Selflessness occupies a contested and multivalent position across the depth-psychology corpus, ranging from ontological doctrine to ethical aspiration to psychological pathology. The most technically rigorous formulation appears in Buddhist philosophy — particularly Tibetan and Zen streams — where selflessness (Skt. nairatmya, Tib. bdag-med) denotes not a moral attitude but the absence of inherent existence in both person and phenomena, a distinction the Lesser Vehicle schools apply only to personal identity while Mahayana extends it to all dharmas. Epstein brings this doctrinal precision into psychotherapeutic dialogue, insisting that Buddhist selflessness is not a regressive merger with oceanic bliss but a transformed mode of experiencing emotion. Nietzsche, by contrast, interrogates ‘selflessness’ as a moralized fiction, treating ‘selfless drives’ with skeptical genealogical scrutiny. In Vedantic and Gita-derived discourse, Easwaran construes selflessness as the progressive diminishment of ego through yajna — selfless service — which functions simultaneously as ethical practice, contemplative discipline, and cosmic participation. The Wang Bi I Ching tradition reads selflessness as ‘pristine unsullied’ inner emptiness enabling trust and alignment with truth. Armstrong situates the Buddha’s campaign of selflessness historically as a counter-movement against egotism and violence. Across these registers, selflessness operates as both soteriological goal and psychological challenge.
Selflessness in Buddhist philosophy is understood to imply the lack of inherent existence both in the personality and in physical and mental phenomena.
This passage provides the canonical Buddhist philosophical definition of selflessness as the absence of inherent existence at both personal and phenomenal levels, distinguishing Lesser and Greater Vehicle interpretations.
, The Tibetan Book of the Dead (Penguin Classics), 2005thesis
those of partial understanding (phyogs-tsam rtogs-pa) comprise the pious attendants (sravaka) who realise the selflessness of the individual person (pudgalanairatmya) but fail to realise the selflessness of phenomena
This passage maps degrees of spiritual understanding onto differential realizations of selflessness, distinguishing personal selflessness from the fuller Mahayana doctrine of phenomenal selflessness.
, The Tibetan Book of the Dead (Penguin Classics), 2005thesis
selflessness is not a return to the feelings of infancy, an experience of undifferentiated bliss, or a merger with the Mother… Selflessness does not require people to annihilate their emotions, only to learn to experience them in a new way.
Epstein corrects a common psychotherapeutic misreading of Buddhist selflessness, arguing it is neither regressive oceanic fusion nor emotional suppression but a qualitatively new mode of emotional experience.
, Thoughts Without a Thinker: Psychotherapy from a Buddhist Perspective, 1995thesis
selfless, selflessness, II 2, H4, H4n, D2, IV 7, IV 8; selfless drives, I 4, II 9; German selflessness,
Nietzsche’s index entry signals his systematic genealogical treatment of selflessness as a moralized category requiring critical deconstruction, linking it to selfless drives and the German cultural ethos.
, On the Genealogy of Morals, 1887thesis
Wang Bi here alludes to Laozi, section 28, where the concept of ‘the uncarved block’ (pu, also ‘pristine, unsullied selflessness’) is discussed, a term Wang glosses as zhen (truth).
Wang Bi aligns selflessness with the Taoist concept of the uncarved block, equating inner selflessness with truth and the condition for genuine trust and right alignment.
, The Classic of Changes: A New Translation of the I Ching as Interpreted by Wang Bi, 1994supporting
A selfless life is a force. Its contribution does not die; it continues in the stream of consciousness.
Easwaran argues that selfless living is not passive renunciation but an active, enduring force whose effects persist beyond the individual in the collective stream of consciousness.
, The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary, 1975thesis
for the selfless, the parapet can hardly be seen because the burden is so light that almost no support is needed.
Through the metaphor of a roadside parapet, Easwaran illustrates that selflessness reduces the ego’s burden progressively, so that the selfless person requires minimal external support from the Divine.
, The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary, 1975supporting
It is necessary for us to engage ourselves in selfless action, which we can learn to do over a long period of time. Sri Krishna refers to selfless action as yajna.
Easwaran identifies selfless action with the Gita’s concept of yajna, framing it as an extended spiritual discipline of giving without expectation of return.
, The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary, 1975supporting
When you engage in selfless service, all your desires are fulfilled by the devas. But anyone who enjoys the things given by the devas without offering selfless acts in return is a thief.
Easwaran presents selfless service as a cosmic reciprocity in which genuine giving fulfills desire, while self-serving consumption is characterized as spiritual theft.
, The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary, 1975supporting
the scriptures force us to confront the ruthlessness and violence of the society against which he had launched his campaign of selflessness and lo
Armstrong situates the Buddha’s teaching of selflessness as a deliberate ethical campaign against a society governed by egotism, greed, and violence.
, Buddha, 2000supporting
Higher than they are those who act selflessly, but the highest are those who have realized the indivisible unity of all life, who have seen the Lord within all.
Easwaran situates selfless action on a spiritual hierarchy, placing it above selfish action but below the supreme realization of non-dual unity.
, The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary, 1975supporting
even if we do not meditate, even if we do not follow the spiritual path, we cannot help finding that when we forget ourselves we are happy, and when we dwell upon ourselves we are miserable. Egocentric people are not only cut off from the mystical experience; they are also unable to enjoy the world. Selfless people enj
Easwaran advances a pragmatic psychological argument for selflessness: the experiential evidence of happiness in self-forgetting is universally available regardless of formal spiritual commitment.
, The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary, 1975supporting
many years of hard, sustained, selfless work. When all desires are right des
Easwaran frames the body’s vitality and disciplined engagement with the world as sustained by and expressive of a life of selfless work rooted in right desire.
, The Upanishadssupporting
Without energetic, intense, selfless action, the practice of meditation can become quit
Easwaran insists that selfless action is not opposed to meditation but is its necessary complement, preventing contemplative practice from degenerating into quietism.
, The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary, 1975supporting
when all our selfishness and separateness die, when all the desires that torment our heart are burnt to ashes, there will be a terrible funeral pyre. Actually it is a jubilant procession
Easwaran reframes the death of ego and selfishness not as loss but as jubilant liberation, revaluing the spiritual transition from self-centeredness to selflessness.
, The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary, 1975supporting
‘If you want to give your best in any selfless service,’ the Lord says, ‘choose the right goal, use right means, and don’t think about results; leave them to me.’
Easwaran articulates the structure of selfless service as goal-oriented but result-detached, linking selflessness to the Gita’s doctrine of non-attachment to fruits of action.
, The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary, 1975supporting
Selflessness:222,226,288
This index entry records selflessness as a discrete topic in the ACA recovery literature, placing it in thematic proximity to selfishness, self-abandonment, and self-reliance.
, ADULT CHILDREN OF ALCOHOLICS DYSFUNCTIONAL FAMILIES, 2012aside
Students of the Way! We should cast away our body and mind and completely enter the Buddhadharma.
Dōgen’s injunction to cast away body and mind constitutes an implicit teaching of selflessness as radical self-relinquishment in Zen practice, though the term is not used explicitly.
, Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki, 1234aside