191–200 of 265 posts
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There's an old Zen saying that goes: "Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water." And another which reads: "Miraculous power, marvelous activity. Drawing water, chopping wood."
Worthless but happy is not a worthy goal. Verify any approach to life by generalisation: what would happen if everyone followed it? The Buddhist approach leads to stagnation.
Reminder: this is a man who killed himself
Funny you should bring that up, considering the circumstances in which he did so. I recommend everyone do some research on his suicide, it's very interesting. Start here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter_S._Thompson#Death
I remember reading this in college and coming away with the feeling that what he was proposing was impossible. I didn't know what my Abilities were and how they relate to the others around me such that I can use them effectively. Not only that I didn't even know what I desire aside from food and sex. Luckily I was on a career trajectory and had quite a bit of experience ahead of me so I took solace in the idea that w…
I think a large part of the problem is that when people talk about finding "happiness" they are actually talking about "winning at life". Which is impossible of course. Every time that you do something that you think will make you happy, and you ask yourself 'is this it?' you allready know the answer, because someone who's satisfied wouldn't ask 'is this it?'. And if you spend years thinking about "finding happiness"…
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This way lies hedonism.
In what way? Are you sure, based on what the parent wrote? Perhaps he was not clear about the difference between "finding meaning" and "finding your own meaning", but few people are clear about that. A search for meaning, personal or otherwise, does not necessarily lead to hedonism--to get there you have to throw out all kinds of useful things, and it doesn't really get you very far, and eventually life loses meaning…
The only thing I don't get is why more people don't do it. People walk around with all sorts of hangups and narratives about why they're denying themselves and they take these to the grave with them. I'd much rather overindulge until I'm bursting at the seams and then having learned where my limit is, dial it back from there. Much fewer regrets in the long run.
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Could you please expand on the last paragraph? I think about happiness a lot lately, and it seems like you have some intetesting thoughts.
There is an unending amount that has been written about measuring happens and finding happiness etc... All of it seems to boil down to what I would consider "hedonism with a mortgage." The focus is on "lasting happiness" with relationships and experiences being there paramount, and de-emphasizes material accumulation and intoxication. Nothing ever asks the question "why be happy anyway?" Seems like it's as bad of a g…
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It's more of a neurotic addictive compulsion and ego seeking behavior than something that is desirable as a sense of fulfillment. These neurotic addictive behaviors (checking social sites, compulsively reading random things, chewing tobacco, drinking alcohol, sleeping) dominate most of my non-mandatory, un-allocated time. Everything else is just a yawning void of nothing, including my wife and 3 kids. Not for lack of…
Hey man, I feel the exact sane way. Though I usually don't care enough to actually get Licenses and stuff, because I don't give enough of a damn to get them. I've done tons of extremely stupid things just to do them, but I genuinely don't care or really give a shit. They're just "things" that I've done. I've never really understood how people genuinely enjoy things like skiing, hiking, skydiving. Ive done them just f…
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When things are hard, it's often because either a) it's new, or b) because we're trying the 'wrong' way. When something is hard and you can't manage to get the desired result no matter how hard you try, consider that rather than to keep working 'hard', you just try something different. I know you haven't (and couldn't, on this forum) encapsulated the breadth of all of the things you've tried to overcome this lack of…
I genuinely believe that people find meaning and contentment in themselves. That helps me as much as asking me to breathe water, or see infrared though. Those deep relationships you speak of; when trying to have these kinds of conversations the response is mostly "I don't know what that's like so I really can't help, sorry." Or you say, ok I need your help by being patient, but that only goes so far for so long, and…
Charlie Rose interviews with comedians (specifically the types that you're referring to) are one of my favorite things to fall asleep to.
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I think a large part of the problem is that when people talk about finding "happiness" they are actually talking about "winning at life". Which is impossible of course. Every time that you do something that you think will make you happy, and you ask yourself 'is this it?' you allready know the answer, because someone who's satisfied wouldn't ask 'is this it?'. And if you spend years thinking about "finding happiness"…
> You have found happiness when the idea "life is meaningless" seem obvious and irrelevant. Precisely. To the best of our knowledge, we're just robots. There is no meaning behind the universe, it just kinda, is . The realization that the only sense you can find in life is the one you create yourself, makes a lot of things clearer. This is also why it should be irrelevant that life is meaningless, since what do you ca…
I have two problems with this realization(not that it makes it any less true).
First, anything truly goes then and we are back to "might is right". Any state/laws some subset of humanity creates is no less right than any other subset of humanity which includes various levels of psychopaths.
First problem is not such a bad one as long as your own morale code more or less coincides with the society in which you reside.
Second problem is more personal. How do you choose what is meaningful given how truly short the life is?
At 40+ I realize that life can end with a whimper at any moment.
Barring some truly Kurzweilian breakthrough 40 more years of enjoyment is most I can hope for.
I truly enjoy the little pleasures of life parenthood, food, drink, chess, biking and so on. At the end of the day, you realize there is no hope of working on that unsolved math problem, that huge programming project, that great novel.
Unfortunately there is so little time and no time for any grand works unless you already showed some promise at early age (ala Thompson).
So far the only solution is somehow to delude yourself that what you are doing is meaningful to you.
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I agree in principal, Hence, why I suggested Camus in my original comment. But what happens when you can't attribute meaning to anything? Do you revert to religion or suicide (Those were the three options for camus)?
> But what happens when you can't attribute meaning to anything? Do you revert to religion or suicide (Those were the three options for camus)? Is this not the basis for The Myth of Sisyphus? If I recall correctly, Camus rejects both religion and suicide as ultimately absurd.
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In my personal experience, I agree, it's a misunderstanding of what happiness is, that causes people to miss the mark when trying to find it. Happiness isn't something you find, it's something you make. The universe is meaningless, it exists, devoid of any reason of its own, and yet, it exists. Your job, when trying to become a happy person, is to find your own meaning, and work at that, until you master it.
This way lies hedonism.