Unpremeditated goodness is often rather motiveless in that it disregards mere efforts to satisfy the self. Satisfying the self is crude, gross, unevolved, and is what most people do. There is a goodness that is unattached-spontaneous, free of the illusory ego, simple, beyond fragmentary thought, and innocent in the way it acts. It is not a mere reaction but, rather, something else is involved. That “something else” is the whole, or is a perception of and from wholeness. Wholeness doesn’t depend upon illusory parts. Parts and fragments — especially when they are illusory, and most of them are — are not what wholeness covets. Wholeness is highly intelligent action, though not merely of the intellectual kind. Wholeness is action, not mere reaction.
Mere reaction feeds the self, with all of its gross demands. The self, in fact, is a product of mere reaction. Crude reactions nourish and sustain the self. Without such reactions, the image and repetitious movements of self would not be. Wholeness operates differently than what reactions and fragments entail. In wholeness, a vast intelligence operates. There is little vastness/intelligence in what is fragmentary and isolated.
Orange Fairy Cup Fungus at the base of an Oak Tree, Illinois … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019
Tom's Nature-up-close Photography and Mindfulness Blog 
Your words about spontaneity and unattached goodness reminded me of this wonderful line from Annie Dillard: “We have not yet encountered any god who is as merciful as a man who flicks a beetle over on its feet.”
Ha! That’s a good one, Linda! 🙂 … even though the line is immersed in a lot of presupposition.
The sum total of anything cannot be compared with just its parts. There is something about wholeness that allows growth and empathy. For example, a human being cannot be understood unless you consider everything that concerns him or her.
Yes, not just the parts, Marie. 🙂
The whole is more than the sum of the parts. Understanding everything about a human being is impossible, as they are — if they are at all alive — constantly changing, ever moving from what they were.
We never stop growing and changing. Thank you!
🙂 Yes, never stop learning/blossoming.
What an interesting fungus!
Certainly not common… and very brightly colored! 🙂
I’m striving to identify and unlearn my illusory fragments and strong reactions are a dead giveaway of something to ponder.
Seeing the fragments without any fragmentary separation may be a good way to start. 🙂
In many ways our dullness and fragmentation is a reification of our selective echo chambers.
Yes, Paul, thinking (and perception through thought) are essentially a material process.