You might like this poem (from what I can find it is attributed to Bill Britton):
When you are forgotten, or neglected, or purposely set at naught, and you don’t sting and hurt with the insult or the oversight, but your heart is happy, being counted worthy to suffer for Christ.
THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When your good is evil spoken of, when your wishes are crossed, your advice disregarded, your opinions ridiculed, and you refuse to let anger rise in your heart, or even defend yourself, but take it all in patient, loving silence.
THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When you lovingly and patiently bear any disorder, any irregularity, any impunctuality, or any annoyance; when you stand face-to- face with waste, folly, extravagance, spiritual insensibility and endure it as Jesus endured.
THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When you are content with any food, any offering, any climate, any society, any raiment, any interruption by the will of God.
THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When you never care to refer to yourself in conversation, or to record your own good works, or itch after commendations, when you can truly love to be unknown.
THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When you can see your brother prosper and have his needs met and can honestly rejoice with him in spirit and feel no envy, nor question God, while your own needs are far greater and in desperate circumstances.
THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When you can receive correction and reproof from one of less stature than yourself and can humbly submit inwardly as well as outwardly, finding no rebellion or resentment rising up within your heart.
THAT IS DYING TO SELF
Are you dead yet? In these last days, the Spirit would bring us to the cross.
“That I may know Him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death.” Philippians 3:10
EDIT: I like to keep this poem around as a reminder on how I should act. I find that self is a hard beast to conquer.
It's so odd to me that since the dawn of time, humans find this innate need to live in slave morality. Living a life of moral slavery based on stories and tales previous humans made with their own minds. It's a definition of insanity, from my own perspective.
To contribute to the discussion: I practice nothing, no religion, no meditations. Nothing. I find peace enough knowing that I'm not morally enslaved and that I trust in natural workings of this possibly created planet. It's not that I do not believe there's some God or force out there, potentially, but I fully trust in living a natural life, the way I was born and in a somewhat Stoic fashion. When I die, I just am. I will become nature once more. So be it.
I'm far from a philosopher so I wasn't familiar with master/slave morality before your comment so bear with me. It is odd to me that you say that this is the definition of insanity to find this need to live in slave morality; yet many of the Stoic and Christian teachings are very similar which is easy to see comparing biblical teaching to the Enchiridion. I mention this since you identify somewhat with the Stoics, maybe I misinterpreted the sentence completely though.
While many of the teachings are very similar, the Christian finds ultimate freedom from sin by turning his/her life to God. While you acknowledge there may be a God, Christians proclaim that there is a God that commands men to repent of their sin and follow Him. The apostle Paul's explanation is much better than mine:
Moral slavery as you put it is one of those things that's bad for you but good for everybody else, unless you're bad at getting away with things in which case it's also good for you.
Another kind of slavery is doing whatever you want, because you don't decide what you want. What you want is determined by the often self-contradictory brain circuits that sprouted in your head without your intent or permission. That's something from the bible, by the way.
I recently heard an experienced psychologist claim that in 30+ years of clinical practice he had never seen anyone "get away with" anything. I was surprised by the statement. This would be Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment universally applied. The psychological consequences of actions we take may be so deeply embedded within our DNA that they become almost impossible to escape.
God is nature itself. I am happy toiling in soils, studying plants, etc. I could just as easily 100% drop computers and engineering next week and live on my own farm toiling the soils, raising farm animals and be as happy as I have ever been in my life.
You know, I think you can interpret Nietzsche's slave morality as the process to master morality. For example, the enlightenment was supposed to free society up from faith-thinking and introduce rational thinking, but (and he right criticizes it) it did not. I think the movement instead brought society out of older slave morality institutions into master morality and which are now considered slave morality again.
I am not Nietzsche expert, but from the little reading I have done it appears that in many context resource poor people have "slave morality" and resource rich people have "master morality". For example, in partner dances, people who are not very popular dance partners argue that "everybody should dance with everybody", whereas people who are very popular dance partners argue that "i did not train 10 years to dance with beginners". And you can see this in almost any human endeavour.
It's so odd to me that since the dawn of time, humans
find this innate need to live in slave morality
Is this really true, though?
Or does it simply look that way to us, as we look back through history -- which was of course largely written by those who benefitted from this sort of slave morality?
When you are forgotten, or neglected, or purposely set at naught, and you don’t sting and hurt with the insult or the oversight, but your heart is happy, being counted worthy to suffer for Christ. THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When your good is evil spoken of, when your wishes are crossed, your advice disregarded, your opinions ridiculed, and you refuse to let anger rise in your heart, or even defend yourself, but take it all in patient, loving silence. THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When you lovingly and patiently bear any disorder, any irregularity, any impunctuality, or any annoyance; when you stand face-to- face with waste, folly, extravagance, spiritual insensibility and endure it as Jesus endured. THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When you are content with any food, any offering, any climate, any society, any raiment, any interruption by the will of God. THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When you never care to refer to yourself in conversation, or to record your own good works, or itch after commendations, when you can truly love to be unknown. THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When you can see your brother prosper and have his needs met and can honestly rejoice with him in spirit and feel no envy, nor question God, while your own needs are far greater and in desperate circumstances. THAT IS DYING TO SELF
When you can receive correction and reproof from one of less stature than yourself and can humbly submit inwardly as well as outwardly, finding no rebellion or resentment rising up within your heart. THAT IS DYING TO SELF
Are you dead yet? In these last days, the Spirit would bring us to the cross.
“That I may know Him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death.” Philippians 3:10
EDIT: I like to keep this poem around as a reminder on how I should act. I find that self is a hard beast to conquer.