Sublime

A way of living in which one is constantly troubled by how one is seen by others is a self-centered lifestyle in which one’s sole concern is with the “I.”

The key is to observe the thought and identify the sense that this thought is about “me.”

We are (usually) the sympathetic hero of the story. In his speech to a graduating class at Kenyon, writer David Foster Wallace observed that there is “no experience you’ve had that you were not at the absolute center of.” We are each “lords of our own tiny skull-sized

Egocentricity has its life in being other, different, and separate. It thrives on struggle, conflict, and strife. Egocentricity wants to find the point of disagreement in everything.

Personal importance, or taking things personally, is the maximum expression of selfishness because we make the assumption that everything is about “me.”

His own values, moods and attitudes absorb him.

It’s selfish to think about my own wants and desires. My kids’/husband’s/clients’ needs are more important than mine.

This “I” has a deep fear of being nothing and is afraid of not having security, power, possessions. It is thin-skinned and easily wounded, always eager to be recognized, easily discouraged, rebellious against others, full of self-pity. There is almost constant fear—not a particular but a general fear—of being insecure or incapable, or some other vu