I used to really care about making the world a better place; It might have even been my primary motivator. The first major issue I encountered was that helping

I used to really care about making the world a better place; It might have even been my primary motivator. The first major issue I encountered was that helping others could easily cross a line into enabling others... and it's a subtle point. However, enabling almost never actually helps people or "the betterment of the world." ie: Sometimes helping is not in the form of providing support... which, to the untrained eye, often looks like maleficence. The next major issue I found was that many common problems require cooperation to solve where people instead view the world as competitive. Driving a car is one such perfect example that many people can see with time/experience. Being competitive in a massively busy system just creates more congestion but there will always be the minority that cares only about the space immediately surrounding their car and their position in an infinite line of cars. There was a phrase which was popular for a time, "think globally, act locally." I liked it and tried to internalize it. The problem with it is that I don't have a clear global view. At best, I have access to scientific papers which I can barely comprehend. At worst, I have highly political news sources. The information we all work from is what we all react to. At the end of the day, we are all pretty similar. It's why billionaires want to own sources of information. Given that the world is as complex as it is, the best thing I can figure to do is make the world around me better. If people in general want a better world and they all do this, then we will have a better world. ie: The world isn't my responsibility; It's everyone's responsibility... and I'll own my part.