The curious case of selflessness

Is selflessness highest of all virtues and is it that simple to understand as it sounds? I call it a curious case because it's actually not. Its much convoluted to understand and implement than it sounds. I would like to start with something which once made me ponder over it for a very long time. I still do at times. Naval Ravikant mentions to Joe Rogan in latter's podcast -

Celebrities are the most miserable people in the world, right? Because they're this strong self image that gets built up, it gets built up by compliments. Every time somebody pays you or me a compliment and we're like, "Oh, well, thank you." Right? Then that builds up an image of who we are. And then one idiot comes along, one out of ten, one out of 100, and they can easily tear it down. Because it doesn't take many insults to cancel out a lot of compliments. And now you're carrying around this big weighty self image, and it's just very easy to be attacked. And because you're famous or you're well known people want to attack you.
It took me time to digest and I couldn't agree more with Naval. This also propelled a slight fear in my mind. One out of a million people can come with his purely weird arguments to tear apart your image and he may very well be right in his own right! For a moment he may look like a winner and the so called celebrity might look like a fool.

Initially I thought it's after-all a price one has to pay for his success. But upon further reflection, I realized that it may be a fear around "validation". Fear of validation, invalidation and revalidation. Thinking about how to avoid such inevitable jerks and keep going without getting much disturbed, I came with these two things as possible solutions - Stoicism and Selflessness. 

Those who don’t show off their faces in victory never feel the embarrassment to hide their faces during failures. That’s the perfect cushion stoicism always provides. Being graceful in victories automatically makes one comfortable in defeats. Gradually one becomes comfortable carrying out his job without getting much worried about what perceptions or image people have about him in their minds.

Coming to selflessness, if one’s goal is to follow his true calling without any out of place notion of copying others or proving anything to anyone, when one’s pursuit is free of malice and is ethical and when one moves forward taking care of people around him alongside, most likely any kind of fear of invalidation might not intimidate him. With time, one can actually rise above such things with this approach. Rather than being perfect word, "selflessness" may be the close word here but the idea I want to express is to rise above personal ego. Selflessness should not be taken only in parlance of abstinence or asceticism. One may very well pursue material ambitions by not being “selfish” around it. A pursuit of material wealth out of pure drive for it without involving ego may still be selflessness and charity done with a subtle agenda of personal appeasement may still be selfishness. On those lines, I refer to being selfless here. Lord Ram for example was a king with enormous wealth and power at his disposal but he was not attached to it. To him it was all part of his job and his resources which he utilized for purposes higher than personal. Same goes with Lord Krishna. He had the element of affluence in his life but no indulgence around it. This actually goes on relating to Bhagvad Gita's teaching in simple words - Do your karma without attachment with the fruit.

So is selflessness the key to liberation? Unfortunately NO. It has a dark side too which is derivative of one’s mindset. Selflessness could be that dangerous red line which when crossed, one may become a complete lunatic who is rather inconsiderate than unassuming. (Selflessness, after all is not limited to being selfless only in material sense. It's deep more than one can imagine or probably is rising above "one's self" in every aspect of it). In the worst case, one may go on becoming completely insensitive, rude and non-compassionate about others. Iravati Karwe writes something similar about Bhishma in her book Yuganta (in context of him finding brides for Kuru Princes)

The Mahabharata does not show that there was any attitude of chivalry towards women. But no man had shown the utter callousness that Bhishma had. Still, we cannot say that Bhishma committed all this cruelty deliberately. It seems that he was indifferent to it. Did this indifference arise out of his obsession with one goal — the perpetuation of the Kuru line? He had sacrificed himself completely. He no longer lived for himself. Could that excuse his almost inhuman treatment of these women? Is a person justified in doing things for others which would be condemned if he did them for himself? Or does the Mahabharata want to emphasize that human life, whether lived for oneself or spent in an unselfish endeavor must inevitably result in wrong to others?

The above text indeed offers a different perspective around being "selfless". Talking briefly about Mahabharata, that’s its USP in my understanding. No utopia and no concrete judgements. An ideal platform for enthusiasts to flex their intellectual muscles :) Back to selflessness, it indeed is complex. There is always a larger picture to the immediate picture. Nothing, absolutely nothing should go unchecked!