance between our self-concern and the appropriate claims of others.

Notice that both consequentialism and the weaker impartialist position are compatible with the eudaimonist’s thesis that having altruistic motives is a component of one’s own well-being. What these two forms of impartialism reject is the stronger eudaimonistic thesis that one’s ultimate goal should be one’s own well-being and that alone.

That stronger eudaimonistic thesis and consequentialism stand at opposite poles from each other, in the following respect: The first of these poles elevates the self to a position of primacy, since it is only one’s own well-being that constitutes one’s ultimate goal; by contrast, consequentialism, at the opposite extreme, deflates the self to the point where it has no more claim to one’s attention than does any other individual. The weak impartialist attempts to occupy a middle ground.

Yet another conception of impartiality—and a novel argument for the rationality of altruism—can be found in the work of Thomas Nagel. In The Possibility of Altruism (1970), he seeks to undermine both psychological egoism, in its strong form, as defined in section 2.1 above, and its normative counterpart (sometimes called “rational egoism or “ethical egoism”), which holds that one ought to have no direct concern with the good of others. Indirect concern, the ethical egoist grants, can be justified: the good of others may be instrumental to one’s own good, or one might happen to have a sentimental attachment to others. But absent these contingent relations to others, one has, according to the ethical egoist, no reason to care about their well-being.

Nagel doubts that anyone actually is a psychological egoist (1970: 84–85), but his major concern is to refute ethical egoism, by showing that altruism is a rational requirement on action. His idea is not simply that we ought in certain circumstances to help others for their sake; it is also that we are acting irrationally if we do not. That is because it is required of us as rational beings to view ourselves and others from what Nagel calls “the impersonal standpoint”. As he puts it,

to recognize others fully as persons requires a conception of oneself as identical with a particular, impersonally specifiable inhabitant of the world, among others of a similar nature. (1970: 100)

Nagel likens the impersonal standpoint to the prudential policy of regarding all times in one’s life as equal in importance. One has reason not to be indifferent to one’s future because the present moment is not more reason-giving simply by virtue of being present. Similarly, he holds, one has reason not to be indifferent to other people, because the fact that some individual is me is not more reason-giving simply because he is me. Terms like “now” and “later, ” “me and not me” point to no differences that make a rational difference. A time that is later eventually becomes a time that is now; that is why it is arbitrary and irrational to discount the future simply because it is future. Giving greater weight to someone’s good because that person is me is no less irrational.

The “impersonal standpoint”, as Nagel conceives it, is a view of the world from outside it, one that deprives one of information about which individual in that world one is. (It is, in the phrase Nagel chose as the title of his 1986 book, The View From Nowhere .) From this perspective, one need not be a utilitarian or consequentialist—one need not maximize the good, but can abide by the constraints of principles of the right. But certain principles are ruled out from the impersonal standpoint: egoism is, as well as any other principle that gives one individual or group a reason not shared by all others. For example, if someone has reason to avoid pain, that must be because pain—anyone’s pain—is to be avoided. So, it cannot be the case that although I have a reason to avoid pain, others are permitted to be indifferent to my plight, as if that pain were not an objectively bad thing, something that gives only the person who feels it a reason to oppose it. Nagel called such reasons “objective”, as contrasted with “subjective”. Parfit, in Reasons and Persons (1984) , speaks instead of “agent-relative” and “agent neutral” reasons, and subsequently Nagel himself adopted these terms. The critique of egoism in The Possibility of Altruism rests on the thesis that all genuine reasons are agent neutral.

What Nagel’s position and utilitarianism have in common is a perspective that is the opposite of the self-centered world of rational egoism: from the point of view of this self-less perspective, each individual is just a tiny part of a vast universe of moral subjects, each of no more importance or value than any other. Our common sense point of view, moving from our inner life looking outward, lulls us into a massive kind of insularity—a tendency to downplay or ignore the fact that we are just one individual of no greater importance than any other. We put ourselves at the center of our world, and this can only be corrected by stepping back, leaving out of our picture the particular individual one is, and making general judgments about how human beings should behave towards each other. From this perspective, when one person ought to do something, some related requirement is imposed on all others as well –some “ought” statement applies to each.

Nagel is faced with the problem of how to explain why self-interest is not regularly swamped by agent-neutral reasons. If anyone’s pain imposes on all other moral agents a requirement of some sort, then one person’s pain is everyone’s problem. As Nagel says in The View From Nowhere , (using the term “objective standpoint” for the impersonal standpoint),

when we take up the objective standpoint, the problem is not that values seem to disappear but that there are too many of them, coming from every life and drowning out those that arise from our own. (1986: 147)

It would be consistent with this picture to add that the weight of reasons that derive from the situation of other people is extremely small and becomes increasingly so, as they are added together. Therefore, it might be said, they do not often outweigh reasons of self-interest. But that would be an ad hoc stipulation, and would differ only slightly from the egoist’s thesis that the good of others has no independent weight. It is hard to believe that we are forced to choose between ethical egoism (which says that only one’s own pain ought to be one’s direct concern) and Nagel’s conception of impartiality (according to which everyone’s pain ought to weigh on me, because that of others is as bad as my own). The first demands no altruism of us, the second too much.

Some philosophers would say that the approaches to altruism discussed thus far are missing an important—perhaps the most important—ingredient in moral motivation. These approaches, one might say, make altruism a matter of the head, but it is much more a matter of the heart. The eudaimonist can say that we should have a certain amount of fellow feeling, but justifies that emotional response by giving a self-interested reason for being so motivated. The consequentialist seems to leave no legitimate room in our moral thinking for the friendly feelings and love we have for particular individuals, for these sentiments are often at odds with the project of increasing the total amount of good in the world. The weak impartialist says that in certain situations we are to be moved by the good of others, but that is only because there is a moral rule, striking a reasonable balance between oneself and others, that requires one to do so. All three approaches—so the objection goes—are too cold and calculating. They call upon us to treat others in accordance with a formula or rule or general policy. What is most important in human relationships cannot be captured by an approach that begins with a general rule about how to treat others, and justifies a certain way of treating each particular individual simply by applying that general rule.

It would miss the point of this critique if one said, in response, that having an emotional response to the good of others is an effective means of getting oneself to give them the aid they need. (For example, the consequentialist can say that this doctrine does call upon us to act on the basis of friendly feelings and love towards particular individuals, because over the long run relationships solidified by such sentiments are likely to result in a greater balance of good over bad than would colder relationships.) But a defender of the critique put forward in the preceding paragraph would reply that one’s emotional response to the good or ill of others can be assessed as appropriate independently of the effectiveness of one’s emotions as motivators of action. When we feel compassion for the suffering of a particular individual, that reaction is already justified; the suffering of another ought to elicit such a response simply because that is the appropriate reaction. Consider, as an analogy, the proper reaction to the death of a loved one; this calls forth grief and ought to do so, even though grief cannot undo one’s loss. In the same way, it could be said that altruistic feelings are the appropriate response to the good and ill of others, quite apart from whether those feelings lead to results. That does not imply that it does not matter whether one does anything for the good of others. One ought to alleviate their suffering and seek their well-being; that is because this is the proper behavioral expression of one’s feeling for them. If, in the face of the suffering of others, one feels nothing and offers no help, the fundamental flaw in one’s response is one’s emotional indifference, and a secondary flaw is the failure to act that flows from that emotional defect.

According to this “sentimentalist” approach to altruism, the question, “why should one act for the sake of others and not only for one’s own sake?” should not be answered by appealing to some notion of impartiality or some conception of well-being. That would be no better than trying to justify grief by way of impartiality or well-being. The sentimentalist simply asks us to recognize that the situation of this or that human being (or animal) rightly calls forth a certain emotional response, and the help we give is the proper expression of that sentiment.

To assess the role that sympathy should play in our relations with other human beings, it will be helpful to consider Kant’s discussion of this question in the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785). He notes that

many souls are so compassionately disposed that, without any further motive of vanity or self-interest, they find an inner pleasure in spreading joy around them. (4:398)

He is by no means contemptuous of them—on the contrary, he says that they “deserve praise and encouragement” (4:398). But not the highest praise or the strongest encouragement.

What they do not deserve, he says, is our “esteem”, because their motivation “has no genuinely moral worth”. That is because the “maxim” of what they do “lacks the moral merit of such actions done not out of inclination but out of duty” (4:398). Kant means that these people are not following a rule when they help others—a rule, rationally acceptable to all, according to which all those who are in such and such circumstances ought to be helped because it is morally right to do so. (The term “such and such circumstances” is a place-holder for a phrase stating in general terms what those circumstances are.) These compassionate people act instead on an emotional basis: they are pained by the misfortunes of others, and they know that if they offer their help, they will give themselves pleasure. That is a good motive, Kant thinks, but it ought not to be one’s sole or primary reason for helping others.

Kant elaborates on his claim by imagining a transformation in one of these sympathetic and compassionate people: suppose someone’s misfortunes have brought him sorrows that extinguish his feeling for others. He retains his power to “assist others in distress” but now “their adversity no longer stir[s] him”. He feels no “inclination” to help them, but does so nonetheless, simply because he believes he has a moral duty to do so. Kant says that when this happens, this man’s character and his action have “ moral worth”—whereas they had none before. His motive is now “incomparably the highest”—not only is it better than before, but, because it is now a moral motive, it has a kind of value that takes priority over every other kind (4:398).

What should we make of this? To begin with, we should acknowledge that if someone assists another person because he is aware of that person’s suffering and is distressed by it, he may not be acting for the most admirable of motives. For example, if you hear someone crying, and this leads you to help him, you may be motivated solely by your desire for a good night’s sleep, which you could not have had, had he continued to cry. Alleviating his pain was not your ultimate end –it was just a way to quiet him down, so that you could enjoy some peace. We might say that you “did a good thing”, but you don’t deserve any praise or admiration for doing so. But this falls far short of vindicating Kant’s claim. This is not really a case of acting compassionately, because it was not that other person’s suffering you cared about—only his crying, and only because this distressed you.

Before we move closer to the sort of case that Kant is discussing, it will be helpful to engage in a thought experiment due to Robert Nozick (1974: 42–5). He imagines an “experience machine” in which a neuroscientist manipulates your brain so that you can have any experiences of your choosing. Those experiences would be illusory, but they could be as lifelike, rich, and complex as you choose. You might, for example, enter the machine in order to have an experience exactly like that of climbing Mt. Everest; you would be lying on a table with your brain attached to the machine, but it would be exactly as though you were facing great danger, wind, cold, snow, and so on. Nozick claimed that we would not choose to plug into the machine, and rightly so, because there is much of value beyond the experiential component of our lives.

With this device in mind, let’s return to Kant’s compassionate souls who “without any further motive of vanity or self-interest, … find an inner pleasure in spreading joy around them”. We can offer them the opportunity to plug into the experience machine, and it would then seem to them as if they were “spreading joy around them”. They would not in fact be helping anyone, but it would seem to them as though they were, and that would fill them with joy. Clearly, there would be little or nothing to admire in those who would enter the machine on these terms. But what about a compassionate person who refuses this offer, and prefers to find joy in actually helping people—not merely in seeming to help them? To be more precise, we might offer someone the following choice: (a) You will experience great joy in the machine, imagining yourself to be helping others; (b) you will experience less joy outside the machine, but it will be joy taken in actually helping others. A genuinely compassionate person would choose (b). He would be giving up a certain amount of pleasure in order to be of use to others. And there is certainly something admirable about that.

According to Kant, however, there is still something of great worth that is missing in the motivation of this genuinely compassionate person, willing though he is to make some sacrifice in his own well-being for the sake of others. His reason for helping is not that it would be morally wrong to fail to do so—wrong because he would be violating a moral rule that makes it a duty for him to help them. What motivates him to aid others is simply that he is inclined to do so. If he did not take any pleasure in being of assistance, he would not do so.

We should agree with Kant that there are situations in which it would be morally wrong for one person to refuse to help another, whether that person has fellow feeling for others or not. For example, suppose a child needs to be taken to the hospital, and it so happens that you can do so at some small cost or inconvenience to yourself. Although this child is a stranger to you, you are someone who finds children adorable and likes to be with them. And so you willingly accompany the child to the hospital. Your love of children is admirable, but you would still be subject to criticism, if that were your sole motivation for assisting this child. By hypothesis, in the situation we are imagining, it would be wrong to refuse—and yet the wrongness of refusing, by hypothesis, is not one of your motives.

But Kant’s point is of limited application, for there are many other kinds of situation in which assisting others for their sake is admirable but not a moral duty. Suppose, for example, a novelist takes time away from her work each day in order to read to blind people in her community. She does not have a moral obligation to assist those people; she helps them because she loves books and she wants to spread the joy she takes in literature to others. Perhaps at some point in the future, her interests will change—she might no longer write novels, and she might get no pleasure from reading to others. She might then no longer volunteer to read to the blind. Kant must say that the help given by this writer does not deserve our “esteem” and “has no genuinely moral worth”, because she acts from inclination rather than duty. But it is implausible to withhold these words of praise. The author does not read to others merely as a means to advance her career or her own well-being. Although she enjoys reading to others, she may believe that it would be better for her to spend more of her time working on her own writing projects. She makes some sacrifices because she believes that other people’s lives will improve if she can instill in them the joy she takes in these books. Surely her motives have “moral worth” in the normal sense of that term: her reason for acting is to help others.

Recall Kant’s thought experiment in which a person full of sympathy and compassion suffers severe misfortunes that extinguish all of his feeling for others. He is still able to benefit others, and he still has a strong sense of duty. Kant seems to be implying that if such an individual continues to “assist others in distress” because he sees that he has a duty to do so, then there is no moral defect in him at all. His motivation, on the contrary, is exemplary, because it has “moral worth” (unlike the motivation of the individual who is moved by inclination and fellow feeling). Surely Kant is right that we ought not to lower our opinion of him merely because he has experienced severe misfortunes—assuming that he did not bring them on himself. He says that the adversity of others “no longer stir[s]” this poor soul, and presumably he would add that this emotional condition is not this unfortunate man’s fault either. But even if there is nothing blameworthy in this man’s emotional indifference to the good of others, it is also true that his relationship with others has been damaged . He cannot respond to others as he should. Lacking any inclination to spread joy to others, when he undertakes projects that fulfill his duty to promote their happiness or diminish their unhappiness, he will do so in a joyless, dutiful manner, thereby tarnishing the relationship he ought to have with them. If, for example, he volunteers to read to the blind, he will be unable to communicate to them a love of literature—for he himself feels no “inner pleasure” when he reads, and has no inclination to help others, due to his own suffering. When he receives news of his adult children’s misfortunes, he will not respond with sympathy or compassion—such news will simply leave him cold (although he will fulfill his parental duties, if his assistance is morally required). It would be appropriate, then, to say that this man exhibits significant moral defects. He lacks the motivation to act towards others as he should, and to feel for others as he should.

We are now in a better position to sort through the package of ideas labeled “sentimentalism” in preceding sections, and to recognize that some are far more plausible than others.

First, we should accept the sentimentalist thesis that one’s feelings can be assessed as fitting or unfitting on grounds other than their causal effect on one’s actions. We should, for example, care about what happens to our children even when we can do nothing to help them; that emotional response is appropriate because it is part of what it is to be a good parent. This point allows us to concede that in certain situations one ought to try to suppress an emotional response that would normally be appropriate. If one has a duty to minister to many people who are suffering, one may be more effective in aiding them if one keeps oneself from feeling the emotions that are fitting. A nurse working in a war zone, for example, might save more lives if she trains herself, for now, to feel little emotion when she hears the moans and cries of the wounded. She has reason to feel compassion, but that is overridden by stronger reasons to act effectively to relieve their burden.

A closely related sentimentalist point that should be accepted is that aiding someone in need, but doing so in a manifestly cold, affectless, or hostile manner is, in many situations, a defective response.

A second idea associated with sentimentalism in section 4.4 was this:

what is most important in human relationships cannot be captured by an approach that begins with a general rule about how to treat others, and justifies a certain way of treating each particular individual simply by applying that general rule.

The kernel of truth in this statement is that some of the most valuable components of our lives are not available by following a rule. We do not fall in love with people by applying a general principle, standard, or criterion about whom we ought to fall in love with. We do not develop a passion for mathematics, or history, or tennis, by seeing these pursuits as specific instances of something more general that we care about. Some of the most valuable components of our lives are available to us only if they arise spontaneously from feelings that respond to the lovable features of the world or the people in it.

But that leaves a great deal of room for the project of treating people in accordance with rules that we accept because they survive our rational scrutiny. For example, it would be absurd to suggest that we should abstain from torturing someone if (but only if) we have an untutored and negative emotional reaction to torturing him. With respect to torture, we need to respond to a general question: are there circumstances in which it would be justified? (And to answer that question, we must first ask: what is torture?) The only way to address these questions is one in which we reason our way towards a general policy—a rule, however simple or complex, that governs the use of torture. And surely such a rule should be impartial—it should be a single rule that applies to all, not tailored to serve the interests of some nations or factions to which we belong.

The same point applies to questions about everyday rules that govern such acts as promise-keeping, lying, theft, and other kinds of suspect behavior. Here too we rightly expect each other to have a general policy, one that takes these sorts of actions to be wrong in normal circumstances. That a promise has been freely made is normally a decisive reason for keeping it; someone who keeps a promise only if he has a positive feeling about doing so would not be treating others as they rightly expect to be treated. (For opposing views, see Dancy 2004; Ridge and McKeever 2006.)

A third question about the relation between our sentiments and altruism arises when we ask about the proper basis for charitable giving. Consider, for example, someone who donates money to an organization devoted to fighting cancer, and chooses to do so because his mother has died of cancer. His gift is an expression of his love for her; it is meant, of course, to do good to others, but those others are chosen as beneficiaries because he takes the reduction of this disease to be an appropriate expression of his feelings for her. Utilitarianism cannot easily accept this form of altruism, since it begins with the premise that charitable acts, like everything else, are right only if they do the most good—and it could easily be the case that money allocated to cancer research would do more good if donated to some other humanitarian cause. But if one does not presuppose the truth of utilitarianism, it is not difficult to defend the practice of choosing one charity over another on the basis of one’s sentimental attachments. If friendships and other loving relationships have a proper place in our lives even if they do not maximize the good, then sentiment is an appropriate basis for altruism. (For an opposing view, see Singer 2015.)

That does not entail that it is always right to follow our feelings when we decide whether to help this person or organization rather than that. Suppose you belong to a group dedicated to reducing the number of people who die in drowning accidents, and you are on your way to an essential meeting of this organization. If you miss the meeting, let us suppose, the group will have to suspend its operations for many months—with the result that the number of drownings will remain high. On your way, you pass a child who is in danger of drowning, and cries for your help. You must choose: either you can save this one child, or you can attend the meeting and thereby save many more from drowning. When you hear the child’s cries for help, you cannot help responding emotionally; it would be cold and calculating to pass him by, even if in doing so you will be saving many more. What ought you to do?

The fact that your emotions are fully aroused by the child’s cries does not have the same bearing on this issue as does the love felt by a son for his departed mother in the previous example. The drowning child whose cries fill you with compassionate feeling is a stranger to you. So your alternatives in this case are whether to help one stranger (the one who is tugging at your heartstrings) or many (whom you do not see or hear at the moment). It would not be implausible to hold that sentiment plays an appropriate role in altruism when it is the expression of a long-term and meaningful bond, but not when it is a short-lived reaction to the cries of a stranger.

We have found no reason to doubt that we both can and should be altruistic to some extent. To what extent? Utilitarians and consequentialists have an exact answer to that question: one is to give equal weight to the good of every human being (or every sentient creature), counting oneself as just one small part of that universal good. If that is more altruism than can be required of us, the better alternative is not to retreat to the other extreme (egoism). Rather, how much altruism is appropriate for an individual varies according to that individual’s situation in life.

Altruism is not necessarily admirable. It is to be admired only in circumstances in which it is appropriate to act for another’s sake—and only when what one aims to do for another really does benefit that individual. If one seeks what one takes to be the good of others for their sake, but is mistaken about what is really good for them, one’s action is defective. Altruism is fully admirable only when combined with a correct understanding of well-being.

What is wrong with those who do not care about others for their sake? It could be the case that such individuals are themselves worse off for their lack of altruistic motivation. That is what a eudaimonist must say, and we have not objected to that aspect of eudaimonism. It could also be the case that there is a failure of rationality among those who are never altruistic or insufficiently altruistic. But it should not be assumed that there must be something else that goes awry in those who are not altruistic or not altruistic enough, beyond the fact that when they ought to have cared about some individual other than themselves, they failed to do so.

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• Sidgwick, Henry, 1907, The Methods of Ethics , 7 th edition, Indianapolis: Hackett, 1981.
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• Skorupski, John, 2010, The Domain of Reasons , Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Slote, Michael, 1992, From Morality to Virtue , New York: Oxford University Press.
• –––, 2001, Morals From Motives , Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• –––, 2010, Moral Sentimentalism , Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• –––, 2013 From Enlightenment to Receptivity: Rethinking Our Values , Oxford: Oxford University Press
• Smith, Adam, 1759, The Theory of Moral Sentiments , Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2009.
• Sober, Elliott and David Wilson, 1998, Unto Others: The Evolution and Psychology on Unselfish Behavior , Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
• Stich, Stephen, John M. Doris, and Erica Roedder, 2010 [2012], “Altruism”, in The Moral Psychology Handbook , John M. Doris and the Moral Psychology Research Group, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 147–205; reprinted in Stephen Stich, 2012, Collected Papers (Volume 2: Knowledge, Rationality, and Morality , 1978–2010), Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 348–400.
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How to cite this entry . Preview the PDF version of this entry at the Friends of the SEP Society . Look up topics and thinkers related to this entry at the Internet Philosophy Ontology Project (InPhO). Enhanced bibliography for this entry at PhilPapers , with links to its database.

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The Necessity of Sacrifice in Serving Others

A meditation on the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in service to the cause of equality for all.

The Necessity of Sacrifice In Serving Others

George Nichols III

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On Monday, we celebrate the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., a man who lived in service to others regardless of the ongoing risks to his life. 

Even after surviving an almost fatal stabbing in 1958, King continued to lead the civil rights movement until his assassination in 1968. He sacrificed his life for a cause: a dream that he had that America could be better, do better, for the benefit of others. His adoption of nonviolent resistance to achieve equal rights for Black and Brown Americans earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964.

King recognized the need to place others before self to propel society. In a speech he gave in 1957 in Montgomery, Alabama, he stated, "Life's most persistent and urgent question is, 'What are you doing for others?'"

I am often asked by people, "What should I do to celebrate MLK Day?" I respond with three suggestions taken from King's quotes and speeches. First, "Dream and dream big!" Follow your dreams and put them into action. Hopefully, those dreams include uplifting others. Second, ask yourself the question he posed in 1957: "What are you doing for others?" Then, go do something! Third, King also said, "The time is always right to do what is right." Go do right by others today and every day!

As the holiday approaches, thoughts of Dr. King's life of service lead me to think about the things, people, and causes I believe in. What and who do you believe in? Consider yourself, the ones you love, your community, and our great nation.

This holiday, let's do more praying, demonstrate more expressions of love, and make more sacrifices to help others. Let's work to change lives in any capacity and possibly inspire others in the process. In following his dream, King lived his life with the purpose of a higher calling that was more about others than it was about himself. 

The Power of Serving Others: How Empathy and Learning Can Create a Positive Impact

Serving others is one of the most important things you can do as a human being . it involves putting the needs and well-being of others ahead of your own. and making a positive impact on the world. i’ll explore what it means to serve, why it is important, and how you incorporate this mindset into your life., recently i read a book about how someone sold over 100,000 copies of a book because of three words. the three words he was referring to were to serve the reader. that really got to me, and i’ve been thinking about service, and in what ways i can serve others. when i read the book, i was in the middle of writing leadership reading: spilling the tea on how top leaders read..

I took the author’s message to heart. When I was titling the chapters, I constantly asked myself how I was serving my readers. Would they know what to expect from the chapter based on the title? I’ve also been thinking about how you can serve others and serve yourself. I think that’s important as well.

The Definition of Serving Others

Serving others can be defined as taking action to help others expecting nothing in return. This involves a wide range of activities, from volunteering at a local charity to helping a neighbor with their groceries. Serving others is about being compassionate, and selfless, and doing what you can to make a positive impact on the world.

My Experience with Serving Others

I have always felt a strong sense of purpose when I am serving others. Whether it's  helping a friend in need or creating a product or service to help others. I have found that serving others is one of the most rewarding things I can do. It has helped me to build stronger relationships, develop new skills, and make a positive impact.

Why Serving Others is Important

There are many reasons serving others is important. It helps to make the world a better place. By taking action to help others, you create a ripple effect of positivity and kindness that inspire others to do the same. Serving others helps you develop new skills, build stronger relationships, and improve your overall well-being.

The Role of Empathy in Serving Others

Empathy is a key component of serving others. By putting yourself in someone else's shoes, you better understand their needs and how you can help them. Empathy allows you to connect with others on a deeper level, creating a sense of compassion and understanding that makes a huge difference in someone's life.

The Power of a Positive Attitude

Maintaining a positive attitude is also important when serving others. By staying optimistic and hopeful, you inspire others and create a more positive and supportive environment. A positive attitude helps you stay motivated and overcome any obstacles or challenges that may arise.

How to Incorporate Serving into Your Daily Life

Incorporating a serving mindset into your daily life is easier than you may think. Start by looking for small ways to help others, such as holding the door open for someone or offering to carry their groceries. Look for opportunities to volunteer in your community or donate to a local charity. By making serving others a habit, you create a positive impact on the world around you.

The Ripple Effect of Serving Others

One of the most powerful aspects of serving others is the ripple effect it creates. When you take action to help others, you inspire them to do the same. This creates a chain reaction of positivity and kindness that spreads far beyond your initial actions. By serving others, you create a better world for everyone.

Serving Others as Planting Seeds

Serving others is like planting seeds. When you take action to help others, you’re planting seeds of kindness and compassion that grow and spread. These seeds  inspire others to do the same, creating a beautiful garden of positivity and kindness.

Serving others is about putting the needs and well-being of others ahead of your own. And creating a positive impact on the world. By developing empathy, maintaining a positive attitude, and looking for ways to help others, you create a ripple effect of positivity and kindness that changes the world. Whether through volunteering, donating, or simply being kind to those around you, you have the power to make a difference.

Wondering what to do next, you can do all of:

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When Loving Yourself Meets Loving Your Neighbor

• American Families of Faith
• September 25, 2023

“Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,” 1 ranks as one of the most repeated verbatim command phrases in the Bible. We frequently forget, however, that this wisdom has two parts: loving our neighbors and loving ourselves. A central part of life’s journey includes finding a healthy balance or harmony between caring for ourselves (self-care) and engaging in acts of sacrifice to help others. For those who take their religion seriously, these choices often are often informed by their faith. 

In a national study about the ways that families of various faiths live their religion, we explored how religious parents and youth cared for themselves and sacrificed for others. Many of those we interviewed reportedly struggled to figure out what combination of engaging in sacrifice and engaging in self-care worked best for them, their loved ones, and others. In their interviews, we identified four central themes that can help us understand how people of faith view and manage these behaviors. These themes included: (1) Motivations for Sacrifice and Self-Care, (2) Types of Sacrifice, (3) Types of Self-Care, and (4) Harmonizing Sacrifice and Self-Care.

  Theme 1:  Motivations for Sacrifice and Self-Care

Various motivations were identified as being important reasons for engaging in both sacrifice and self-care, including: personal, familial, and religious. 

Personal motivations. David 2 , a Christian father, explained, “I was at a point where I realized I needed to be whole and complete and happy on my own and not dependent on anybody else for my happiness.” W hen discussing how selfishness was one of the biggest problems he and his wife dealt with, a father named Lyndon shared, “That’s probably what the biggest thing that we struggle with is just selfishness. I need time for me. She needs time for her.” His wife, Heidi, shared her motivation for participating in couple-based scripture study: “It is a time to be spiritually selfish and to fill up our bucket. Whenever I get frustrated or drained, at least I know we are gaining knowledge together.” Along with Lyndon and Heidi, other participants shared that it was sometimes appropriate to take time to be “selfish.”

Familial motivations. One example of self-care to meet the needs of her future family came from Jameela, an East Indian Muslim young adult woman:

I don’t want to prolong it too much, but I think the ideal age [to get married] would be after I finish up my schooling… . So I can be committed to a family, because a marriage and a family is such a big responsibility; I want to have as much of my attention that I can dedicate to my husband and ultimately my children.

Jameela demonstrated foresight as she shared how she thought about future relationships when deciding to take care of herself in the present.

Often, familial or relational motivations stemmed from a desire to make someone else happy or comfortable. Katrina, a Black Christian mother, said:

Whatever the need is, we do it all; we serve each other … whenever somebody has a baby or something, and we all just get together and serve them and make sure that her family has meals. Or she might be ill, or she needs to be hospitalized, or her husband may be out of work and have no support, whatever the need is. I mean, we all go to church, we all have each other, and I feel like … my husband and I … would be empty if we didn’t have that support from the church.

For Katrina, it seemed that her relational motivations to sacrifice stemmed from a desire to feel part of a community, to feel supported by others, and to provide similar support for others.

Participants often experienced meaning within their relationships when they engaged in acts of sacrifice. LeeAnn, a Catholic mother, explained how her religious beliefs encouraged and gave meaning to her motivations to sacrifice for family members:

[Jesus] came to teach us how to live as Christians and to live in love for each other, and I think that that really helps our family. Because of His sacrifice, sometimes maybe we might sacrifice an angry moment or something and keep it to ourselves and be kinder to each other.

Like LeeAnn, many participants suggested relational motivations that coincided with religious motivations.

Religious motivations . Calvin, a Black Baptist father, shared, “Part of … what we’re taught in our religion is giving of yourself.” Other participants appeared to share this perspective. Jimmy, an Episcopalian father, explained how his religious beliefs taught him to sacrifice: “Because I have to stand in front of God for what I did and did not do for my family … my job is to lift her burdens … so she can deal with the important stuff [like] raising kids.” Rozene, a Native American Christian mother, shared that she and her husband sacrificed because of what they felt God had told them to do:

We went to God-forsaken reservations across the United States. [I sometimes thought], This isn’t what I [was] raised for. Why am I here? What are we doing here? But … God sent us here for a reason, and I know that my husband provided much-needed care to these people, and we had roles even as young as we were.

Some of the religious motivations participants experienced came from religious teachings and beliefs, such as those shared by Jimmy, and others came from interpretations about reasons for life experiences, as Rozene shared.

Several participants expressed excitement about spiritual self-care and sacrificing for members of their congregations. Benton, a Black, Latter-day Saint father, shared how he and other members of his congregation found joy in sacrificing for others: “ Come spend a month with me at the church … [and] you’ll see a humble people, people [who] just really wanna work and do the things that the Lord has asked them to do, without pay.”

Theme 2: Types of Sacrifice

The types of sacrifice described in the interviews conducted included: food, time, school activities, social expectations, vacations, work, finances, and many others. Lee, a Christian father, shared how his family sacrificed where they lived for religious reasons.

The reasons we’ve moved so many times have been related to our work in the ministry … [we] sacrifice stability in terms of a long-term place… . We’d like, sometime, to have a place … that’s our place, so those have been sacrifices. Actually, when we moved here, we’d been in one place for a year, the kids were in public schools, and the girls especially were starting to form some friendships. That was a sacrifice to leave there and come here. I think they would say they’re glad that we’re here, and they’re glad for maybe the opportunities they have here now, but I think at first … it felt like a sacrifice.

Like Lee, several participants shared how one experience could hold multiple types of sacrifice for different members of the family. 

Not all participants immediately saw benefits from engaging in sacrifice. Scott, a Catholic teenager, shared how he had to trust others to feel better about the sacrifices he made:

I’ve been the one known on my soccer teams that’s missed a lot of games. I lost lots of games over church or [Confraternity of Christian Doctrine; CCD]. And right then, I really hate it [and] I don’t want to go to church or CCD, but then I think [of] the people I’ve talked to: They actually say it’s going to be good for you, and I guess I kind of trust that.

Many of the teenagers shared that they sacrificed peer acceptance, sometimes through not participating in sporting activities when conflicting with religious observance, partying, or impulsive behaviors with their peers.

Theme 3: Types of Self-Care

Self-care was discussed in terms of physical, spiritual, social, and mental ways of caring for oneself. Rita, a black Christian mother, shared how she engaged in many types of self-care:

I ask God to direct me and show me what to do daily; sometimes, moment by moment, I ask Him to give me directions. I also have people that I call who are prayer partners who I ask them to pray for me, to pray for guidance. I spend time with my friends that I know are very supportive, and that I can talk with [and] I talk to my husband a lot during stressful times. I also exercise a lot.

For Rita, personal prayer, supportive church sisters, friends, her husband, and consistent exercise were all part of her varied approach to self-care. Indeed, several participants included the support of others (e.g., God, friends, family members) in their examples of engaging in self-care. 

Abaan, an Arab-American Muslim father, shared some ways that he and his wife cared for their marriage: “Having common things that we do together is helpful for marriage. It could be religious practice, or it could be some hobbies that we have, that we can share.” 

Many engaged in self-care when things became stressful or they realized something needed to change. When talking about how he tried to sustain several responsibilities unsuccessfully, Russell, a Catholic father, said, “We had to change our priorities. In life, you change your priorities according to what you can handle because you can go way overboard.” Manuela, a Latina Catholic mother, repeatedly fought to balance stress with spiritual self-care:

Spiritual time, which you do on your own, is not something that you say you’re going to do. [My husband] has a lot of time at work that he’s by himself, and so he has a lot more time to do that than I do. I’m at work with people all day. Employees ask me questions. I [sometimes] have to literally go hide, from children and him and the whole world, to be able to have any peace of mind.

We now move from the need “to literally go hide” to our final theme.

Theme 4: Harmonizing Sacrifice and Self-Care

When discussing connections between faith and family, many participants alluded to a struggle when deciding what was most important: caring for their own needs or others’ needs. Despite expressing the importance of sacrificing for others, many also shared thoughts and feelings about struggling with and resolving tensions between sacrifice and self-care. Abby, a Congregationalist mother, shared her struggle and resolution:

Of all the people I’m taking care of, I need to be included in that class of all the people who need their fair share of attention and time and love… . I used to operate from this perspective of … taking care of everybody else, but not seeing that I needed to be taken care of [was a mistake].

Abby shared that she was able to overcome her tendency to ignore self-care and now has found a better personal harmony between sacrifice and self-care.

Ubayd and Baseema, Arab-American Muslims, related the tension between sacrifice and self-care from a Muslim perspective. Ubayd stated, “ There’s a saying in the Qur’an that says: ‘Take good care of your children.’” Baseema then added, “In the Qur’an, you have to take care of yourself first … but you are [also] responsible for your children.” Ubayd and Baseema were not the only participants who struggled with sacrifice and self-care in the context of their sacred texts and looked to religious beliefs, teachings, and doctrine to provide guidance. Anoki and Lulu, a Native American Methodist couple, reportedly cared for themselves by caring for others . Anoki shared, “ I think we would agree [that caring for others] is an investment [for which] we are richly rewarded.” This led Lulu to share, “No matter what you do, a lot of times you think you’re doing it to help others, but you end up getting so much more for your time.”

As we continue the theme of harmonizing sacrifice and self-care, we turn to a married Korean Christian couple, the Choi family, who offered an account that, like Anoki and Lulu’s, features cheerfully-given service as a meaningful form of self-care.

Haesun (Wife): I enjoyed the church in San Diego much better than the one here.  Oui (Husband): She served a LOT. If someone was coming from Korea and she didn’t have a car or anything, usually my wife would help the person with riding and shopping and with all kinds of stuff … Haesun: I had two Bible studies a week, and every Friday, I served my group dinner in my home. Oui: 10-20 in the group, so it was not easy. We didn’t have enough money, but she liked it very much. Haesun: …We did a lot together. Walks together on the beach. I was very happy there. They needed me, and I needed them. Interviewer:  You were happy serving others? Haesun:  Yes, they were happy, so I was happy. Here I [am not] needed [by] anybody. They are always busy with their job. I don’t have the friends, I don’t have the Bible study, I don’t have anybody [to] serve. …I am here alone.

In Haesun’s story, we see that sincere service rendered can be an optimal expression of self-care, while absence of service can result in isolation and loneliness.

For Jerome, an African Methodist father, it seemed that being able to find harmony between sacrifice and self-care was important. He said,

To reach out and love somebody, you gotta learn where you stand [and] be comfortable with where you’re at… . Then you can reach out and help someone else. Build on yourself; you gotta get that right first, then the other stuff will follow.

Desiree, an African Methodist mother, shared a specific example that seems to demonstrate the journey toward finding harmony between sacrifice and self-care:

We share our role so that whenever I’m not there or I’m frustrated, my husband takes over. So we’re complementary of each other, one can be stern, the other the comforter… . I’m with my kids all the time because I work at home. So sometimes, I get frustrated because I’m always here, and they’re always asking me questions. Because [my husband] works at night, he sleeps. Sometimes I get up to the hilt, and I have to call for reinforcement, backup, and I say, “I’m just leaving,” and he comes down. I come back thinking my house is going to be a wreck, and my house is clean, and my kids are clean, my kids are calmed down. So we just complement each other.

Eric, a Presbyterian teenager, shared a perspective that seemed to help him harmonize sacrifice and self-care when he said, “ Hurting yourself is somewhat like hurting another person; taking care of your spirit is just as important as taking care of other people’s spirits.”

Through these accounts, we learn that people of many faiths have similar struggles, including finding ways to engage in sacrifice and self-care within family relationships in ways that lessen stress and provide for more positive experiences. In Western culture, people often use the term balance to refer to the process of struggling with these two types of behaviors that often seem to be at odds with each other. However, from the devoted women and men in the present study, we learn that it may not be that we need to engage in sacrifice and self-care in ways that make them “equal.” Perhaps it is more about discerning when it is appropriate to sacrifice and when it is appropriate to take care of oneself to harmonize sacrifice and self-care. 

Many of the faithful individuals we interviewed reported that great blessings came through learning to wisely harmonize sacrifice and self-care in their lives—and that those blessings included greater love for themselves, their neighbors, and their God. They seemed to offer the collective message that the second great commandment, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,” is loving wisdom from our Creator to engage in both sacrifice and self-care.

1. See Leviticus 19:18; Matt. 19:19; Matt. 22:39; Mark 12:31; Romans 13:9; James 2:8.

2. All participants’ names are pseudonyms.

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Friendship is a place of sacrifice—and sanctification

There is a way of praising friendships that unintentionally undermines them. We often picture friendship as our refuge—romantic relationships bring drama, work brings hassle, family is chaos, but with friends you can relax. You’re understood. Friendship is “The Golden Girls,” where every tiny comic tiff is resolved by the end of the half-hour. Friendship is sweet because friendship is easy. Friendship is safe, because friendship is too small to really hurt you.

This is not the only Christian model for friendship. It isn’t even the most obvious Christian model. The greatest friendships in the Bible are sites of sacrifice. Jonathan, having made a covenant of friendship with David, gladly sacrifices personal safety, his relationship with his father and the kingship. Jesus identifies friendship with discipleship and with his own sacrifice for us on the cross, in Jn 15:13-15 (of course it’s in John, the Gospel of the “beloved disciple”): “No one has greater love than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you.” That model, in which friendship can be the site of our sanctification because it is a site of sacrifice, animates much of St. Aelred’s dialogues, Spiritual Friendship . For Aelred, friendship is sweet (he himself was called a “honeycomb” because of his tenderness toward his monks) but it also requires painful honesty, loyalty in spite of faults and selfless love.

‘Big Friendship: How We Keep Each Other Close’ by Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman offers a defense of sacrificial friendship.

As contemporary secular writers notice how attenuated our concept of friendship has become and look for ways to build lives where friendship is central, they are also rediscovering the sacrifices common to deep friendships. A new book, Big Friendship: How We Keep Each Other Close , by Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman, gives one of the best defenses of sacrificial friendship I have read in a long time.

Sow and Friedman ditched the comfort-food ideal of friendship long ago. They can write honestly about the beauties of friendship because they have also confronted some of its pain. Much of the book discusses how friends “stretch” you—and stretching hurts as it strengthens. In a glossy, hashtaggy voice, Sow and Friedman describe what it is like to live friendship for better and for worse. They sometimes sound like Insta influencers, but their questions go beyond the advice-column staples (“How can I make friends in my 30s?”) into cultural critique of the marginal role friendship plays in our institutions and imaginations: “It can be extremely hard to figure out the right amount of growth and sacrifice to be devoting to a friendship, because we’re not taught that friends are worth stretching for at all.”

Sow and Friedman are echt millennials. They started “the first culturally relevant policy nerd blog.” Their envisioned reader relates to dismissive references to the Eucharist (Friedman was raised Catholic) and thrills to the words of “This American Life.” But beyond the blank, unholy podcast of it all, being millennials means they are attuned to the economic pressures on modern friendship. They know how crucial a friend’s love and admiration is when unemployment makes you feel worthless. They found their own friendship strained by work and the distance they had to move to find work; they know they were only able to repair their bond because they had more money and leisure than many in their generation.

St. Aelred distinguishes between “carnal” and “spiritual” friendship, but he understood that at least at the beginning, most of us mingle the two.

Big Friendship opens with this friendship—once so close that they got matching tattoos of interlocking circles—already on the rocks. Sow and Friedman have booked a spa weekend together in the hopes that tandem mud baths will rekindle that BFF spark. When the weekend fails, the pair go to actual couples therapy for their friendship.

It was so easy at the start! St. Aelred distinguishes between “carnal” and “spiritual” friendship, but he understood that at least at the beginning, most of us mingle the two. Sow and Friedman bonded over trashy TV and cute handbags, but they also shaped one another in deeper ways: Together they learned to comfort, to encourage, to listen, to forgive and to seek forgiveness. They became “inextricable.”

Sow and Friedman were there for one another through mourning and chronic illness. The love and understanding they offered one another helped them learn what to look for in romantic relationships. They had keys to each other’s apartments. They were each other’s emergency contact.

Sow and Friedman were there for one another through mourning and chronic illness.

Much of the language they had for this inextricability was borrowed from romantic partnerships: “We gave wedding gifts jointly, signed, ‘Love, the Sow-Friedmans.’” Partly this is just because many forms of love resemble one another. Sow and Friedman even had their own limerence, the early period of obsessive infatuation that the lovestruck sometimes suffer. But partly we struggle for ways to explain the depth of a “big friendship” because these relationships have been pushed out of the public sphere: Friendship is for children; but once you can reach the YA shelves, messy love triangles are where it’s at.

Sow’s experience of chronic illness exposes some of the features of modern friendship that make it at once vulnerable and resilient. Friedman couldn’t be there for her physically because she had taken a job on the other side of the country. She sent care packages and urged Sow to video chat, but as Sow felt helpless in the face of pain, Friedman faced her own helplessness against distance. When I talk to people who are seeking to build lives centered on friendship, this is one of the central concerns they raise: What if one of us has to move? Most friendships will not function as an economic unit, and so friends are more likely than spouses to be separated by distance.

But friendships have the advantage that, unlike marriage, they are not exclusive. Some people will always have one BFF, but others will be able to bring several people into an equal intimacy. When Friedman could not be at Sow’s bedside, Sow’s friend Shani could; their relationship too seems familial. In the acknowledgments Sow writes, to Shani, “I know that you are my home.”

Supporting the “friendweb” trains you to put your friend’s needs first, not your own insecurity or fear.

Sow and Friedman urge friends to support one another’s other friendships. Supporting the “friendweb” trains you to put your friend’s needs first, not your own insecurity or fear. Friedman longed to be with Sow when she was hospitalized—but instead she learned to be grateful that others could take care of the woman she loved.

Their most Insta-friendly term is “Shine Theory”: “I don’t shine if you don’t shine.” This phrase is their proverb against envy. It is their version of the motto of America’s first Black women’s club, the National Association of Colored Women, “Lifting as we climb.” And it is also a declaration that friendships strengthen our other commitments and loves: “Without friends, it’s much harder to get through periods of family transition, like the death of a parent, the arrival of a baby, or an estrangement from a sibling.” Against the idea that we have limited resources to spend on love, they argue that our friends make it possible for us to give more in all the other areas of our lives.

If friendship can be so life-sustaining, how did it become so limited and marginal? Sow and Friedman talk to the historian Stephanie Coontz, who says that friendship slowly came to seem like a threat to the emerging ideal of “companionate marriage.” Basically, if your husband is supposed to be your best friend, your BFF becomes a distraction. And as Western cultures increasingly identified intimacy with sexuality, all same-sex love started to look too much like homosexuality. Coontz is right that homophobia damaged same-sex friendship; if we want more life-shaping friendships, we need to create communities where people are not scared to be thought gay. But Coontz’s account starts too late—in the 16th century, when public honor for friendship was already fading fast. Looking earlier would uncover two different models of love that could illuminate what Sow and Friedman have experienced together.

In the ancient world, pairs of men or women could promise lifelong love and companionship.

In the ancient world, pairs of men or women could promise lifelong love and companionship. They could merge their families. We see this in the Iliad, when two warriors refuse to fight one another because their grandfathers swore friendship, and in the Hebrew Bible in the vows of David and Jonathan and the promises of Ruth to Naomi. Alan Bray’s 2006 The Friend explores the public promises medieval and early modern friends could make to become kin. Sometimes these bonds were called “wedded brotherhood,” which “the Sow-Friedmans” might appreciate. These older models suggest that friendship could take on greater public meaning without losing its private sweetness.

These bonds were exclusive: David had only one vowed friend. To understand the jealousies and sweetnesses of the “friendweb,” we might turn to a different model, the monastery. In the Cistercian monastery where Aelred penned Spiritual Friendship , friendship was both sacrificial and down-to-earth: Aelred was popular enough that he had to manage his friends’ jealousy, their tendency to say, as the character Walter does in Spiritual Friendship , “Gratian has had sufficient attention.” (“Walter” was based on a real monk, who wrote Aelred’s biography and is endearingly proud of being the jealous guy from Spiritual Friendship .)

Sow and Friedman’s biggest insights are the focus on healing rifts between friends—and the attention to the specific challenges facing interracial friendships. Seemingly small racial slights become microcosms of all the ways that Sow, who is Black, has to guard herself in friendships with white people. She dreads what Big Friendship calls “the trapdoor,” the moment in which the white friend will side with the white world. And after some such “incident” comes the fear that even mentioning it will get you accused of overreacting. Silences replace safety—until an outside event forces a painful reckoning.

Big Friendship handles race adroitly. It is less well-equipped to handle the complexities of upward mobility.

Big Friendship describes in detail this reckoning in Sow and Friedman’s friendship. Friends may fear that honesty about the hurts and disappointments of even a deep interracial friendship will weaken the friends’ bond. Sow and Friedman, by contrast, show that accountability, listening, apology and reconciliation strengthen friendships—and make possible the honesty that is another name for intimacy. This is true in spite of the “harsh reality” that the “stretching” isn’t equal in these friendships: “It’s likely that the nonwhite friend is going to feel more negatively stretched, while the white friend gets to have a ‘learning experience.’”

Big Friendship handles race adroitly. Its peppy social-media voice is less well-equipped to handle the complexities of upward mobility. Sow and Friedman, having experienced some of the precariousness of the contemporary economy, treat material success as an uncomplicated good rather than as a source of moral danger. St. Aelred says “friendship...cushions adversity and chastens prosperity.” But Sow and Friedman show only the first. Out of friendship they “assured each other that it was OK to want more, to ask for more”—but is that still what you need once you have become the boss?

“Shine Theory” attempts to offer upward mobility to everyone, but money is privilege, and privilege cocoons. The richer you get, the harder it is to offer intimacy, understanding and realistic support to friends who have less money. Sow and Friedman note this dynamic in the celebrity friendship of Oprah Winfrey and Gayle King, but their ideal of mutual empowerment bars them from naming power as a temptation.

For models of sacrificial, chastening friendship, Sow and Friedman might turn to fictional meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous. The characters in Dan Barden’s 2012 neo-noir The Next Right Thing know friendship is more duty than choice for them. Without the bonds forged in the rooms, they will die.

AA’s Fifth Step, in which an alcoholic shares with one other person “the exact nature of our wrongs,” shapes the novel’s plot. On a symbolic level it becomes a kind of sacrament of friendship. To receive someone’s worst self is an honor; to share your own is a necessity. Both roles are pledges of lifelong love.

The Fifth Step is a chronicle of abuse of power. It is a reminder that the biggest friendships are the ones that remind you, as they say “in the rooms” of AA, to stay right-sized.

Eve Tushnet is the author of Gay and Catholic: Accepting My Sexuality , Finding Community, Living My Faith and Punishment: A Love Story .

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Altruism: How to Cultivate Selfless Behavior

Kendra Cherry, MS, is a psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, psychology educator, and author of the "Everything Psychology Book."

Verywell / Zoe Hansen

• Explaining Altruism

Is Being Altruistic Good?

Fostering altruism, potential pitfalls of altruism.

Altruism is the unselfish concern for other people—doing things simply out of a desire to help, not because you feel obligated to out of duty, loyalty, or religious reasons. It involves acting out of concern for the well-being of other people. 

In some cases, these acts of altruism lead people to jeopardize themselves to help others. Such behaviors are often performed unselfishly and without any expectations of reward. Other instances, known as reciprocal altruism, involve taking actions to help others with the expectation that they will offer help in return.

Examples of Altruism

Everyday life is filled with small acts of altruism, from holding the door for strangers to giving money to people in need. News stories often focus on grander cases of altruism, such as a man who dives into an icy river to rescue a drowning stranger or a donor who gives thousands of dollars to a local charity.

Some examples of altruism include:

• Doing something to help another person with no expectation of reward
• Forgoing things that may bring personal benefits if they create costs for others
• Helping someone despite personal costs or risks
• Sharing resources even in the face of scarcity
• Showing concern for someone else's well-being

Types of Altruism

Psychologists have identified several different types of altruistic behavior. These include:

• Genetic altruism : As the name suggests, this type of altruism involves engaging in altruistic acts that benefit close family members. For example, parents and other family members often engage in acts of sacrifice in order to provide for the needs of family members. 
• Reciprocal altruism : This type of altruism is based on a mutual give-and-take relationship. It involves helping another person now because they may one day be able to return the favor.
• Group-selected altruism : This involves engaging in altruistic acts for people based upon their group affiliation. People might direct their efforts toward helping people who are part of their social group or supporting social causes that benefit a specific group.
• Pure altruism : Also known as moral altruism, this form involves helping someone else, even when it is risky, without any reward. It is motivated by internalized values and morals.

What Causes Altruism?

While we may be familiar with altruism, social psychologists are interested in understanding why it occurs. What inspires these acts of kindness? What motivates people to risk their own lives to save a complete stranger?

Altruism is one aspect of what is known as prosocial behavior . Prosocial behavior refers to any action that benefits other people, no matter what the motive or how the giver benefits from the action.

While all altruistic acts are prosocial, not all prosocial behaviors are completely altruistic. We might help others for a variety of reasons such as guilt, obligation, duty, or even for rewards.

We're not sure why altruism exists, but psychologists have suggested a number of different explanations.

Psychologists have long debated whether some people are just born with a natural tendency to help others, a theory that suggests that altruism may be influenced by genetics.

Kin selection is an evolutionary theory that proposes that people are more likely to help those who are blood relatives because it will increase the odds of gene transmission to future generations, thus ensuring the continuation of shared genes. The more closely the individuals are related, the more likely people are to help.

Prosocial behaviors such as altruism, cooperativeness, and empathy may also have a genetic basis.

Brain-Based Rewards

Altruism activates reward centers in the brain . Neurobiologists have found that when a person behaves altruistically, the pleasure centers of their brain become more active.

Engaging in compassionate actions activates the areas of the brain associated with the reward system. The positive feelings created by compassionate actions then reinforce altruistic behaviors.

Environment

Interactions and relationships with others have a major influence on altruistic behavior, and socialization may have a significant impact on altruistic actions in young children.

In one study, children who observed simple reciprocal acts of altruism were far more likely to exhibit altruistic actions. On the other hand, friendly but non-altruistic actions did not inspire the same results.

Modeling altruistic actions can be an important way to foster prosocial and compassionate actions in children.

Observing prosocial behavior seems to lead to helping behavior among adults as well (though the extent to which this occurs varies based on factors like gender, culture, and individual context).

Social Norms

Society's rules, norms, and expectations can also influence whether or not people engage in altruistic behavior. The norm of reciprocity , for example, is a social expectation in which we feel pressured to help others if they have already done something for us.

For example, if your friend loaned you money for lunch a few weeks ago, you'll probably feel compelled to reciprocate when they ask you if they can borrow $100. They did something for you, now you feel obligated to do something in return.

While the definition of altruism involves doing for others without reward, there may still be cognitive incentives that are not obvious. For example, we might help others to relieve our own distress or because being kind to others upholds our view of ourselves as kind people. Other cognitive explanations include:

• Empathy : People are more likely to engage in altruistic behavior when they feel empathy for the person in distress, a suggestion known as the empathy-altruism hypothesis. Children also tend to become more altruistic as their sense of empathy develops.
• Helping relieve negative feelings : Altruistic acts may help alleviate the negative feelings associated with seeing someone else in distress, an idea referred to as the negative-state relief model. Essentially, seeing another person in trouble causes us to feel upset, distressed, or uncomfortable, but helping them reduces these negative feelings.

While altruism can have some drawbacks when taken to extremes, it is a positive force that can benefit both you and others. Altruism has a wide range of benefits, like:

• Better health : Behaving altruistically can improve physical health in a variety of ways. People who volunteer have better overall health, and regularly engaging in helping behaviors is linked to a significantly lower mortality.  
• Better mental well-being : Doing good things for other people can make you feel good about yourself and the world. Research shows that people experience increased happiness after doing good things for other people.
• Better romantic relationships : Being kind and compassionate can also lead to a better relationship with your partner, as kindness is one of the most important qualities that people across all cultures seek in a romantic partner.  

In addition to these benefits, engaging in altruism can also help improve social connections and relationships, which can ultimately play a part in improving health and wellness.

Some people come by altruistic tendencies naturally, but there are things you can do to help foster helpful behaviors in yourself and others. These include:

• Find inspiration : Look to inspirational people who engage in altruistic acts. Seeing others work to actively improve the lives of individuals and communities can inspire you to act altruistically in your own life.
• Practice empathy : Rather than distancing yourself from others, practice empathy by building connections and putting a human face on the problems you see. Consider how you would feel in that situation, and think about things that you can do to help make a difference.
• Set a goal : Find ways that you can regularly perform random acts of kindness for others. Look around you for people who may need help, or look for ways that you can volunteer in your community. Fix a meal for someone in need, help a friend with a chore, donate during a blood drive, or spend some time volunteering for a local organization.
• Make it a habit : Try to keep kindness in the forefront of your thoughts. For example, think about the altruistic acts you've performed, how they might have helped someone, and how you might repeat them going forward. Or, consider performing at least one act of kindness a day, and take some time to reflect on it.

There can be some possible drawbacks and difficulties to altruism, like:

• It can sometimes create risk. People may engage in altruistic acts that can place them in danger.
• It may sometimes lead people to neglect their own health, social, or financial needs in order to care for others.
• While acts of altruism may be done with good intentions, they don't always lead to positive outcomes.
• It may lead people to focus their efforts on one cause while neglecting others.

People who work in helping professions may find themselves emotionally overwhelmed by caring for and helping others. In a more severe example, a person who altruistically adopts animals may shift into animal hoarding , reaching a point where they can no longer house or care for the animals they have taken in.

Despite these potential problems, altruism is generally a positive force in the world, and it's a skill worth developing.

Cortes Barragan R, Dweck CS. Rethinking natural altruism: Simple reciprocal interactions trigger children's benevolence . Proc Natl Acad Sci USA . 2014;111(48):17071-4. doi:10.1073/pnas.1419408111

Sisco MR, Weber EU. Examining charitable giving in real-world online donations . Nat Commun . 2019;10(1):3968. doi:10.1038/s41467-019-11852-z

Reuter M, Frenzel C, Walter NT, Markett S, Montag C. Investigating the genetic basis of altruism: The role of the COMT Val158Met polymorphism .  Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci . 2011;6(5):662-668. doi:10.1093/scan/nsq083

Klimecki OM, Leiberg S, Ricard M, Singer T. Differential pattern of functional brain plasticity after compassion and empathy training . Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci . 2014;9(6):873-9. doi:10.1093/scan/nst060

Jung H, Seo E, Han E, Henderson MD, Patall EA. Prosocial modeling: A meta-analytic review and synthesis .  Psychol Bull . 2020;146(8):635-663. doi:10.1037/bul0000235

Poulin MJ, Brown SL, Dillard AJ, Smith DM. Giving to others and the association between stress and mortality . Am J Public Health . 2013;103(9):1649–55. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2012.300876

Post SG. It’s good to be good: 2011 fifth annual scientific report on health, happiness and helping others .  IJPCM . 2011;1(4):814-829. doi:10.5750/ijpcm.v1i4.154

Thomas AG, Jonason PK, Blackburn JD, et al. Mate preference priorities in the East and West: A cross‐cultural test of the mate preference priority model .  J Pers . 2020;88(3):606-620. doi:10.1111/jopy.12514

By Kendra Cherry, MSEd Kendra Cherry, MS, is a psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, psychology educator, and author of the "Everything Psychology Book."

Self Sacrifice: Finding Balance Between Giving and Self-Care

• Felix Prasetyo
• Updated February 29, 2024
• February 29, 2024
• Category    Affirmations and Words of Encouragement

Table of Contents

Ever thought about putting others’ needs before your own? That’s the heart of self-sacrifice. It’s that moment when you give up something precious for someone else’s benefit. It’s not just about grand gestures; sometimes, it’s the small acts of kindness that truly count.

Diving into the world of self-sacrifice, you’ll find it’s a complex blend of altruism and personal growth. It’s about understanding the balance between helping others and not losing yourself in the process. Ready to explore how this noble act can change lives and perspectives? Let’s immerse.

Overview of Self Sacrifice

Self sacrifice isn’t just a high-minded concept; it’s a daily reality filled with actions big and small. You’ve witnessed it, maybe you’ve lived it. That moment when someone puts their needs on the back burner to help another? That’s the heart of self sacrifice.

Research shows that acts of self sacrifice are often rooted in attachment . When you’re attached to someone—a friend, a family member, even a pet—your natural inclination is to support and protect them. Studies in psychology suggest that strong attachments can boost the likelihood of self-sacrificial behavior. Think of parents working extra shifts to afford their child’s education, or a friend lending a listening ear after a tough day. These actions stem from a bond that prioritizes the well-being of another over personal convenience.

But self sacrifice extends beyond personal attachments. It can manifest in gestures aimed at larger communities or causes. Donating to a charity, volunteering for environmental clean-ups, and advocating for social justice are all forms of self sacrifice where the attachment is to a broader goal or collective need rather than an individual.

Self sacrifice is a complex blend of altruism and personal growth. Engaging in self-sacrificial acts doesn’t just benefit the receiver; it fosters a sense of fulfillment and identity in the giver. This interplay between giving and growing demonstrates the multifaceted nature of self sacrifice. It’s not just about what you give up but also what you gain in understanding, compassion, and connection.

Embrace the moments of self sacrifice in your life, recognizing them as opportunities for growth and deeper connection. Whether it’s lending a hand without expecting anything in return or stepping back so others can step forward, self sacrifice shapes not just the lives of those you help but your own journey as well.

The Meaning of Self Sacrifice

Definition of self sacrifice.

Self-sacrifice is all about putting the needs and well-being of others ahead of your own. It’s that moment when you’ve only got one slice of pizza left and you offer it to your friend who’s still hungry, knowing deep down your stomach won’t forgive you. But it’s also much more profound than pizza dilemmas. It involves actions driven by genuine concern for others, sometimes at a significant personal cost. Think of firefighters who rush into blazing buildings or a parent working two jobs to ensure their child can attend college. These acts aren’t just for show; they stem from a place of deep care and attachment to those they’re helping.

The Importance of Self Sacrifice

You might wonder, why go through all this bother? Why not just focus on your own happiness and let everyone else handle their own issues? Well, self-sacrifice plays a critical role not only in maintaining societal bonds but also in personal growth. Research suggests that acts of self-sacrifice can strengthen relationships, creating a deeper sense of attachment and trust between individuals. It’s like when you lend your favorite book to a friend, knowing well that it might return with dog-eared pages, but the joy it brings them makes it worth the risk.

Also, self-sacrifice often leads to a stronger sense of identity and fulfillment. There’s something incredibly rewarding about knowing your actions have made a positive impact on someone else’s life. It’s as if by helping others, you carve out a more significant place for yourself in the world. Interestingly, studies have shown that people who engage in self-sacrificial behaviors tend to report higher levels of happiness and satisfaction with life. So, in a way, while you’re busy lifting others, you’re also giving yourself a hefty boost.

Remember, self-sacrifice doesn’t always mean going to extreme lengths. Simple acts of kindness, like listening intently to someone’s problems without glancing at your phone or volunteering a few hours at a local shelter, are potent forms of self-sacrifice. It’s about being attached to something bigger than yourself and recognizing the power of putting others first.

Examples of Self Sacrifice in History

Self sacrifice in war.

Right off the bat, let’s talk about wars. They’re not just battles and strategies; they’re stories of intense self-sacrifice. Soldiers, often driven by a strong attachment to their country and comrades, have performed acts of bravery that define self-sacrifice. Take, for example, medics who dash through gunfire to save a fallen comrade or soldiers who throw themselves on grenades to protect their squad. These aren’t just actions; they’re powerful statements about putting others’ lives before one’s own.

Self Sacrifice in Medicine

Moving to a different battlefield, the medical field is rife with self-sacrifice. Doctors, nurses, and medical workers, attached to the well-being of their patients above all, often work long hours in high-risk environments, especially noticeable during pandemics. Historical figures like Florence Nightingale and Dr. Li Wenliang have become icons of self-sacrifice in medicine, dedicating their lives, sometimes at great personal cost, to the care of others. These professionals embody the essence of self-sacrifice by prioritizing the health and safety of the public over their own.

Self Sacrifice in Social Movements

When it comes to social movements, self-sacrifice takes on a more collective form. Individuals deeply attached to a cause or a community have often placed themselves in harm’s way to champion rights and justice. Civil rights activists like Martin Luther King Jr. or suffragettes who fought for women’s voting rights showcased tremendous self-sacrifice. They endured imprisonment, physical harm, and societal backlash with the belief that their struggles would lead to a greater good for future generations. Their attachment to their cause and the wider community drove them to acts of self-sacrifice that have shaped history.

The Psychology of Self Sacrifice

Motivations Behind Self Sacrifice

You might wonder why someone would put themselves in harm’s way for others. Well, the motives behind self-sacrifice are as varied as they are fascinating. At the heart of these acts lies a complex mix of altruism, empathy, and the deep-seated need for social connection. Research shows that altruism —the selfless concern for the well-being of others—plays a significant role.

People often act out of empathy , feeling a powerful connection to the plight of others and an irresistible urge to help. Then there’s the attachment factor. Those with strong attachments to family, friends, or causes often find themselves more inclined to act in self-sacrificing ways. It’s like your Mom diving into a messy school project the night before it’s due—except on another level.

The Impact of Self Sacrifice on Mental Health

Engaging in self-sacrifice can be a double-edged sword for your mental health. On one side, it’s been linked with profound personal growth and a heightened sense of fulfillment. You know, that warm, fuzzy feeling you get when you’ve done something good for someone else without expecting anything in return? Yeah, that’s it.

But, it’s crucial to strike a balance. Constant self-sacrifice without regard for personal well-being can lead to burnout, stress, and even resentment. Studies highlight the importance of maintaining a healthy boundary between helping others and taking care of oneself. It’s a bit like being told you should put your oxygen mask on first before helping others – it’s not selfish; it’s necessary.

By understanding the psychological underpinnings of self-sacrifice, you’re better equipped to engage in such acts more healthily and sustainably. Essentially, it’s about finding that sweet spot where you can be there for others without losing yourself in the process. And remember, even heroes need a break.

The Ethics of Self Sacrifice

Is self sacrifice always noble.

You might think self-sacrifice is the ultimate act of nobility, but let’s dive a bit deeper. Is it always noble to put others before yourself? Experts in ethics and psychology argue that the context greatly matters.

For instance, donating blood to save a life is a universally applauded act of self-sacrifice. But, consistently neglecting your needs to the detriment of your health or happiness might not be noble but rather a misplaced sense of duty. Research shows that motivations for self-sacrifice can range from genuine altruism to a desire for social approval or a deep-seated need to feel needed.

Attachment plays a significant role here. People deeply attached to family, friends, or causes are more likely to engage in self-sacrificial behaviors. Yet, it’s crucial to question whether these actions stem from a healthy place. Does sacrificing your well-being genuinely benefit those you’re attached to, or does it create an unsustainable dynamic?

Balancing Self Sacrifice with Self Care

Finding the sweet spot between helping others and taking care of yourself isn’t easy, but it’s necessary. You’ve probably heard the saying, “You can’t pour from an empty cup.” Well, it’s not just a cliche; it’s backed by science. Studies indicate that people who maintain a healthy balance between self-sacrifice and self-care are not only happier but also more effective in their altruistic endeavors.

Here’s how you can start balancing the two:

• Recognize the signs of burnout. Constant tiredness, irritability, and feeling overwhelmed are red flags.
• Set healthy boundaries. It’s okay to say no or to limit the help you offer to what’s reasonable and sustainable for you.
• Incorporate self-care rituals. Whether it’s a hobby, exercise, or simply quiet time, make sure to recharge your batteries.

Self-care isn’t selfish; it’s a critical component of being able to help others sustainably. Remember, looking after yourself doesn’t mean you’re not committed to those you’re attached to. It means you’re ensuring you’re in the best position to support them, without sacrificing your own well-being. Your ability to help others can actually grow when you’re healthy, both mentally and physically.

So, next time you’re contemplating a self-sacrificial act, consider not only the immediate benefits but also the long-term effects on both you and those you’re attached to.

The Rewards of Self Sacrifice

Personal Growth and Fulfillment

When you think of self-sacrifice, personal growth and fulfillment might not be the first benefits that come to mind. Yet, diving into self-sacrifice often leads to profound personal development. Studies show that acts of giving, even in small doses, can enhance your sense of wellbeing. For instance, helping out a neighbor or volunteering at a local charity not only benefits those you’re helping but also enriches your life with purpose and happiness. This isn’t just feel-good fluff; it’s backed by research demonstrating that altruistic behavior can boost your mood and even lead to longer life spans.

Getting attached to causes or communities beyond your immediate concerns allows you to develop a deeper sense of identity. You begin to see yourself not just as an individual, but as a crucial part of a larger narrative. Each self-sacrificial act, then, isn’t a loss but an investment in this greater sense of self. Personal growth isn’t always about climbing mountains or hitting personal bests in the gym; sometimes, it’s about the quiet strength gained from putting others first.

Building Strong Relationships

Let’s talk relationships. Self-sacrifice is like the secret sauce to building stronger, more meaningful connections. When you put the needs of friends, family, or even that one coworker you barely know before your own, you’re doing more than just a good deed – you’re laying the bricks for deeper, more resilient attachments. People tend to reciprocate kindness, so your acts of self-sacrifice often come full circle, strengthening the bonds you share.

Being deeply attached to someone often means you’re willing to sacrifice for their happiness or well-being. This isn’t about grand gestures; even the smallest acts can amplify the sense of trust and loyalty in a relationship. Remember, it’s about the quality, not the quantity, of these gestures. Researchers have found that partners who regularly engage in self-sacrificial acts report higher satisfaction within their relationships. This doesn’t mean you should lose yourself to the needs of others but finding that balance can make your connections richer and more gratifying.

So, whether it’s lending an ear to a friend in need or going the extra mile for your partner, these moments of self-sacrifice can weave stronger threads of attachment and trust in your relationships. And as you navigate the complex dance of give-and-take, you’ll likely find that the more you give, the more you’re bound to receive – in friendship, love, and the rich world of human connection.

The Power of Self Sacrifice

You might not wake up thinking about how to sacrifice your time or resources today, but embracing the power of self-sacrifice could change your life—and someone else’s—in unexpected ways. It’s all about finding the sweet spot where your actions positively impact others while also enriching your own life .

Studies show that self-sacrifice, or putting others’ needs before your own, isn’t just noble; it’s beneficial for you too. For example, psychologists argue that acts of giving are often linked to increased well-being. Think of those moments when you’ve helped a friend move or donated to a cause you care about. Sure, you might’ve lost a Saturday or some cash, but didn’t you feel pretty great afterward?

Self-sacrifice also deepens attachments. Whether it’s with family, friends, or a broader community, sacrificing your time or energy for the benefit of others strengthens bonds. It’s like, by giving a piece of yourself, you’re actually building stronger connections.

But let’s get real for a second. There’s a study from the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology that highlights a fascinating twist: individuals who engage in self-sacrifice for the sake of their relationships report higher levels of personal fulfillment. So, while you’re out there thinking you’re only helping your buddy, your brain’s getting a healthy dose of happiness hormones.

Before you go out and give away all your worldly possessions or sign up for every volunteer opportunity under the sun, remember it’s about balance. Sacrificing for others should not come at the cost of your own well-being. It’s possible to be too attached to the idea of self-sacrifice.

In essence, self-sacrifice has the power to elevate your sense of purpose and connection in life. But it’s crucial to approach it with a mindset that seeks harmony between helping others and preserving your own health and happiness.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is self-sacrifice.

Self-sacrifice involves putting the needs of others before your own. It can manifest through both grand gestures and everyday acts of kindness, focusing on altruism and personal growth.

Can self-sacrifice lead to personal growth?

Yes, engaging in self-sacrificial acts not only benefits the recipient but also promotes a sense of fulfillment and identity in the giver, leading to personal growth and increased well-being.

How does self-sacrifice affect relationships?

Self-sacrifice can strengthen relationships and create deeper connections by prioritizing the needs of others, which leads to more meaningful and stronger attachments.

Is self-sacrifice always beneficial?

While self-sacrifice can yield immense rewards such as enhanced well-being and deeper relationships, it’s crucial to recognize signs of burnout and maintain a balance with self-care to prevent adverse effects.

How can one balance self-sacrifice with self-care?

Finding a balance involves recognizing the importance of your own needs alongside others’. It’s essential to set healthy boundaries, practice self-care rituals, and ensure that acts of giving do not deplete your own well-being.

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The Neuroscience of Giving

Proof that helping others helps you..

Posted April 24, 2014 | Reviewed by Jessica Schrader

The altruism center of the brain is considered a "deep brain structure," part of the primitive brain. We know when we see a child in trouble, our instincts kick in and we spring into action before we can even think.

Humans are social animals, so it is no surprise that we are wired to help one another. In our complex modern society, there are many ways to give and the good news is that we now understand that both the giver and receiver benefit from the relationship. Neuroscience has demonstrated that giving is a powerful pathway for creating more personal joy and improving overall health.

While the brain is remarkably complex, the neurochemical drivers of happiness are quite easy to identify. Dopamine , serotonin, and oxytocin make up the Happiness Trifecta . Any activity that increases the production of these neurochemicals will cause a boost in mood. It’s really that simple.

But the benefits don’t stop at moods! Serotonin is connected to sleep, digestion, memory , learning, and appetite . Dopamine is connected to motivation and arousal. Oxytocin “the cuddle hormone ” is among the most ancient of our neurochemicals and has a powerful effect on the brain and the body. When oxytocin begins to flow, blood pressure decreases and the foundation for sexual arousal is built. Bonding increases, social fears are reduced and trust and empathy are enhanced. Oxytocin is also an anti-inflammatory and reduces pain and enhances wound healing.

So if giving allows us to secrete all the chemicals at once, we owe it to ourselves to give as often as possible!

Helping others can take on many forms. Small repeated boosts of the Happiness Trifecta will produce the most benefit so find ways to give and to give often. Opening a door, helping a stranger change a tire, donating money or time, and giving advice are all wonderful ways to give. Anytime we step outside of ourselves long enough to help someone else, something wonderful is waiting for us when we return: the Happiness Trifecta neurochemicals are all boosted!

Helping others triggers impacts to our brain in many positive ways:

Empathy : There are structures in the brain that are dedicated to helping you see things from the perspectives of others, so these mental processes get some great exercise when you put yourself in the shoes of another person and try to give them what they need.

Mirror Neurons : Helping others is often a highly social activity, which creates a beautiful cycle of smiling. When you smile the whole world smiles with you because you are triggering their mirror neurons. Both the giver and the receiver can directly impact the other's brain in a positive way.

The Happiness Trifecta: Helping others triggers a release of oxytocin, which has the effect of boosting your mood and counteracts the effects of cortisol (the dreaded stress hormone). Interestingly, the higher your levels of oxytocin, the more you want to help others. When oxytocin is boosted, so are serotonin and dopamine!

When most people think of giving, they may have too narrow a focus. All giving works wonders, not just cash given once or twice a year. How can you help others? Is there a cause you support? A friend that needs help? A stranger that needs a random act of kindness? You should fill every day with small acts of giving, as this is an effective way to bring happiness to yourself and others. Even just smiling at someone is an act of giving and will brighten both of your days. Starbucks owes its extraordinary success not just to the addictive powers of caffeine, but also to the power of the smile. You can give one away multiple times a day at no cost, and in the process boost your mood and your health.

Don’t limit yourself to stock phrases. The next time you check out at the grocery store, try telling the person, “I hope everyone is nice to you today!” You’re almost guaranteed to get a smile. "Great to see you!" and "You did a good job on that project!” cost you nothing, yet everyone gains. Combine the words with a smile and you’ll boost your investment and your return.

So give, give often, and bask in the mental and physical effects of your actions.

Eva Ritvo, M.D. , is an internationally-known speaker, best-selling author, vitality expert, and psychiatrist with a practice in Miami Beach.

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Student Essays

Essay on Sacrifice | Types, Value & Importance of Sacrifice in Life

The concept of sacrifice is central to many religious traditions and also has an important place in secular societies. It is often considered a noble thing: The word “sacrifice” comes from the Latin sacrificium, which meant the performance of sacred rites in exchange for something or on someone’s behalf. This etymology implies that sacrifices are performed for the sake of something else, and usually to please a god or spirit.

Essay on Sacrifice & its Importance in Life

Sacrifice is a word with many meanings. In everyday usage, it refers to any event in which someone gives up something that he or she values highly for the sake of something else regarded as more important or worthy. It can be defined as an act of giving up something highly valued, but it also means the surrendering of goods and property.

It is an act or instance of surrendering something, for example a battle or one’s life, especially to the enemy under the compulsion of direst necessity. It is an inconvenience or difficulty that causes someone to suffer so as to achieve a desired result.

>>>> Related Essay: Life of a Soldier Essay for Students

Types of Sacrifice

Personal sacrifice – this means sacrificing for other people rather than sacrificing for self. Personal sacrifices can be made through giving time, energy or money Personal sacrifice usually involves doing things that do not benefit you at all but give you inner satisfaction about helping others. The second type of sacrifice is religious sacrifice, which is associated with piety.

This type of sacrifice is mainly practiced at temples or places of worship. It involves offering items such as food, money or other valuables to please a god or an idol in the hope of getting some thing valuable in return for example prosperity and good luck in life. The third one is sacrifice in war which means giving up something very important for your country i.e., your people’s safety by sacrificing your life for them.

Finally, the fourth type is self-sacrifice which means giving up something of yours without any hope of getting anything valuable in return i.e., example when you give your life to save others or you jump before a moving train so that the people behind you can live their lives happily.

Value of Sacrifice in Life

In life, we need to put some value on things, if you want something more valuable in return for a less valued thing you sacrifice it. Example: when we go shopping with our mom and we see the most beautiful dress we ever saw in our lives and we really like it and ask our mothers can I buy that?

And she says no, because you have a lot of clothes at home and if we buy that one dress now, then we will need to sacrifice something else which was much valuable or needed more. Sacrifice is a way to distribute limited resources across competing needs.

Importance of Sacrifice

Sacrifice means to make a sacrifice and offering up. It can be an animal, goods or property that is sacrificed. A sacrifice may also mean that you put forward your own interests in favor of someone else’s interest or well-being. The act of sacrificing something such as time, comfort, money etc., for the sake of achieving something more important.

Example of sacrifice is you are hungry and want some delicious food, but your mother wants you to study for exams, so the benefit of getting the delicious food goes out of window as you choose to study.

Benefits of Sacrifice

It mean that something more valuable will be achieved through sacrificing what is less valued or giving up something. In an employee’s point of view, they perform extra work in order to receive a promotion or a reward, the reward is something valuable it means you don’t have to sacrifice but receive more valuable things in return.

In the corporate world, you have to put yourself ahead of your company and do some very hard tasks that others may not do, this is because it will make you more valuable and help your company to grow. For achieving something valuable or increasing the value of an object we need to sacrifice something.

>>>> Related Post: Essay on My Favorite Author Robinder Nath Tagore

Sacrifices take place in almost every field of life, from the corporate world to religious places. Sacrifice is a way to get more valuable rewards by means of giving up something less valued for it. In today’s time we see everything seems to be getting expensive and difficult for us that our basic needs are no longer fulfilled, because we spend most of our money on some unimportant things that has no benefit to us. A lot of self-sacrifice is required in order to bring some changes in our lives, be it the personal life or the professional life.

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Greater Good Science Center • Magazine • In Action • In Education

Can Helping Others Help You Find Meaning in Life?

The idea that helping others is part of a meaningful life has been around for thousands of years. Aristotle wrote that finding happiness and fulfillment is achieved “by loving rather than in being loved.” According to the psychologist Carol Ryff, who reviewed the writings of numerous philosophers throughout history, relationships with others are “ a central feature of a positive, well-lived life .”

Yet today many of us seem to be struggling to find meaning by gathering up achievements, spending so much time at work that we’re cut off from other people.

Are we headed down the wrong path? New research is providing more and more evidence that kind and helpful behavior causes us to feel that our lives are meaningful, and discovering what we can do to reap those benefits.

Relationships and the meaningful life

Often, psychologists have distinguished between two types of well-being: hedonic well-being (a sense of happiness) and eudaimonic well-being (a sense of meaning and purpose). Although happiness and meaning overlap significantly, researchers suspected that helping others is especially crucial to developing a sense of meaning.

A recent study by Roy Baumeister at Florida State University sought to investigate this and other differences between happiness and meaning. In a survey of over 300 participants, the researchers looked for traits and behaviors that were related to happiness (but not meaningfulness) and vice versa. The researchers found that having strong social connections was important for both happiness and meaningfulness. However, helping others in need and identifying oneself as a “giver” in relationships were related to meaning alone. 

Baumeister points out that a meaningful life is different for everyone (since the cultural messages we have been exposed to can impact what we see as meaningful). However, the research on meaning in life points to one factor that appears to be important for all of us: developing high-quality relationships.

Does helping promote a sense of meaning?

But does behaving in a kind and helpful way (“prosocially”) actually cause us to feel that our lives have more meaning? While it may seem intuitive that helping others goes along with a meaningful life, it’s possible to imagine a variety of different explanations for this: Perhaps those who feel like their lives have meaning are more motivated to help others, or perhaps some other factor (for example, being religious) causes people to be helpful and experience more meaning in their life.

A recent article published in The Journal of Positive Psychology by Daryl Van Tongeren and his colleagues sought to examine this relationship. In a preliminary study, the researchers asked over 400 participants to report on how frequently they engage in different altruistic behaviors (such as volunteering) and how meaningful their life feels. Participants who were more altruistic reported a greater sense of purpose and meaning in their lives.

More on Kindness

Practice kindness (and boost your sense of meaning in life) with these practices:

• Random Acts of Kindness : Feel happier by doing things for others.
• Feeling Connected : A writing exercise to foster connection and kindness.
• Loving-Kindness Meditation : Strengthen feelings of kindness and connection toward others.
• Reminders of Connectedness : A subtle way to induce kindness, particularly in kids.
• Encouraging Kindness in Kids : Praise kids in ways that make them more kind.

In a second study, the researchers sought to assess whether expressing gratitude , which is considered a prosocial emotion , could actually cause participants to report a greater sense of meaning. In this study, some participants wrote letters of gratitude to someone who had impacted their lives, while some participants wrote about other topics. The researchers found that participants who wrote gratitude letters subsequently reported that their lives were more meaningful than did other participants. Importantly, this study addresses the issue of causality; since participants were randomly assigned to write about gratitude or other topics, it appears that expressing a prosocial emotion actually increased their sense of purpose.

Why does helping make life more meaningful?

According to Van Tongeren, engaging in altruistic acts may allow us to find fulfillment because it improves our relationships. To test out this idea, the researchers asked participants about their prosocial behavior, meaning in life, and level of relationship satisfaction. They found that prosocial behavior and meaning in life were linked, and that relationship satisfaction—in other words, the quality of people’s relationships—partially accounted for that link.

Another factor that might come into play is detailed in a 2010 study published in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology . According to this article, when we choose to engage in prosocial actions, it helps to meet our basic psychological needs: for autonomy (feeling that we have freely chosen our actions), competence (feeling that we are good and capable), and relatedness (feeling close to others).

In one study testing this idea, participants were either allowed to choose to give money to someone else in the study, or told by the researchers how much money to give. For participants who freely chose how much to give (although not for participants who were told how much to give), giving more money was related to higher well-being and to feeling that their psychological needs were met. Importantly, that feeling accounted for the link between giving and well-being, suggesting that giving may improve well-being because it helps us meet our psychological needs.

Taken together, these two studies suggest that helping others is beneficial because it fulfills basic human needs—and that altruism may be especially important for strengthening our relationships and connecting us with others.

How to increase your sense of meaning

The research described above suggests that giving helps us feel more connected to others, which imbues our lives with a sense of meaning. Do you want to live a more meaningful life? The suggestions below can help you take the first steps.

• Start small. You don’t need to begin with grand gestures; even small, everyday behaviors can have an impact on others and on your own sense of well-being. For example, in a study published in Science , spending just five dollars on someone else led to boosts in happiness. The Eliciting Altruism practice includes strategies for starting a habit of kindness and generosity, such as reminding yourself of your connections to others and identifying with individuals who may need your help.
• Make your helping count. It turns out that not all types of giving have the same effects on us. The Making Giving Feel Good practice offers strategies for how to help others in a way that boosts your own sense of happiness and well-being. In particular, helping others can be especially effective when you can see the specific impact that your actions have.
• Take time to thank others. As the research presented here has shown, expressing gratitude towards others can be a prosocial act, too. When others take time to do something nice for you, making them feel appreciated can help build your relationship with them and make your life more meaningful. This exercise offers suggestions for how to write a Gratitude Letter like the ones in Van Tongeren’s study.

Recent research has provided evidence to support the idea that helping others goes hand in hand with meaningfulness. It’s not just that people who have already found their purpose in life enjoy giving back. Instead, helping others can actually create the sense of meaning we’re seeking. Rather than ruminating on what makes our life worthwhile as we work toward burnout, we can find the answer outside ourselves, in human connection.

About the Author

Elizabeth Hopper

Elizabeth Hopper, Ph.D. , received her Ph.D. in psychology from UC Santa Barbara and currently works as a freelance science writer specializing in psychology and mental health.

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Home — Essay Samples — Life — Life Experiences — Sacrifices

Essays About Sacrifices

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My Personal Story of The Sacrifices Made by My Parent in Order to Give Me a Good Education

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Sacrificium ; Selflessly giving or risking one’s life ; Self-sacrifice

A sacrifice is a selfless act in which a person actively puts their life in danger to protect their sacred values or for the benefit of others. While psychological research has often considered the (real or imputed) willingness to make a sacrifice a distinguishing feature of heroes, historical and sociological scholarship has focused on the various functions that narratives of heroic sacrifice serve for a community, for example, to comfort, to mobilize, to self-affirm, and/or to legitimize actions.

Psychological Research

Based on an understanding of heroism as a form of pro-social behavior that involves deliberate risk-taking, recent research in the field of psychology has recognized the willingness to make a sacrifice as a central feature of heroes (Allison et al. 2017 ; Zimbardo 2007 ; Best 2011 ). Some researchers make sacrifice a part of their definitions of heroism. For example, Franco et al. ( 2011...

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Feitscher, G., Gölz, O. (2023). Sacrifice. In: Encyclopedia of Heroism Studies. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17125-3_406-1

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“Love Is Sacrifice”: Learning To Be Selfless In Your Relationship

The art of sacrifice can be important when building a selfless and fulfilling relationship between two people. Individuals who prioritize their partner’s needs and well-being while being skilled at compromise are often successful in relationships because of the sacrifices they make. Sacrifice can seem one-sided at times, but it usually benefits both partners and promotes individual growth at the same time. Between partners, sacrifice can develop a sense of trust, intimacy, and respect. For individuals, it can develop boundaries, communication, and reflection. However, there normally needs to be a healthy balance between sacrifice and taking care of oneself. Sacrificing too much without balancing it out can lead to resentment, while only prioritizing individual needs can be inconsiderate to a partner. Understanding the benefits of sacrifice, learning strategies to maintain a healthy balance, and practicing effective communication can help individuals build healthy relationships on a foundation of respect and trust. Individual or couples therapy may help you strike the right balance between self-care and sacrifice in your relationship.

The role of sacrifice in a fulfilling relationship

Building a solid and loving partnership often requires sacrifice from both partners. Putting a partner's needs and well-being ahead of your own and making compromises for the sake of the relationship can be great examples of sacrifice. These examples often demonstrate a willingness to work together and prioritize the relationship over individual needs. 

Selflessness can also lead to increased happiness and satisfaction for both partners.  Time supports these ideas: "Scientific research provides compelling details to support the anecdotal evidence that giving is a powerful pathway to personal growth and lasting happiness. Through fMRI technology, we now know that giving activates the same parts of the brain that are stimulated by food and sex. Experiments show evidence that altruism is hardwired in the brain—and it's pleasurable. Helping others may just be the secret to living a life that is not only happier but also healthier, wealthier, more productive, and meaningful.”

When both partners are willing to sacrifice for each other, it can create trust and intimacy for both partners. This can lead to a deeper emotional connection, greater understanding, and improved communication. 

Strategies for prioritizing your partner's needs

Understanding how a partner expresses love can be an important aspect of building a healthy and fulfilling relationship. Everyone tends to have different ways of expressing and receiving love, so taking the time to understand a partner's unique love language can show them they are valued in a way that is meaningful to them. 

Effective communication and active listening can also be crucial components of a healthy relationship and sacrifice. It can be important to listen to your partner's needs, concerns, and desires while also communicating openly and honestly about your own.

Time quotes a study in which “participants were asked to record instances in which either spouse put aside personal wishes in order to meet their partner’s needs” for two weeks. Researchers assumed “the couples would reap the most benefits when acts of kindness were recognized and acknowledged—and that hypothesis proved true, for both husbands and wives. But they also found that givers reported emotional boosts even when their actions weren’t consciously noticed. In these cases, emotional benefits for the giver were about 45% greater than the benefits for the recipient.”

Showing a partner their needs and wants are valued usually involves actively prioritizing their well-being and happiness. This is not always limited to small gestures of kindness and thoughtfulness; it can also include more significant acts of sacrifice and compromise. Understanding a partner and their needs, practicing active listening and communication, and showing them that you value them can build a strong and fulfilling relationship based on mutual respect.

Maintaining a healthy balance between self-care and sacrifice

Sacrifice and selflessness are frequently important in a relationship, but understanding the importance of self-care can also be crucial. Compromise can be an important component of a successful relationship, but it typically needs to be balanced with prioritizing your own needs. Recognizing when you're sacrificing too much and when to prioritize your own needs can be challenging, but it can also be essential for maintaining a healthy balance in the relationship. Signs of sacrificing too much can include: 

Feelings of resentment toward a partner

Neglecting your own needs and desires 

Feeling burnt out in the relationship

The challenges of building a selfless relationship

Building a selfless and fulfilling relationship can be challenging, and putting your partner's needs before your own may not come naturally. One of the challenges of putting your partner's needs before your own may be the potential for feeling neglected or resentful if your own needs are not being met in the same way. Setting healthy boundaries in a relationship can be an effective way to address this challenge. This may involve respectfully communicating your needs and limits, setting boundaries, or being willing to say no or take a step back when necessary. 

Conflict can be inevitable in any relationship, even when both partners are committed to practicing selflessness. Handling conflict healthily usually involves effective communication, active listening, and a willingness to find a compromise that works for all parties. Partners who prioritize healthy boundaries and effective communication can address conflict as it arises and reach a compromise. 

Seeking professional support in relationships

Seeking professional help for relationship issues can be a valuable resource for individuals looking to improve their relationships and develop effective strategies for finding the balance between self-care and selflessness. Mental health providers specializing in relationship issues can offer guidance and support for individuals who desire to strengthen their relationships and understand selflessness on a deeper level. Speaking to a professional can help individuals identify their unique needs in a relationship and develop strategies for managing them. This may involve working on communication skills, practicing self-care and stress management techniques, or addressing specific issues related to sacrifice and compromise in the relationship. 

Online therapy can be a valuable resource for individuals looking to build fulfilling relationships and learn more about the art of sacrifice. With online therapy, individuals may have a safe and quiet space to discuss their relationship concerns and goals with a licensed mental health professional. This can be particularly important when discussing sensitive topics like sacrifice, self-care, and relationship dynamics. In addition to offering a safe space for discussion, online therapy can also provide flexibility in terms of scheduling and frequency of sessions, potentially making it easier for individuals to fit therapy into their busy lives. 

As online therapy becomes more and more reachable, it is generally becoming an increasingly effective option. This study looked at the efficacy of online therapy in comparison to traditional in-office therapy and found that both were typically equally effective.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can you love without sacrifice?

In general, compromise and sacrifice can be crucial for loving, healthy relationships.

What is the greatest sacrifice for love?

There have perhaps been many great examples of sacrifices for love throughout history. In 1936, for example, King Edward VIII abdicated the throne to be with the woman he loved. In Christianity, the greatest instance of sacrificing for love was likely the passion of Christ, referring to the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. 

What the Bible says about love and sacrifice?

The Bible generally calls for Christians to live a life of sacrifice and compromise following Christ.

• When Will I Find Love? Medically reviewed by Majesty Purvis , LCMHC
• Losing Your Mind In Love: Sense, Logic, And Seeing Reason Medically reviewed by Arianna Williams , LPC, CCTP
• Relationships and Relations

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People who sacrifice their own happiness for others often possess these 7 unique strengths.

Have you ever met a person who seems always to sacrifice their own happiness for others? I bet you’ve wondered how they do it. I know I have because even after a few hours helping someone out I need time to recover.

Well, these types of people often possess some wonderful and unique strengths that enable them to be the kind people they are.

Read on to find out about 7 of these strengths.

Do you wonder why these types of people seem to understand what others are going through when they help them? It’s because they possess empathy and lots of it.

People whose strength is to have a lot of empathy often offer support to others before they have even been asked. They just want to brighten up someone’s day.

An interesting article about empathy says that empathetic people often feel energized after helping someone. So even though they have done some hard work and possibly sacrificed some of their happiness, they get a boost of energy and joy from it.

I know that for me when I’ve been able to help someone out and they have appreciated it, I feel great even if it has been hard work.

Empathetic people almost seem to have a sixth sense of knowing when to help someone. It is a wonderful strength to have.

2) Compassion 

Another wonderful strength that people who put others first have is compassion. 

Similar to empathy, compassion is when you relate to someone’s needs so feel like you want to help them.

Have you ever been in a situation where something bad is happening to someone and it’s happened to you before so you just want to help because you’d have appreciated it if someone had helped you?

I like to think that if I help someone else, then if something goes wrong in my life someone else would do the same. 

I remember what it was like in the first week of my last job, and how overwhelming it felt with all the rules and procedures I had to remember. So when I had someone new join my team, I was compassionate and tried to give her extra hints and tips and help to ensure that she had an easier transition. 

She said she appreciated the help so much, and when she moved on to another company, she recommended me for a job there.

3) Patience

If you’re sacrificing a fun day out to go and help someone move house or fix up their garden you’ve got to have patience. 

I know if it was me, I’d just want to go in, do a token amount, and then go off to the beach or to the salon or whatever it was that I’d wanted to do that day.

But these wonderful people are patient. They stay until the very end. They make sure everything is done properly and probably even stay for a chat afterward.

Patience is an amazing strength that not many people possess. A beautiful example of this is when a parent puts their child’s happiness before their own.

Children often don’t even realize that this is what their parents are doing at the time, so the parents usually don’t get any thanks. But the reward for the patience is the happiness they see in their child.

Related Stories from The Expert Editor

• 7 signs you’re dealing with a very demanding person, according to psychology
• 8 signs someone has a kind and gentle soul, according to psychology
• If someone uses these 8 phrases, they’re a naturally likable person

4) Resilience 

I don’t know about you, but resilience can be seen in both negative and positive light. Often we hear about people who have been through tough times being resilient. But it can also be a positive trait, especially when it comes to helping others.

This article explains that resilience is “the process of being able to adapt well and bounce back quickly in times of stress.” So this means that when these kinds of people are helping others, it doesn’t affect their wellbeing. They can bounce back and continue with their life afterward.

For me personally, after sacrificing my happiness for others, sometimes I need quite a big break to get back to being myself again. I need to rest and recoup. These resilient people are quite the opposite, which makes them pretty awesome humans.

5) Problem-solving abilities

Helpers are always good at problem-solving. You might have noticed they’re usually cool, calm, and collected when something goes wrong.

Being able to solve problems is such a great strength to have because not everyone has this. Some people get stressed and flustered when things go wrong. So to have a friend who can sort things out easily is always a godsend.

If you’re off sacrificing your day or happiness for others, the last thing you need to be doing is messing things up and not knowing how to help. If you can sort things out quickly and easily then you’re much more helpful and you’ll also get things done quicker.

“ Problem solving helps you to succeed even when you’re working under pressure.”

How great is that!

6) Generosity

Have you ever looked at someone who is always helping out others and just thought “Wow they’re so kind and generous”? Well, you’d be right.

Selfish people don’t go around doing things for other people unless what they’re doing is going to benefit themselves in some way. 

As well as it is a lovely thing to do, did you know that being a generous person can boost our mood, our self-esteem, and even our immune system? Psychiatrist Kelli Harding says so! She also says being generous can reduce anxiety and help us sleep better. 

I guess this is a unique strength where the advantages surely outweigh the disadvantages. A little bit of self-sacrifice for all of those great health benefits!

7) Emotional intelligence 

When you see someone who sacrifices their happiness for someone else. What do you think about that person? Do you wish you could be like that? Or you think they’re wasting their time? Or are you that person and you’re very happy to be sacrificing your happiness for others, helping out?

Well, what psychologists have discovered is that the latter types of people have higher emotional intelligence .

People with high emotional intelligence are team players, according to this article . They are people who love to see other people succeed. They don’t need the limelight. They train or help other people to stand in it instead. That is their glory and high point!

People who sacrifice their happiness for others are emotionally intelligent because they take responsibility for their actions, they are active listeners, and they are often very successful leaders.

These are such unique and powerful strengths for someone to possess! 

If you know someone like this, see if you can make their life a bit better in return. They won’t ask for it, but it will help to fuel their giving to others and you can be part of the cycle of happiness.

Who’s your “Friends” alter-ego?

That’s it for the article, but before you leave…

Have you ever debated with your friends about which ‘Friends’ character you’re most like? Who out of Ross, Rachel, Monica, Chandler, Joey, and Phoebe you really resonate with?

Well, now’s your chance to find out!

We’ve created a fun new quiz which matches you with your Friends alter-ego. Answer a few simple questions and we’ll match you with the character that truly matches your personality.

Ready to find out who you’d be hanging out with at Central Perk?

Take the quiz by clicking here.

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Ancient Genomes Reveal Which Children the Maya Selected for Sacrifice

Thousand-year-old DNA from Chichén Itzá offers eye-opening details of the religious rituals of ancient Maya.

By Freda Kreier

In the spring of 1967, workers building a small airport behind Chichén Itzá, the ancient Maya city in Mexico, ran into a problem: Their excavations had uncovered human remains in the pathway of the proposed runway. The airport was set to serve V.I.P.s who wanted to visit Chichén Itzá. But with the remains so close to a major archaeological site, the work had to be halted until the bones could be examined.

Any hope for a quick resolution dissolved when archaeologists who were called to the scene uncovered a chultún — an underground rainwater-storage container that, in Maya mythology, was viewed as an entrance to the subterranean land of the dead. Connected to the cistern was a cave containing more than 100 sets of human remains, almost all belonging to children. In a push to finish the airport, researchers were given just two months to excavate and exhume the cache of bones.

Nearly 60 years later, ancient DNA extracted from 64 of the children is offering new insights into the religious rituals of the ancient Maya and their ties to modern descendants. In a paper published on Wednesday in the journal Nature , an international cohort of researchers revealed that the children — sacrificial victims killed between 500 and 900 A.D. — were all local Maya boys who may have been specifically selected to be killed in sibling pairs.

“These are the first ancient Maya genomes to be published,” said Johannes Krause, an archaeogeneticist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany. The DNA work provided a previously unseen glimpse into the identities of the sacrificed children. “One feels quite moved by such a finding,” Dr. Krause said, noting that he himself has a young son.

The search into the genome of the Maya boys did not start as an exercise in ancient Maya rituals. In the mid-2000s, Rodrigo Barquera — now an immunogeneticist at the Max Planck Institute — was hoping to discover the genetic legacy of Mesoamerica’s deadliest pandemic.

In 1545, an outbreak of Salmonella enterica spread like wildfire across what is now Mexico. Over the next century, the disease killed up to 90 percent of the Indigenous population. Pandemics like these often leave their mark on the immune genes of survivors. To uncover this genetic legacy, Dr. Barquera and his colleagues needed to compare the DNA from the precolonial remains with that of people who were born after the calamity.

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