selfish versus selfless

The last couple of days have shown me how much selfishness I have inside. How my thought patterns create more "self-fulfilling prophecies" of pain, not only for me, but more importantly to others. I am seeing how often and for how long I have [subconsciously] made my emotional unrest a problem for other people. I feel like i am in the throes of it now and don't have a lot of hindsight clarity, but am sure that will come as i continue to feel this and explore it all as it is rising in my consciousness.

The fifth sutra of the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali says:

Vrttayah Pancatayyah Klista Aklistah

There are five kinds of mental modifications which are either painful or painless.

from Swami Satchidananda's translation of the Sutras:

Selfish thoughts ultimatlely bring pain. For example, to love something or someone is pleasurable. But many of us have experienced how the very same love brought us a lot of unhappiness, pain, hatred, jealousy, and so on. Why? because that love was not just a pure love but was based on some expectation in return.There was selfishness in it. the expectation may be anything from a little financial comfort, physical pleasure or recognition. So love, though it appears to be a painless thought, ultimately ends in pain if it is based on selfishness.

Also, doing some reading on jealousy, wanting to get some understanding about what is actually happening and where it comes from, i found these good words that resonate with me--

from David Deida:

Jealousy stems from a desire to be loved.

The desire to be loved stems from a feeling like you are not loved already.

The feeling that "you are not loved already" stems from feeling like you are separated from God.

Jealousy points to your false hopes of fulfillment.

Jealousy is the sting of false hope. You are open or closed, various experiences come and go, everything gained is threatened by loss, and nothing is quite as fulfilling as your jealousy promises.

This sense of waiting, as if the future might offer you something more fulfilling than this moment, is the essence of jealous suffering.

You may need to follow in your friend's footsteps, acquire riches, and surround yourself in the image of your relief. Then, sitting in the midst of your acquisitions, the evidence will be incontrovertible: Something still feels missing. Still, you are jealous of someone or something. Still waiting.

While you are unwilling to open as you are, jealousy reminds you of what you are waiting for.

from someone else whose name i didnt get

What you are actually clinging to with such jealousy is the body of your beloved, that is to say, an envelope, a shell.

How can the fear of losing a shell, someone's body or house, be compared to the joy of winning a spirit, of having that spirit at your side?

The only thing you can do is avoid opening the floodgates: that is the only way to remain in control of the situation. Intelligence is the only thing that can overcome jealousy. It is all a question of thought, of reason.

So all of these thoughts. all of this opening is where i want to grow the most. my issues of being self-conscious, of not wanting to be seen as a teacher or being so afraid, so uncomfortable, really it is all just a game of selfishness. And I haven't even been very aware of it, but I am painfully aware now of how much of this suffering i have created in relationships, for other people. right now i feel afraid that i don't have what it takes to be any other way, but i believe that is just more of the same negative, painful patterns that i have operated as. i do know from experience that the more I meditate, the more I still and quiet myself internally, the more I find happiness on the inside and allow God's love to completely fill me-fill the place where I still act like there is something external that will satisfy it, staying true to my path, the more I feel relaxed and grateful for how much I have and can love freely in the waves of the Divine's ocean. Putting my attention on all riches I have and am receiving rather than how things could (falsely) be better.

transormation and evolution is a spiral, with dips and hops and stops and skips.