Posts Tagged "virtues"

Why do we even care ?

Posted by yseult on Feb 23, 2009 in Issues, The Odd Philosophical Question

Why do we even have friends? Why do we link ourselves with others when there’s only heartache, abandonment, betrayal and pain to be had from it…?

The question is as old as society itself and probably even as old as language itself. Consequently philosophers, thinkers and good people have produced a varied catalogue of ideas on the subject that range as far as just stating that man is not made to live alone to a completely utilitarian approach: because it serves us.

But even if the simplistic theory that we can have ethical considerations and moral decisions towards our peers and fellow human beings only because we recognise ourselves in them falls short on several accounts, the intellectual approach that we care because we can or must, doesn’t help much more to understand what it is that makes us connect to this person, but not that one.

Quite generally speaking we are brought up with the idea that caring for others is an ideal to aspire to. That stepping out and away from the weight of your own needs and make someone else’s fears imperative for yourself, brings you something more, offers you some kind of insight into your own soul and one step closer to a ‘good life’.
There is no religion and no social system or idea that does not operate on this basic idea either by reinforcing it or by negating it.

But is the abstract idea of some heavenly reward in an afterlife or aspiring to the ideal of a good life or being a good person, really enough to account for the fact that we do against all odds, against adversity, despite rejection, hurt, desolation and frustration reach out, touch others, take up their burdens, listen to their fears, soothe their minds again and again?

Because secretly we hope that the people we care for will do the same for us, for even if I am someone who’s not used to facing the problem of not caring enough, but rather too much even for strangers that cross my path… even I am sort of speechless when in one of my weaker moments I am ignored by my friends.
That fundamental element of ‘shared love and shared burden’ doesn’t make us manipulative or even interested in the way we deal out our affections and our readiness to help, but rather it points to the next even more fundamental characteristics of our human condition: we need care.

We need people taking care of us and our emotions, people noticing us, recognising us for what we are and who we strive to be, listen to what we have to say or teach or even cry about and what makes us passionate. We don’t need it just to feel better or inflate our egos, what I am referring to is much more basic, much more unreflected. It’s not so much different than the impulsive touch towards a pet or a baby and the basic level of need either the animal or the baby feel for that touch and proximity.

Thomas Merton wasn’t the first to use the phrase ‘no man is an island’, but he certainly took the concept to a completely different level. His reaching out seemed to know no boundaries and looking closely at his biography might even suggest that it bore dangerous self-annihilating traits. And yet, his generosity of heart has become an ideal… because, no man is an island.

But what does that mean? Truly? That ultimately we’re flawed and can’t ever be enough on our own, for our own? I shouldn’t think so. I find it much more inspiring to think that our actions, however small they may be cause a light to shine (or ripples across existence, if you prefer that image) that – not unlike a seed – will grow over time, be reinforced by connecting to others and caring for them and it will eventually affect people outside of our immediate range of action… if we cannot believe that our actions influence others around us and our surrounding society, what else keeps us from not shutting down and surfing the ego trip to self destruction?

In times where dehumanisation is something that is so quickly achieved, where the mass of people in our immediate focus has grown exponentially through internet and modern media, where friends can be nothing much more than a few points on a computer screen and a name (maybe just an avatar), the danger of limiting people, shutting them out, casting them off or simply not taking care of them is even bigger than before. Not only does the internet make it much easier to connect with each other, it also makes it much easier for us to lose focus on the most important thing in life: nothing remains. We can’t take anything with us. When we die, all that remains will be the people we’ve loved and the ones that have loved us and the icon of a memory of that love.

So, we better start minding our friends, caring for their hearts, accepting their limits and loving them for what they are. Not because they deserve it or because we might need them one day, but because there is no greater and more effortless gift than love.

Be generous with yourself and someone you haven’t dared to reach out to today. It’ll make their day a brighter one and your heart shine harder.

Communication: The Sins of our Fathers

Posted by yseult on Nov 13, 2008 in Issues, The Odd Philosophical Question

We are how we talk and we talk like our parents have or have not taught us. Would teaching dialectics and discussion in school help with the current non-culture of debate and argumentation?

Prompted by the post on the communication style during the past US Presidential Elections, someone pointed out to me on plurk that they thought that communications, dialectics and the ethics of discourse should be taught in school to kids already and I gathered that for him that would mean a considerable improvement of certain things going wrong at this point in history when partisanship seems to be more important than the political, social et al. issue at hand.

I only half agree with that idea for one general reason: we talk like our parents. Or rather we discuss like our parents.

Let me explain this slightly exaggerated assertion. While I am all for teaching young adults the arts of talking properly, right and for effect on one hand and to analyse arguments and react to them on the other hand, I also believe that such a teaching is next to fruitless if it falls on unprepared ground.
Aren’t we much more influenced by the discussion style and culture going on in our parent’s house while growing up than shaped by what the teacher tells us at say… the age 14?

It is a common and widely accepted ground rule today that our way of talking, expressing ourselves in normal circumstance is shaped by our social upbringing, the surroundings we’ve been exposed to at tender age and the all the other socio-historical stimuli we’ve been subjected to. It’s shaped by what we read, when we read it, what we hear and process and finally who we consider our idols and personal heroes. (I had and still have a huge sympathy for the Roman Senators and it has pushed me at an early age to learn the history and nature of rhetoric making me real pain in discussions… )
If that is the case for ‘normal style’ communication, then it isn’t too far fetched to assume that the particular case of discursive discussion is just as influenced by our roots. As kids and adolescents we learn from what we see and if our parents have either a passive agressive discussion and confrontation style, or one that makes the roof blow off the house, as children we will either adopt that or refuse it completely depending our level of auto-evaluation and critical analysis of our actions.

The point I am trying to make here is simple really: an ethos is discussion and argumentation cannot be built by schooling and teaching alone, because these levels already assume a certain meta-level because they aim at teaching something. A good discussion style starts much earlier and parents are important in that process. The effect of an all-mighty father that can say ‘Yes, you’re right and making a good point there. I concede that I was wrong/hasty etc.’ are immense on the psyché of a child that will learn that even though a parent is the measure of all things in their life, conceding to being wrong isn’t the end of the world. This in turn will at a later age tell them that riding an argument even though you know that it’s flawed is a bad thing and that it’s better to learn from others rather than stand on your own viewpoint against all odds and the wrath of the gods.

I’ve seen people with a lot of kids being condescending with people who tried to have a decent discussion with them in the course of these Elections, who were deliberately mean and inflammatory and abrasive only to show how right they thought they were and it made me seriously worry about the example they give to their children, because I don’t believe that in their home environment they discuss differently than online. We are what we say and how we say it after all and if you don’t have a discussion ethos with the big topics, why would you have one in the most fundamental social cell, family?

Neither one of us has proof of the ultimate truth, if they did, the world would look differently and there wouldn’t be any need for discursive analysis and discussion or even so much as a teaching exchange. In such a utopian state of Eden, we all would know and thus wouldn’t need to exchange knowledge or different points of views. The second a person, locked in a discussion, assumes that they have the better point of view, the right way of looking at things, the respect clause has been violated and since at this point only condescension can be had from that person, the discussion dies a sudden death.
Now people will continue on, trying to work with such a person, to make them see other contrasting arguments to their view, or even pull the mother of all arguments: personal experience. (A well known ‘trick’ to try and bring emotion into the discussion and tone down the heat.) But with someone as fundamentally convinced as this, even that will be shot down.

There is no value to be had from such discussions. Not a social interactive value, not a personal one and certainly not a political one. All it serves is giving rhetorical bullies a box on which they can stand on their personal speaker’s corner. All that comes from it is insult.
Kids that grow up under such communication circumstances are bound to have a ‘strike first’ attitude in their discussion style and chances are such an attitude will also spill over into their general conflict resolution attitudes (hitting when no arguments are at hand etc.).

So, truly, as adults, we shape the future generation’s communication style as well as their ability to deal with information, process it and use it in discussion. A detail that often gets lost in the mayhem that can be child upbringing.

Let’s talk about it… or not

Posted by yseult on Nov 8, 2008 in Issues, Personal

Now that the US Presidentials are over, I can finally start thinking about blogging and writing again.

Sounds like an odd thing to say, doesn’t it? Why would the US elections keep me as a European, a writer or a philosopher from blogging my mind? The answer is easily given. There are only two ways to go about a topic that is so invasive in our everyday lives and has such a massive presence in the news: either you avoid talking about it completely, but then the avoidance will always show in your writing since it is what is on everyone’s mind after all OR you do write about it and open a can of worms that you cannot close again.

Of course I had an opinion on the votes and the elections, of course I have a personal stance and a professional one since I can rarely dissociate the one from the other. As someone trained in philosophy going about in the world, you can rarely not be influenced by the things and current topics around you and think about them with your ‘philosophical’ mind. So, even if I wasn’t to talk about the elephant in the room, I would in a way by avoiding it meticulously.

So the main question remains: why not blog about it if it’s such an important issue of our time?

Because in the myriad of comments, opinions, partisanship battles, demeaning thought processes etc. my word doesn’t count for anything. Not amongst the friends that I live around, close contacts over the internet that I’ve come to consider my friends on certain levels, not among the people that share my faith or convictions or the people I respect. Because just as the media coverage enlightens our knowledge of the world (not to be confounded with actual knowledge, I’m just referring to factual knowledge), it also taints and escalates the dialogue. There is practically no informed discussion to be had about anything in this respect. Not about the kind of dog Obama’s kids will get or the colour of Palin’s breakfast cereal.
I have in all honesty only seen ONE explame of a discussion that could be called constructive and instructive for both camps in all of over 2 years of following the whole circus called U.S. Presidential Election.

What a sad bottom line that makes.

And something I was not ready to expose myself to. There are only so many fall-outs with friends and family that you can get past and once certain things are being said… the going back is almost impossible. The Philosopher’s Attic isn’t about that. It’s about looking at the world in a different manner. It’s about getting a small spark of something else in your day and in mine. And that is what I’ll try to bring back now that this race is over.

A great weekend to all of you.

Solitude

Posted by yseult on Aug 15, 2008 in Philosophy, The Human Mind

In a time where every minute of every day is filled with chatter and noise, solitude and silence do seem like an endearing thing. And while silence and solitude are bound to connect us much more deeply to ourselves and the things that haunt us, work on us, make us laugh or cry, they – just as anything else – can be the most oppressive and terrible things.
Being alone, lonely… maybe it’s for that reason that these expressions have become tinged with the sense of something negative. Or maybe it’s just our society that is suggesting that the more people you have around you that keep you from being alone, the more successful, more cherished, loved and popular you are. After all, who actually likes to be alone? Isn’t it rather the mark of a socially inept person to be alone, to seek loneliness, to find silence?

Another tradition runs against this. In it men and women have chosen solitude and silence as a way to holiness. For it is in the silence and solitude that we hear our inner selves proclaimed. It is in these lonely hours between the waking and the morning that we truly have to accept our own limits, our own fear and our own hardships that do not come from the world that surrounds us, but from the world that lives in us. But if holiness is found in solitude, why do we shy away from it?

Getting to know oneself is the challenge of a lifetime and some say that you can never achieve it until you’ve drawn your last breath. Be that as it may, it still is a hard task for sure. There never is a moment where we do not either surprise ourselves or are scared by our own darkness, meanness and gratious hardness towards either ourselves or the people that depend on us. Listening, hearing and accepting those limitations of our own being, of ultimately what makes us be the humans that we are… will break us or make us.

And thus solitude becomes a catalyst, a primer, a moment of hesitations before we launch ourselves back at the world to change it.

This is a tease post in a series of short essays or meditations that will sooner or later be published alongside with my poetry.