UNSELFING

 

That's what the ghost of Bertrand Russell called it when he looked at Midnight staring at himself in the mirror.

Ghost pipe smoke doesn't smell by the way, though Midnight still sneezes at it.

 

Anyway, he explained that "unselfing" was "some instinctive wakefulness to an aspect of the world other than myself: a helping hand extended to someone else’s struggle."

Something beyond the bruising boundaries

of ego.

He ruffled my hair (what little is left of it) with his ghost fingers ... it ticked.

"The world is vast and our own powers are limited. 

If all our happiness is bound up entirely in our personal circumstances it is difficult not to demand of life more than it has to give. 

And to demand too much is the surest way of getting even less than is possible."

Midnight coughed up a fur-ball at his feet.

He smiled thinly, "He obviously spends too much time with the ghost of Mark Twain."

He sighed, "They would both profit if they learned that the secret of happiness is this: 

let your interests be as wide as possible, and let your reactions to the things and persons that interest you be as far as possible friendly rather than hostile."

What do you think?