October 1st. It may just be another day which you look out of the window in your office impatiently waiting for it to be emptied out at six. This day, however, is of some significance to me. It reminds me that my trivial existence is worthy of celebration. Which suggests that there is something inherently admirable in the process of ageing. It reminds me that I am one step closer to my final destination. It is my birthday.
But why do we celebrate our birthday? Are we supposed to be grateful to be alive? Is life filled with hopes and dreams which are worth our struggle? Unfortunately, the facts confront us with the irrefutable. Our world is threatened by vast tragedy. There is in this world so much injustice, so much hatred, so much fear, and so much envy. Though we continue to live day by day, we are at loss what the meaning of our individual existence is. Nevertheless, every time I wander around in a bookstore and look at the bookshelves which are occupied with self-help books, it is not uncommon to find an author who is encouraging blind-optimism. They construct what seems to be compelling arguments in hope of convincing their readers to affirm life. That all of us can be as successful as Bill Gates and Steve Jobs. This leads to the question whether we should celebrate our birthday.
Most of us apparently choose to celebrate birthday because we are all horrified by the idea of death. We are reluctant to admit the fact that birthday also signifies we are approaching to the final destination. Life is supposed to be joyful. We were not born to submit to the philosophy of Schopenhauer. It is better to be optimistic rather than pessimistic. I am often surprised of our capacity to imagine. But imagination is an illusion. It cordons our feeble minds off the realistic world. It deceives us into hoping for a better tomorrow. This optimism wears us down.
It is useless to escape from the irrevocableness of death. In our constant struggle between lightness and weight, we are often in muddle of the thought whether a life of lightness or a life of weight is a better option. Anyone who contemplates the details of life will necessarily be drawn to the nihilistic conclusion. That our life is full of futilities and nothing else. The facts decide which option we ought to take- the unbearable lightness. But in this acceptance of futility, however true, there is a sense of fear which is concentrated upon my individual soul night after night. This feeling torments my immortal soul, leaves me with something which I am unbearable to speak, and strengthens my only wish to liberate it from its mortal coil. In the spectacle of life and death, in the inextricable relationships of men and women, in the never-ending pursuit of our dreams, there is nothing I wish to hold on to. Little wonder the aristocrats and the members of the Royal family commissioned Rembrandt to secure their glorious days by means of portraits. Because they were aware of the fact that their fame, power, and wealth would one day become ashes and dust.
But humans always contradict themselves. We invest our faith in what we are capable of achieving. History tells us that we have produced great art, literature, music, philosophy and science that have changed minds and filled lives. Though we are surrounded by life's absurdities, our inner selves still long for the arrival of beauty to hold on to our hearts. In friendship, in romantic love, in parental affection, in compassion, in the devotion to science and the arts, there is nothing we wish to diminish. They take away all the imperfections and impurities from our souls and attend us to the idea of weight. They flower our lives with meanings and dreams.
After meditating on how we should approach our birthday, it seems difficult to know whether we should celebrate it. But Nietzsche offers us a solution: imagine a life which you live now must be lived by you for infinite times and you would have to repeat every single details in it again and again. What does that tell you? If you are to repeat the same life again and again, you may want to do something which will delight you innumerable times. This thought propels your mind to decide what you should do next. It makes you focus on the present. It urges you to revise your goals and dreams which you always hold on to. If you are at loss what you should do next, it suggests that your life is not as satisfying as it seems. This Nietzschean thought invites us to live our life at its fullest while at the same time pulls us away from the idea of lightness. That a life of little weight may be what we should desire after all.
Life is full of sweetness and bitterness. It may be a cruel fact that the amount of bitterness usually outweighs that of sweetness. But on birthday, we rejoice from the blessings of our friends, of our parents, and of our romantic partners. The contemplation of birthday not only inspires us how we should think about life, it also sheds light on how should enjoy our birthday at its fullest and richest. It keeps us from denying the spectacle of joy life wishes to offer. It keeps us from abandoning our hopes in perfection. It keeps us from thinking ourselves as the centres of the universe. It keeps us away from a morbid sense of loneliness.
W
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By the time we're told that we can become another Bill Gates-like success, it's too late. We've already had it embedded within us that we're worthless. So much so that if you asked the average person if they thought they were worthless they'd say no. Then, they'd go to their factory job, where they're the manager and feel proud that they've done 'the best' for themselves, because they are a manager. From when school starts, we are told to 'shoot for the stars' or 'aim high', and 'reach your (our) maximum potential' but what that means is reach for the maximum OF THE MINIMUM. We accept the minimum, proudly and feel accomplished. By the time we realize what we could've been, it's far too late to truly understand how to get out of that mindset and develop the skills it takes to reach the maximum of the maximum, and so it's done blindly. We are sure that they just had the same mindset as us, they were no different, and it all happened by chance, and not out of a higher understanding and a set of developed skills.
ReplyDeleteImagine that there's a great boxer who has boxed most of his life. He wins most of his fights and his technique and understanding of the sport is incredible. He it at that level through experience, theory and knowledge. Suddenly, everyone wants to become a boxer, and so books and DVDs and things are released telling you that "you can do it, too!", in every single one of them, the general idea is "just punch! And keep punching!" and so everyone would end up just blindly punching any old way, convinced that that's exactly what the great boxer done, and then woke up one day with great technique and understanding. We'd have a society full of people doing the fucking windmill, waiting for that one day where they will suddenly be a great boxer.
I agree with you on 'the maximun of the minimum' bit. The Greek philosophers were wrong. They thought that happiness could be obtained by individual effort. However, our reality suggests that happiness greatly depends on our sheer luck.
ReplyDeleteI am also sick of those 'you can do it, too!' type of bullshit. We need to learn to accept failure. We just can't master everything.
W
Haha you are both very cynical.
ReplyDeleteOk, to be fair I'm normally really cynical too but the problem with that is - you give up. Yeah, the world sucks and people are worthless and on self-destruct from day one. We fail all the time. But if you don't fail at something you can't learn from it. I'm sure Einstein actually said the same thing once upon a time (I did actually just try looking it up but it was too much effort, I'm sorry).
re:"Nietzsche offers us a solution: imagine a life which you live now must be lived by you for infinite times and you would have to repeat every single details in it again and again"
^^ I like this. I think this is what we should work with this idea in our lives. There's no point doing things you don't want to do, because this is your life. If you waste it doing things you hate on whatever the premise, be it to fulfil some religious obligation or to live up to some social expectation of what you should be or even if you're just too scared to try incase you fail, then all you're doing is wasting away.
All we are is what we make of ourselves - we have to write our own story. Yeah, much of this path is out of our control, with other people building fences or taking away bricks before we even get a chance to lay them down, but we can control somethings. We can make the decision between following your 'heart' and doing what you want and just being happy or doing what you think you have to do and being miserable.
I'm not sure how on topic my reply really is lol - think it was probably more a response to you two being so gloomy =p
I read this a couple times already today and have been meaning to come back and leave a response but I wasn't sure what to say.
Pennie,
ReplyDeleteYes, I think passion matters the most. You won't be able to get anything done without passion. It kind of reminds me of the movie 'One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest' when Mr. McMurphy says 'At least I tried'. But that's already the best we can do.
This entry was meant to express my feelings about the world as I was feeling sad when I was writing this. It's not really a 'philosophical essay'. It's normal that you weren't sure what to say.
W
i think we are not at loose life has some thing in its each color ,i know at the moment we are living in the world which is full of misery and sucked a very few powerful people,but as a individual if we are not responsible for some once misery and trying to live healthy positive life we should be happy in every single moment of life and should live it with deep sense of gratefulness because at least we are living a normal life ,we must think that whatever we have ,existence ,our mental physical health or our skills are not our personal achievement,these are a gift which demands nothing much but use them in positive way for us or around us if we think that we did our best honestly but got failed then there is some hidden signs for us and we must understand them ,every breath is precious because when it will stops we are not any more so each single moment of life is a most beautiful gift we have
ReplyDeleteBaili,
ReplyDeleteThat's why I think we need to learn to accept failure. Failure should not be defined by the flock. If we fail because we are unable to live up to some social expectation, then we are just part of the herd instinct. We need to understand what we truly desire.
W