Excerpt from an article on the Relevant Magazine site about how toxic selfishness is to self and others. It is an addiction in itself and unhealthy to self-esteem and relationships.

1. Selfishness Makes You Fight More

When we act in selfishness, we often stir up controversy or disagreements in all sorts of areas. You’ve seen this in other people: the type of people who not only stumble across online articles they disagree with but actively look for them. They seem to enjoy spending a great deal of their waking hours angry at something. They don’t just disagree with some things; they want to disagree with almost everything. People generally don’t enjoy being around these types.

Ultimately, a person like this loves being offended because it makes them feel self-righteous and puts the attention on them. It’s a subtle form of selfishness because it makes it more about the person complaining than about the issue itself. Have you been this person?  Have you made it seem like you were participating in the noble task of defending the truth, but were really just burning with selfishness and looking for wood for the fire. But that fire only burned bridges.

2. Selfishness Kills Your Joy

Selfishness often squelches the ability to simply enjoy things because it finds something wrong with everything.

An example of this is the type of person who becomes a perpetual Sherlock Holmes whenever he/she is around others. They have the uncanny ability to find flaws in anything.  You’re watching TV and notice a beautiful or handsome character? They’ll go on a tirade about makeup and eating disorders or how immoral the beautiful/handsome character probably is.

This can be a subtle form of selfishness because it makes a critical person feel in control. It makes them feel above others in a self-proclaimed position of authority because they’ve identified a mistake somewhere.  Are you this person?  Do people slowly start hanging around you less?  Does your love for pointing out problems eventually turn you into a problem?

3. Selfishness Sets Unrealistic Expectations

It’s often pretty obvious when selfishness makes us expect too much of others, but it’s more subtle when it makes us expect too much of ourselves.

A person with too high expectations for him/herself never accepts a compliment, never feels like they’ve succeeded even when they clearly have, and expects nothing but perfection. They might seem humble because they’re hard on themselves, but inside they hold themselves to an insane standard for human achievement.

This can be a subtle form of selfishness because it ignores one’s own natural limitations and assumes one should be able to do anything at any time. While positive thinking is a good thing, the reality is, most of us aren’t able to do whatever we want to do even if we put our minds to it. We all have limitations and should learn to embrace them as part of our humanity.

Sure, some of us are underachieving and aren’t living up to our potential. But many of us are working hard and investing our time and gifts well. It’s entirely possible to fulfill God’s design for your life through doing something the world wouldn’t call incredible. You can completely fulfill your potential even if you don’t become an astronaut or the next president.

Are you the person who expects too much from yourself, and it caused all kinds of strain and damage?   Can yout take a compliment?  Do you feel like you are too good for certain people? Are you seeking to fulfill an unending standard for yourself, and in the process, losing people around you?

4. Selfishness Rejects Getting Better

Most of us have a hard time with criticism, but at the same time, we know somewhere deep down that some criticism is necessary for improvement.

But selfishness rejects any sort of criticism. This is the person who completely flips out when someone criticizes them, for anything. They assume a true friend of theirs is a person who focuses only on their positives and ignores their negatives. So, when someone offers helpful critique with the full intention of helping them, they interpret it as scorn and disrespect.

This is a subtle form of selfishness for obvious reasons.  People who are hyper-sensitive to criticism are quick to defend themselves and rationalize their issues because they feel like they’re not supposed to make mistakes. The irony is, most of us would be better than we are if we willfully allowed people to speak into our lives and help us grow!

Have you been this person and it damaged your life because you wouldn’t let people speak truth to you about problems you had?   Have you lived for years oblivious to your issues, and hurt yourself and others in the process?

But thankfully, God won’t allow you to stay there. Selfishness can ruin your life if you let it take over, but it doesn’t have to.

Read more at http://www.relevantmagazine.com/life/4-ways-selfishness-ruins-your-life#FZlwB0F7ZgQoByIu.99