Me:

All human conduct is NOT motivated by self-interest.However its development and personal institution in many cases is a by-product of life experience and interpretation of life.Cynicism is toxic.An alternative is a degree of decided armor.Perhaps pragmatism to balance idealism.There is a level of predisposition involved,I would rule out depression,seek balance.Cynicism is influenced by past and present circumstance,and no one knows except the person,what brought them to the adoption of cynicism,or what drives its momentum to continue.I believe you experienced pain,and therefore want armor.But,my feeling is that all things require borders,boundaries,and balance.Not to appease the world,but to find a healthier middle ground.

Definition,

=: contemptuously distrustful of human nature and motives
=:based on or reflecting a belief that human conduct is motivated primarily by self-interest
Cynic=: a faultfinding captious critic; especially : one who believes that human conduct is motivated wholly by self-interest

Yale University cognitive psychologist Frank Keil

:found that children as young as 7 begin responding cynically to suspect statements as part of normal development.

But University of California-Irvine personality researcher Salvatore Maddi :

contends that many cynics are more like Bayan: They aren't so much born as made. provided By Elizabeth Svoboda Rick

Bayan:"The world belongs to people with IQs of 120. Anything much greater or less amounts to a liability,"

Rick Bayan muses on his bile-coated Web site The Cynic's Sanctuary, a home for "disgruntled idealists, subversive wits, professional misfits, skeptical jesters, curmudgeons, and misanthropes."

Donald Haas at New York's Mount Sinai Medical School

: a cynical outlook really can take years off of your life.Cynics also suffer and die from heart problems in disproportionate numbers. Cardiologist Donald Haas found that suspicious people who suffer from heart disease are more than twice as likely as their more optimistic counterparts to end up gravely ill or hospitalized for their condition.
Interestingly, cynicism leads to greater heart reactivity when it occurs along with being angry. That is, blood pressure fluctuates more. However, when a person is cynical but not angry, blood pressure fluctuations are actually less.Cynicism though, has been found to be associated with diseases of the muscle and bone in women, and diseases of the heart in men.

I guess my point is that in all things,there must be a balance. jmo