Isn't everyone a little self-centered?

Arrogance is not an often admired characteristic. While we occasionally allow ourselves to find humor in the behaviors of a celebrity or media personality that seems especially narcissistic, few people have a high tolerance for egotism in real relationships. I'm sure we've all, at some point, encountered a friend, colleague, or classmate who while tolerable at first, eventually grew exhausting to be around because of their uncanny ability to steer conversations back to the same topic- themselves. After all, there's only so much one-sidedness a discussion can support before it transforms from a dialogue to a soliloquy. 

But aren't we all a little self-centered? In a sense, we have to be; our most basic survival instincts tell us that our greatest concern should be self-preservation. Of course, this doesn't mean everyone's inherently cocky, but given the choice, I think most of us would admit to having blinders on when it comes to our understanding of other's lives and struggles. As hard as we may try to be supportive of one another, I can't deny that there are times when friends have ranted to me about problems and I've felt relieved that "at least it's their dilemma and not mine." 

With such self-centered mindsets, it's not surprising that most of us don't realize how truly insignificant we are in the grand scheme of things. In "The Death of the Moth," Virginia Woolf gives us a taste of reality, allowing her readers to experience with her a "queer feeling of pity" for a moth's "futile attempts" to exhibit its passion for life in the face of inevitable death. Though to the moth, the "possibilities of pleasure seemed [...] so enormous," it only had "a moth's part in life," just as we only have a human's part in life in a world of over 7 billion others and a universe that we can merely guess at the scope of. 

Ultimately, our self-absorption isn't a quality that deserves direct criticism. So many people want to have an impact on society, to change the world, and so the fact that we fear confrontation with our own insignificance comes with little surprise. But with that being said, perhaps it is good for us to open our eyes and allow ourselves to see the world through a larger lens. Though it goes without saying, there are certainly many concerns that go unaddressed, simply because we cannot tear our focus away from what's right in front of us.