Was Buddha acting selfish closing himself to the outside world during his long meditation?

Answer 1

Dear great Inquirer,

Thank you, You have just invented a great question indeed! It gives me great joy to answer your lovely question. Dear friend, no Buddha was not acting selfish to the outside world during his long meditations. Because "Meditation" in itself is also the best way of the communication with the whole universe at the same instance beyond everyday time and space! No Buddha, who is in his or her deep meditation, is away from the universe around, rather they are not only more near but also one with the whole universe! Let me make it more clear to you. If you consider the world which you experiance through your senses like touch, sight, fragrence, taste, sound, and a intellectual brain signal synthasizer called intellect, as good as a movie that is projected on the screen your inner light of universal consciousiness, which you share equally with the whole nature around! In your deep thoughtless state of meditation you are notheng else but a peerless inner light of the universal consciousiness! Just the colourless bright light of intellegent screen. Tell me when you are seeing a movie in a talkis, if you just remember the blank movie screen which is invisible to the self-forgotten spectator who is watching and experiancing the unreal emotions in manmade movie, can "You" said to be as away from the other engrossed spectators? No you are just more aware than the rest of them, because you are a Buddha! Buddha is one who is in the world yet at the same time far beyond and ahead of the world. He is the ever ominipresentness of the light of the universal consciousiness growing and evolving from within the human beings and nature. He is the very "life force" itself and nothing else. After Buddhas, leave their physical body, they dissolve into the light of the universal consciousiness! As the inner light of witness that exists within all human beings and the whole universe. Meditation is the only way to become one with your ever present your inner "Buddha" and the universe at the same time because Buddha and the whole universe are not different from one another. Hence you are already a Buddha, which you have to self-realize before you become physically incapable to meditate, to self-realize, to become enlightend. To become one with the intellegent light of the ever presentness of the "Now and Here"

Answer 2

I don't know so much about Buddha but, in any case, he needed to find out about the world before living in it. Fortunately, he did found out and drew some lessons but, what if he had not found anything, at the end?
On the other hand, vittalkop...'s answer is a really good one.

Answer 3

Meditation is not being selfish

Answer 4

On the contrary expecting anything from others is selfish. He was minding his own business for his own soul and that is selfish then we all should be selfish rather than begging from others for our own salvation.

Answer 5

You can't play the worlds games and find the truth.

At least most of us can't.

I just feel lucky that He came back to us with the teaching that he did.

Love and blessings Don

Answer 6

On the contrary.He was saving humanity with the teaching he discovered.

Answer 7

Yes he was selfish, he was talking to his God.

Answer 8

I do not believe so. Meditation provides human beings peace of mind, and helps us cultivate loving-kindness, Patience, empathy, and understanding toward other. It reveals to us that judging, criticizing, and condemning others is not the wholesome way to go, but to practice Tolerance and patience toward all humans, is more practical, bringing not only us peace, and happiness, but helping others to find peace of mind and happiness as well. I learned this information below through Buddhist teachings, which came forth from meditation. Please patiently read this. Thank You very much.
**What in the world is the difference between loving a person, and being attached to them? Love is the sincere wish, for others to be happy for others and free from suffering. Having realistically realized other’s kindness, as well as their faults, Love is Always focused on the other person’s welfare. We have no ulterior intensions or motives to fulfill our own self-interests; or to fulfill our own desires, we love others, all people, simply because they exist. Attachment, on the other hand, exaggerates others’ good qualities, and makes us crave to be with them. When we’re with them, we are happy, but when we’re separated from them, we’re miserable. Attachments are always linked with expectations of what others should be, or what they should do for us. Is love, as it is understood in most societies, really love OR attachment ? Let us examine this a little more. Generally speaking, we are attracted {drawn to) people because they have qualities we value, or because they help us in some way. If we carefully observe, through introspection, our own thought processes we’ll notice that we very often look for specific qualities in others. Some of these qualities we are drawn to are qualities within our parents, or qualities which society values.
We examine someone’s looks, education, social status, financial status, and so forth. This is how Most of us decide on whether or not the person holds any true value, or not. In addition, we judge people as worthwhile according to how they relate to us. If they praise us, encourage us, help us, if they listen to what we have to say, if they make us feel secure, if they take care of us when were sick, unhappy or depressed, we consider them good, or sometimes righteous people, and these are the people we more drawn to, whom we are most likely attracted to, and the people we choose to be around with.
In all honesty, this is very biased, for we are judging them, only in terms of how they relate to us, as if we are the most important person in the world & thinking the world revolves around us! After we’ve judged certain people to be good for us, whenever we see them, it appears to us as if goodness is radiating out from within them, but as we are more mindfully aware, we realize that we have projected this goodness on to them.
Desiring to be the people who make us feel good, we become emotional yo-yo’s, when we’re with these people, we’re up, but when we’re not with them, we’re down. Furthermore, we form fixed concepts of what our relationships with these people will be, and thus have expectations of them. “When they do not live up to our expectations of them, we’re unhappy, disappointed or may even become angry. We want them to change so that they will match what we think they are. But our projections and expectations come from our own minds, not from other people. Our problems arise not because others aren’t who we thought they were, but because we mistakenly thought they were something they were not. We often use a type of Checklist also. Checklist: “I Love You IF ___________ !” This Love is Conditional and what we call love, is most often attachment. It is actually an attitude which overestimates the qualities of another person.
’Then we cling tightly to that person, thinking our peace and happiness depends on that person. We even often blame that person for our unhappiness.’ Love, on the other hand, is a very patient, calm, optimistic and relaxed attitude. We want others to be free from suffering and to be happy simply because they exist. While attachments are uncontrolled, and too emotionally sentimental, Love is Patient, powerful, and controlled(disciplined). Attachment obscures our judgment {our ability to make sound, wise decisions), and we become impatient, angry, and impartial – helping our dear ones, and those who do us no harm. Love clarifies our mind, & we access a situation by thinking of the greatest good for everyone. Attachment is based on selfishness, while love is founded on valuing, & cherishing others, even those who do not look very appealing to us. Love always looks beyond all the superficial appearances and dwells on the fact that they are just like us: they want peace of mind, happiness, and wish to avoid suffering. If we see unattractive, or unintelligent people we most often feel repulsed, because our selfish minds want to find attractive, intelligent, and talented people. On the other hand, Love never evaluates others by theses superficial standards and looks much deeper into the person. Love recognizes that regardless of the others appearances, they’re experiences are they same as ours: they want inner mental peace, happiness, and wish to be from suffering. When we’re attached, we’re not mentally, emotionally, & spiritually free. For we overly depend on, and cling to another person, to fulfill our emotional, mental, and spiritual needs. We fear losing the person, fearing that we’d be incomplete without them.” This does Not mean that we should suppress all our emotional needs, or become aloof, and totally independent, for that too would not solve the problem. We must simply realize our unrealistic needs and slowly, gently and patiently – seek to eliminate them. If we try to suppress them, pretending they do not exist, we become insecure, anxious, or possibly depressed. In this case, we do our best to fulfill our needs, while simultaneously working gradually to subdue them. The core problem is that most of us seek to be loved, rather than to love. We yearn to be understood by others, rather than to understand them. Our sense of emotional insecurities comes from the selfish obscuring of our own minds. We develop confidence by recognizing our inner potential to become a Selfless human being, having many magnificent qualities, then we’ll develop and have an accurate perception of ourselves, gaining self-confidence. We’ll seek to increase true unconditional love, to increase compassion, to cultivate patience, as well as generosity, right concentration and wisdom. Under the influence of attachment, we’re bound by our unstable emotional reactions to others. When they’re nice to us, we’re happy, but when they ignore us or speak sharply to us, we take it personally, and are unhappy. But pacifying attachment doesn’t mean we become hard-hearted, rather without attachments, there will be space in our hearts and minds for genuine affection and impartial love for them. And as a result, we’ll be more actively involved with them. As we learn to transform our minds & lives, through subduing our attachments, we can definitely have successful friendships, and personal relationships with others. These relationships will be richer, more meaningful because of the freedom and respect the relationships are based on. We’ll really care about the happiness and misery of all human beings equally, simply because everyone is the same inside: we all want inner peace of mind, Happiness, and to be from suffering.
However, of course, our lifestyles and interests may be a bit more compatible with some people. Our friendships and our personal relationships will be based on mutual interests, and to help other people. Having such an attitude, we’ll be much More Patient, & tolerant toward others; will remain mentally calm, having Peace of Mind AND Happiness, and Will communicate successfully with others in life.**

P.S. - I enjoyed Vittalkoppal's answer. He is
worthy of the 10 points.

"You asked an excellent Question. Remain very
Optimistic. This helps brings peace of mind."