“We The Living” is about a struggle of three individuals in Soviet Russia. Ayn Rand claims that the heroin inherits all the philosophical ideas from her.
In the beginning of the book, Kira was my model. She did not care about anyone but herself. She walked the path which would make her happy. She denounced society because according to her, oneself always comes first. The highest reverence of man is himself. Selfishness is a virtue.
A few chapters later, I lost interest on Kira. She contradicted herself because she fell in love. Her love affair(s) is unconventional. So what? She attached herself to another and that created a “society”. This is the beginning of her downfall and she never rose back.
I have been attempting to detach myself completely from everything — emotions, society, etc. I had the opportunity to complete the task 4 years ago. I also had another opportunity 5 months ago. Both opportunities were shattered by an emotion that everyone seeks and what caused Kira her downfall.
Once a man is detached, he shall live life like a comatose. So far, I have devised three phases in order to achieve complete detachment: (1) detach yourself from blood, (2) detach yourself from love, and (3) detach yourself from dependence. I shall explain each one.
Detachment from blood means to extract yourself from your family and relatives. This does not mean casting out of the house (you will do this in the third phase). What I meant here is to not care what happens to the family. You shouldn’t feel grief, envy, jealousy regarding the family. This may be the hardest because you grew up attuned to this form of collective. It’s the basic form of society — family.
Detachment from love means to not be in love with anybody. This is difficult as well because the emotions playing here are very enigmatic. However, this is the only phase where you have to overcome something that’s not inherent. It’s injected. It’s poison to selfishness. Total self control is needed in this phase. Strong will to resist external temptation is a must.
Detachment from dependence is not exactly independence. Independence is the result, but is not the task. This is the most difficult of the three because you will have to abandon all connections. You will no longer depend on others in order to live. You will not have a job, acquaintances, connection to the world. You will be completely alone.
The first phase, I have partially completed. There are still stray emotions I need to sort out. The second phase, I should have the full control in this. For now, I can’t say I have this taken care of. Lastly, I need to save in order to accomplish the third phase. I have a long way to go… What about you?
June 1st, 2008
According to Thomas Hobbes, the state of nature is the state where each individual would have the right, or license to everything in the world. I believe that if society is stripped down — of everything artificial — we would be in that state. The world was originally in a state of nature.
Before I go any further, here I define a state as a point in space, not a governing one or a collective.
Hobbes’ assumption of the natural state led him into proposing a social contract — ultimately creation of society. For my own behalf, I will only accept the truthfulness of Hobbes’ assumption.
In the state of nature where a man can do what he wants is the foundation of my selfishness. If a man was originally allowed to do what he wished — free from constraints of society, then he should be forever allowed to do what he wants to do regardless of its effect on others.
It is not difficult to acknowledge the state of nature because it is always present, only hidden by the artificial curtains enveloping it. It is a sad thing, however, that when a man is born, he is conventionally acquainted to the artificial state and will take him a lifetime to realize that there is indeed a state with no constraints.
May 14th, 2008
Did something ever occur to you where you’ve said something and you wish you did not say it because it will open a discussion, only that discussion should and must not proceed? Well, it happens to me all the time because of my nature. First off, there are two kinds of me - simpleton and enigmatic. Each kind corresponds to a person’s level of acquaintance with me. I’m a simpleton towards a person if that person is familiar or intimate with me. I am transparent towards that person. Otherwise, I’m a complete enigma. For the sake of this entry, I will be referring to my simpleton self.
The wife and I chatted online, catching up on things. Towards the end when the session was about to end, she asked a question based on her observations of how I speak over the phone, talk online, etc. She can analyze me pretty well - quite a feat of her I must say. She knows how I would express certain things through speech patterns and tones. I guess that’s because we’re the same. There’s no escaping so I answered honestly. Then came the follow up question that MUST always supersede that former question. The answer to the follow up question she posed is of highest significance to complete the thought of my answer to the first question, otherwise it would be dangling. Well, you guessed it. I did not answer the follow up question.
I have a dilemma. I’m troubled. Not answering the follow up question definitely breaks the concept of “open to each other.” I feel guilty. The thing is that I probably would bring the answer to my grave, unless she can completely read my mind. Only I, alone, know the answer to the question. To meet halfway with her (I probably gave her more headaches with it), I encrypted the word (only one word answers the question) using SHA-256 and gave the encrypted string as the answer. A simple brute force decryption would solve the mystery. I couldn’t resist her so I had to tell her. I’m relieved.
Last edited by aovaron on May 11, 2008 at 8:52 AM
May 11th, 2008
A man is born to serve what purpose? My guess is as good as yours. Is it to populate, shape and define the world? Maybe. What I am sure of is that a man is born waiting to die. A man’s life is finite. He lives and after a span of time, he dies – forever decayed; no soul, no afterlife. During the time the man lives, he undergoes several transformations toward his ending. He suffers through time to reach that end. Life is a process of dying.
So why do we value life so much? Life is not precious because sooner or later it is gone. It causes all kinds of pain. So why do we protect something that is worthless and destructive? What is so good about the world that we thrive to live in it longer. These questions are yet to be answered; not here, but hopefully a hint appears.
I’ve lived twenty-six worthless years and spent a decade of those years in a quest to answer these questions. I have no answer, but I realized a tiny bit of it – happiness. There is no stopping the birth of man no matter what laws, medications, family planning we implement. Time and time again, man will be born save annihilation. Even so, man will evolve one way or another. So I thought, what would man do if he has no control over his birth? He has to live life and goes in a journey where he avoids suffering that is brought by living. Only in the absence of suffering happiness is reached.
What is suffering? Suffering is a feeling of destruction. Something that will cause physical and mental aspect of man to break down. These things we know as grief, jealousy, envy, hunger, pain, torment, and many more which your imagination can define. By that definition, we can deduce that man suffers because of another. Man does not grieve because of himself, he grieves because of another. Man loves (a form of attachment) another and will do everything to keep the attachment intact. Once the attachment is lost, man undergoes a series of states of suffering - grief, loneliness, depression, etc.
Since the cause of suffering is not oneself, society gets the blame. Social attachment torments a man. Being social do bring happiness, but only until a point. In society man acquaints himself with another who would bring happiness in a moment, but would later on bring lifelong suffering. Once a man attaches himself to another, he will protect both the relationship and the other entity as if it is a treasure.
A treasure is defined as an entity which – naturally – cannot be lost. It is only lost if hidden (i.e. kept or stolen), but it still exists. Life cannot be a treasure because it is lost no matter how careful the caretaker is. What is left behind when a man dies is a pseudo-self which is also known as memory.
Protecting a treasure is already cumbersome and takes so much out of a person. That act in itself contributes to a person’s suffering. How else would the feeling be if the treasure is lost? Naturally, anger, grief, disbelief, etc arise. As previously stated these are sufferings. It is true that having that treasure makes a man happy, but it’s troublesome taking care of that treasure.
In conclusion, eternal bliss cannot be attained by sharing with others. Eternal bliss is for an individual, not a group that’s why it is so difficult to achieve. The happiness we enjoy now is only temporary and we should enjoy that as much as possible. Think not of the future nor the past, enjoy the moment because it is now that will shape the future. Be happy if you’re happy.
May 5th, 2008
My latest addiction. Since Ruruoni Kenshin, I’ve been looking for a series worth my time. I passed on Naruto a few times because I thought it is not up to par on the seriousness of Kenshin. Even after an acquaintance mentioned Naruto, I still passed on it. However when I watched At The World’s End, Naruto Movie trailer was included in the Coming Soons and the soundtrack struck me. I thought I should give it a try and see if the series really is full of energy. A few days later, I was bored and searched for a downloadable Naruto Movie and found one. The movie didn’t really catch my attention, but I found a list of downloadable episodes…and that’s where it started.
What I really like about this series is the main characted, Uzumaki Naruto. Not because of his techniques, which he doesn’t have the best in the story, but it is Naruto himself. He has no family and most adults in the village loathe him which also means the children are also distant to him. He supports himself. I was touched when he showed his frog wallet to his mentor and telling him that he saved every bit of his mission money. He is only twelve years old and he lives by himself in an apartment. The series is very specific Naruto’s lifestyle and I think it is very important.
Do I pity Naruto? Maybe, but his lifestyle is my dream. I salute his courage and perseverance. Good job Masashi Kishimoto for creating an inspiring character. Rock on!
June 18th, 2007
