My life philosophy as of now (25)
As someone who has a surface level education and understanding on the tradition of philosophy and as someone who is beginning the pursuit in gaining a grander understanding on the tradition through formal education and at home reading the leggends, I wanted to make this now, to look back in the future at this moment of me to see how my education and experience will change me.
What is my philosophy towards life? First I want to remark that I have, through interfacing with the surface of the tradition, leaned heavily towards the existentialists in my division of time: Nietzsche, Camus, Sartre, Doestoesvsky. Why? I think I went to philosophy in the first place through uncertainty about just about everything, as most probably do, however the pressing uncertainty is about me and the choices I ought to make. We have a limited time here and if we throw our darts with lackluster posture and 60% of our attention we are going to finish the game on average with a result reflecting the input, and regret if we’re honest with ourselves. And so the choices we make are like the most important thing in the world to us and so it always bothers me when people want to steer the conversation, when it does occur, away from this investigation. I understand it though, recognizing that the choices we make does have a ripple effect onto the future of our wellbeing and onto all that surround us and so into the future forever once were gone is an incredibly daunting thing to think about. Most just want to drink their beer with their ball game and talk about whether people are attractive or not, exchange jokes, remark on stories, etc. And so philosophy is not for the faint of heart, but, is the faint of heart destined for philosophy? Is there another cure besides psychoanalysis? Is there something wrong with a lack of courage regarding figuring out what is fundamentally important to you? My hunch is that all would answer yes, but, many might say to themselves “I have tried in the past and gotten nowhere and just thinking about this is causing me serious emotional turbulence and fuck” *cue open up whatever social platform, play whatever game, eat whatever snack, do whatever drug in order to comfort and subside ( and distract???) this emotional turbulence.
What is my philosophy towards life?
Step 1: be (and remain) happy
Step 2: dont die
These steps should happen chronologically, and I don’t want to give the idea that if you are unhappy not dying isn’t important because you can always turn that around for yourself to a place where not dying is important. When I go about my life and chat with people it seems that all are interested in being happy. We all want to feel better if we can. However, when I chat with people about not dying it seems that most don’t actually really care. What is the cause of this? I think it is a mixture of ignorance towards the current state of our understanding of human biology, a lack of long term thinking and, and I weight this last one as the most relevant in why people don’t care about not dying, unhappiness. To give a damn about not dying we need to give a damn about our life and I’m concerned that most don’t. I can count the friends who have seriously contemplated suicide on two hands and those are just the people who have revealed that. If you are happy and don’t want to die I recommend looking into longevity scientific content creators. My personal favorite is Dr. Peter Attia. My other personal favorite is Bryan Johnson, someone who is either crazy or a human revolutionary, who I think is the latter (in my complete ignorance to the hard sciences) but will remain to be seen over the next 100 years, whos content is at least endlessly entertaining to me (great production value and sense of humor). That is all I can say about step 2, I give the wheel to the experts and listen to their commandments.
I feel I have some valuable input to step 1 as someone who for years has had a great recreational interest in the human condition. Additionally, I have been able to radically reinvent myself as someone who was emotionally non present with himself and failing at step 1, to someone who meditates on these ideas daily and who is one of the happiest people I know.
Segway, if you feel you’re too dumb for this stuff I encourage you to check out this channel, https://www.youtube.com/@markmolloy1381/videos Mark Molloy on YouTube if you cant click the link. He is one of the most inspiring individuals I have ever come across. He is an individual who scored 70 on an IQ test (most score between 85–115) but somehow has been instilled with such a positively wise rigor for life and personal development that he seems to have conditioned himself into being a smart dude. When I watch his videos his attitude and articulation and commitment to reading despite his impairment is mind-blowing. His processing speed may be slower then the average person if they both underwent the same intellectual training, but the product of his personhood that has emerged appears to me as someone who is wise. What’s the use of intelligence anyway if it isn’t placed on a healthy framework? I had a similar reaction to this channel as to when I saw Herbie Handcock perform this summer at Ottawa Jazz Festival. My dad asks between between songs what I thought and I think I just muttered how is this is even possible. This guy is 83 and is delivering one of the most electric riveting lively and sonically diverse performances I’ve ever seen and he’s hanging with young dudes who are all just complete monsters at their craft. There’s a saying in music that you are only as strong as your weakest link and there was no semblance of weakness. I asked a bright friend what he thought of Noam Chomsky recently in his current form, he dismissed him not on the grounds of any logical product but because he is 90. Get off the stage buddy, you can’t hang. No. Herbie can hang, Mark Molloy can hang. Scorsese can hang. Overcome emotionally influenced self limiting beliefs.
Step 1 is a life pursuit, it is the most important thing you’ll ever do and it is not easy. It is a you did or didn’t regarding wether you took your vitamins and went to your gym and ate your macros. Step 1 is not. Step 1 cannot be complete without a deep self understanding. Step 1 asks you to ask yourself “who are you?“. What makes you, you? This is not an all or nothing discovery either, it is a constant evolving process. If you think you know yourself make sure you think again every so often cause tastes, values, priorities, circumstances change with time and you do with it. What does it for you when you’re 23 might not do it for you when you’re 24, and it’s not that 23 or 24 you were wrong, you could both be right in your own pocket of time, but knowing where you’re going and why is essential for the right kind of growth. Time slipping away is more bothersome to you when you have ambitions, but looking back and realizing you could of had developed ambitions if you discovered who the hell you are and what a self actualized version of that are is, is worse. It is not just a lack of will to action, it is realizing later in life that you really didn’t understand yourself all these years. That can be really painful and might lead to cue to vices listed above, but better go through this transformative emotional process now when 30, and process and accept the regret and grow, then 40, 50, etc. Check out this Dr. K (leggend in every sense of the term) video on the subject if you feel this applies to you. He is a Harvard Medical School alumni psychiatrist.
When I feel lost in terms of identity I ask myself what do I find beautiful? And although preference for some things fluctuates with time, I have never found something that I once found beautiful to cease being beautiful. The awe of the beauty is fundamental to my identity as far as I’m concerned because it appears thus far to be fixed, love that's real will not fade away.
