On Selfishness and Survival
Lately I’ve been confronting something simple: people are selfish, and so am I.
Not in the cartoon sense. Just in the basic, biological way that shows up when anyone feels pressure, threat, or scarcity. When life squeezes, people retract into themselves. They protect what they can. They stop pretending.
What I used to interpret as betrayal or inconsistency was just human nature. Everyone is unstable under stress. Everyone defaults to their own interests first. I’m no exception.
What’s changed is not the world — it’s the way I see it.
I used to expect loyalty from individuals: friends, colleagues, family. I thought trust was a matter of goodwill. But goodwill collapses under pressure. Systems don’t.
Institutions — universities, legal frameworks, healthcare systems, financial structures — may be slow, imperfect, sometimes absurd, but they’re stable. They don’t love me, but they also don’t panic. They don’t wake up one day and decide to rewrite the rules because they’re tired or insecure. They just keep functioning.
I’ve realised I don’t need people to be saints. I just need structures that don’t break when someone’s mood changes.
Maybe this is what growing up actually is: letting go of fantasies about how humans “should” behave, and building a life that doesn’t collapse when anyone — including myself — gets overwhelmed.
It’s not cynicism. It’s calibration.
And strangely, it makes me feel lighter.