On the topic of selfishness, generosity and symbiosis

Once again, my dear friend Rebecca Elvy made me think - this time by putting forward the observation that "consuming content is at least as much an act of generosity as creating it. In fact, creating content is somewhat selfish. But it can't be completely selfish, because you share it..."
 After giving it some thought, I guess you could call those who create content selfish, as most creators do it because they live with some inner force that drives them to create the content; they simply have to create it, regardless of whether it is of interest to others or not, in order to satisfy this inner force. But in other ways it is selfless - because creators put their creations out there for us consumers to consume it (sometimes with a price tag, but the consumers accept that the content is much more valuable than what the creator demands to get for it).
But I think the most fruitful way point of view us to creators and consumers as being parts in a symbiotic relationship - at it's best, creators might create their content without having an audience in mind, but still most creators thrive on the feedback from the consumers; the consumers, on the other hand thrive on the content of the creators and offer their feedback in return - thereby creating a feedback loop which makes both creators and consumers better than they would be on their own - for which reason both the creators and the consumers are happy that the other part exists and spends time and energy on keeping the circuit alive. It is mutual inspiration at its best - and both creators and consumers see the other part as being generous, because both parts bring something to their common good. And either part consider herself the selfish one, because she benefits from her counterpart's generosity.
The trick is to seek these fruitful relations - because I recognise that there are other, less fruitful creator-consumer relationships out there, where each part tries to benefit as much as possible from the other part's generosity. The trick is to replace the "what's in it for me"-mindset with that of "I'm in it for you".
(Translated from Noget om egoisme, generøsitet og symbiose)

On the topic of (lack of) focus

Following a recent post, I came to think of a Calvin and Hobbes strip, an old colleague had pasted up on a kitchen cupboard - a strip in which the conclusion is the following one-liner from the mouth of Calvin: "Happiness isn't good enough for me! I demand euphoria!"
I am afraid that we modern people have become so focused in our search of euphoria that we cannot hear happiness when it comes knocking on our door. That we have become too focused on how much more that could be poured into the glass of our life that we do not recognize that it is well above half way full. And that we have become too focused on pouring into our own glass without regards to the fact that what we have to fill it with is also important for others' attempts to fill their glasses. And we have thereby become too bad to focus on what is really important.
Now, fortunately, our deceased ancestors are not here to look at us. Because I am really afraid that they would be disappointed to see how we handle glasses, which already contain much more than what would have filled their glasses far beyond spilling over the edge.
(Translated from Noget om (manglende) fokus, originally published March 27, 2016)