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swagmancerThanks to a YouTube recommendation rabbit hole, I've started learning more about the philosophy of names I've heard thrown around for years - Kierkegaard, Nietzsche - and. It's freaking me out. Because so often when I'm listening to one of these mini-lectures, I hear a concept described that I know I've considered before, or I hear an experience described that's already intimately familiar. Which in turn leads me down more rabbit holes.
Come with me, and you'll be, in a world of philosophisation~
A while back I started seeing videos pop up in my recommendations from the channel Academy of Ideas, with titles like "How to turn your mind from your enemy to your ally," "Freedom & Anxiety: The inner god versus the inner worm," and "Existential Psychotherapy: Death, Freedom, Isolation, Meaninglessness." I started wading into them with some amount of caution - though I couldn't express how at the time, I already foresaw how those kinds of videos could be gateways to Jordan Peterson-style intellectual bro-ism. And even though my recommended videos have started getting peppered with videos on how to manipulate women into dating you and with actual Jordan Peterson, the Academy of Ideas videos themselves have been mind-opening. They're concerned with the exact questions I've been wrestling with since I don't know when. How do I affirm and embrace life in the face of suffering and tragedy? Why am I afraid of things that might bring me joy? How do I overcome my fear of other people? Why do I feel the pull of conformity so strongly from so many different groups, and what does it mean to resist it?
I experienced the biggest brain-bomb while watching the video Introduction to Nietzsche this morning. This isn't the first time I've heard of Nietzsche or encountered a quote from him. This is the first time I can remember that I've actively chosen to sit down and engage with his philosophy for more than a minute. As far as I can recall, I've never even talked to anyone else about it at length. Yet listening to this lecture felt like having my own mind, my own inner experiences, narrated back at me.
Nietzcshe himself built into his works the idea of a destined audience, a "Higher Man" who sought out these questions. And here I was, having my own struggles and the conclusions I took from those struggles spoken out loud by someone I've never spoken to. I realized that I have always been drawn to people I see as philosophers, and that many of the stories I love have very Nietzschean themes. It does appear that I'm the exact person who Nietzsche was writing for - so what's up with that? Did I come to these conclusions because I'd already absorbed the ideas from elsewhere? Or did I possess a natural tendency toward these conclusions already?
What does bring someone to contemplate and study philosophy? Did I subconsciously curate my own arrival at this point, by surrounding myself with the kind of people who would lead me there? What does my upbringing have to do with it (because I can remember having versions of these thoughts for a very long time)? Is it something anyone is capable of, if they are put into the "right" circumstances, or would some be fundamentally resistant to it?
I ask these questions for a couple of reasons. I can see an inherent danger in unquestioningly accepting the label of Nietzcshe's "Higher Man" for the philosopher. I think this may be the exact gateway (or one gateway, at least) into intellectual bro-ism, the idea that a pure, objective view of the human condition is possible, and that the more one aspires to it, the more one is superior to others. Fuck that idea forever and ever. I engage with these questions so that I can approach my personal human condition with ever-increasing love and joy, not to build myself an ivory tower.
Yet at the same time, I can't help feeling like asking these questions and facing up to the answers is kind of... essential? Not in the sense that everyone does it, but that, for anyone who wants to live the slightest bit outside the norms of larger society and their immediate in-group, even on the edge of them - I don't know that we can live fulfilling lives without embracing the creation of our own moral compass and our own life's meaning. So, even if not everyone has the potential, maybe the "Higher Man/Woman/Individual" is more common than one might think.
Ultimately, no matter why or how I ended up here, here I am. It was tempting to feel foolish that someone had had all these thoughts before me, but nah. I may have arrived at class having done some of the work already, but now I get to engage with the work that others have put into humanity's collective knowledge and use that to speed my growth. And since I've already experienced some of the rewards, I already know it isn't all academic hooey. I can approach it with perspective and healthy skepticism, but at the same time an open mind.
But uh. I guess I'm into philosophy.
Come with me, and you'll be, in a world of philosophisation~
A while back I started seeing videos pop up in my recommendations from the channel Academy of Ideas, with titles like "How to turn your mind from your enemy to your ally," "Freedom & Anxiety: The inner god versus the inner worm," and "Existential Psychotherapy: Death, Freedom, Isolation, Meaninglessness." I started wading into them with some amount of caution - though I couldn't express how at the time, I already foresaw how those kinds of videos could be gateways to Jordan Peterson-style intellectual bro-ism. And even though my recommended videos have started getting peppered with videos on how to manipulate women into dating you and with actual Jordan Peterson, the Academy of Ideas videos themselves have been mind-opening. They're concerned with the exact questions I've been wrestling with since I don't know when. How do I affirm and embrace life in the face of suffering and tragedy? Why am I afraid of things that might bring me joy? How do I overcome my fear of other people? Why do I feel the pull of conformity so strongly from so many different groups, and what does it mean to resist it?
I experienced the biggest brain-bomb while watching the video Introduction to Nietzsche this morning. This isn't the first time I've heard of Nietzsche or encountered a quote from him. This is the first time I can remember that I've actively chosen to sit down and engage with his philosophy for more than a minute. As far as I can recall, I've never even talked to anyone else about it at length. Yet listening to this lecture felt like having my own mind, my own inner experiences, narrated back at me.
Nietzcshe himself built into his works the idea of a destined audience, a "Higher Man" who sought out these questions. And here I was, having my own struggles and the conclusions I took from those struggles spoken out loud by someone I've never spoken to. I realized that I have always been drawn to people I see as philosophers, and that many of the stories I love have very Nietzschean themes. It does appear that I'm the exact person who Nietzsche was writing for - so what's up with that? Did I come to these conclusions because I'd already absorbed the ideas from elsewhere? Or did I possess a natural tendency toward these conclusions already?
What does bring someone to contemplate and study philosophy? Did I subconsciously curate my own arrival at this point, by surrounding myself with the kind of people who would lead me there? What does my upbringing have to do with it (because I can remember having versions of these thoughts for a very long time)? Is it something anyone is capable of, if they are put into the "right" circumstances, or would some be fundamentally resistant to it?
I ask these questions for a couple of reasons. I can see an inherent danger in unquestioningly accepting the label of Nietzcshe's "Higher Man" for the philosopher. I think this may be the exact gateway (or one gateway, at least) into intellectual bro-ism, the idea that a pure, objective view of the human condition is possible, and that the more one aspires to it, the more one is superior to others. Fuck that idea forever and ever. I engage with these questions so that I can approach my personal human condition with ever-increasing love and joy, not to build myself an ivory tower.
Yet at the same time, I can't help feeling like asking these questions and facing up to the answers is kind of... essential? Not in the sense that everyone does it, but that, for anyone who wants to live the slightest bit outside the norms of larger society and their immediate in-group, even on the edge of them - I don't know that we can live fulfilling lives without embracing the creation of our own moral compass and our own life's meaning. So, even if not everyone has the potential, maybe the "Higher Man/Woman/Individual" is more common than one might think.
Ultimately, no matter why or how I ended up here, here I am. It was tempting to feel foolish that someone had had all these thoughts before me, but nah. I may have arrived at class having done some of the work already, but now I get to engage with the work that others have put into humanity's collective knowledge and use that to speed my growth. And since I've already experienced some of the rewards, I already know it isn't all academic hooey. I can approach it with perspective and healthy skepticism, but at the same time an open mind.
But uh. I guess I'm into philosophy.
