Poor Reasons To Do Good

Sometimes, I feel good about myself because I help people for a living, but that's part of the problem: I help people for a living. I accept payment for helping people with their writing. If I wasn't getting paid, I wouldn't do it, at least not as much or as often as I do now. Sure, there are worse ways to earn money, but there are better reasons to do good.

I find that much of the good I do is poorly-motivated. I do some of it to earn money, I do some of it out of a sense of obligation, and I do some of it for the long-term blessings I hope to get out of it. I do good things frequently and regularly, and I'm somewhat proud of that, but much of the good I do is motivated by my own interests.

Still, I imagine that doing good for poor reasons is better than not doing it at all. I'm still helping people, even if I have selfish reasons for doing so. They are still getting help, and that is certainly good. Of course my motivation could be better, but it's still good that the good gets done, no matter why I do it.

I'll try to develop better motivation for doing the good that I do, but in the meantime, I'm going to keep doing good, no matter what motivates me to do it.