Because I still have this rash around my eye I took a leave today and obviously what else do we do when we're sick and at home? We think about things.
Well, not really. I usually just lay in bed all day, sometimes asleep and most times with the laptop. 4 tabs are open: gmail, facebook, twitter, and an extra tab for which my current "what to read up today?" is set. That 4th tab is usually spent on blogs, with no particular subject.
Today wasn't different; I lay in bed but this time with the most indulgent feeling that it is a monday and I am at home, with my 4 tabs to keep me ~busy.
Today's 4th tab:
"July 12, 2013
Matter-of-fact
After getting a life insurance plan with retirement benefits a few months ago, I immediately told a sibling that maybe he should get one too. He quipped, “E pano kung mamatay ka before 65?"
I replied, “E di may 1 million each si Mommy at Daddy."
Recounting this conversation now, I’m not sure whether to laugh or cry at the manner with which I answered him: nonchalant, matter-of-fact, shrugging even. Now I ask: Is the focus on a purely financial consequence of one’s death some kind of hidden defense mechanism? Or is it evidence of one’s acceptance of everyone’s inevitable mortality?
I want to believe it is the latter, but I guess it really is difficult to grasp dying for someone so young and someone who has so much to live for. Maybe it’s the fear and the hope that actually move people forward; living, breathing.. until it stops."
Original post here.
That's my friend's blog entry, and I found it short enough to evoke some thinking.
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I googled Existentialism.
The first few paragraphs on this was overwhelmingly complicated. I am not well versed with philosophies, but these different explanations of how to view the world fascinate me.
Read up a few of its concepts, and I could say existentialism is what makes us ponder about life's meaning. That deep, long thought, essential life meaning.
I mean really,
What. is. life's. meaning?
I give you 5 seconds.
...
Did you just define it through the people around you, your achievements, the roles you play in circles that you belong to?
If so, then that is exactly what existentialism is
not about. Lol I am not helping am I?
The philosophy has a detached approach to life and I find myself relating to some of its concepts. And I don't say that's necessarily bad (nor good).
The two existentialist concepts that will really make you think are:
1. Existence precedes essence
2. Absurdism
The first just says that we first exist, and that's that. Anything that comes after is just a role that we assume, whether by force or not. This is what I mentioned above that thinking of the roles we play in society is only secondary to the fact that first, we existed, free from anything. Let me borrow Sartre's words, my direct source being
wikipedia (please don't judge me i know wiki's not a legit source but it did explain it well i know i know i know):
"...man first of all exists, encounters himself, surges up in the world – and defines himself afterwards." Of course, the more positive, therapeutic aspect of this is also implied: A person can choose to act in a different way, and to be a good person instead of a cruel person. Here it is also clear that since humans can choose to be either cruel or good, they are, in fact, neither of these things essentially.
Right? Existence, precedes essence. Says the existentialist.
The second one, in its most simplistic form, says that the human mind always has the tendency to seek for "inherent value", inherent meaning.. and realize that the human mind is unable to do that. Such an
absurd case, if you think about it. To always have that tendency to seek, but always have that answer of NO - ya can't find it.
The point of absurdism is that since the human mind is unable to grasp all of the unknown, that we are not able to define all things with certainty, then we won't be able to satisfy our tendency to define things' inherent meaning - and that includes life. That in the end, life's meaning is whatever meaning we give to it.
Life's meaning is whatever meaning we give to it.
Life's meaning is whatever meaning we give to it.
And it can mean nothing.
The other concepts of existentialism are just as interesting (especially
The Other and The Look), most of them converging to the idea that - and this is just from what I understood, I encourage you to read on your own - we always have a choice. The twist is that even if that choice is bad, it isn't really by reason "bad", but only as is dictated by the society.
Such as in the concept of
angst, where:
..example is the experience one has when standing on a cliff where one not only fears falling off it, but also dreads the possibility of throwing oneself off. In this experience that "nothing is holding me back", one senses the lack of anything that predetermines one to either throw oneself off or to stand still, and one experiences one's own freedom.
Now that's what you call a choice. That because "everything is just subjective, I can move separate from that subjectivity (or essence) and just be free (exist)."
See, kind of twists your perspective, right? It's liberal in thinking, and honestly, I don't know my point in writing this entry. Obviously i'm free writing and just putting here thoughts. My incoherent paragraphs are a proof of that. Like now. See?
Thinking about it now, I guess this just proves one of my life's philosophies, which is that
we see things the way we want to see them.
Something like that. That everything is about perspectives. And then there's positivity, the concept of silver linings.
Life's meaning, I think, really can't be inherently defined. But who cares? If I am writing this entry now, boggled but convinced at the same time, then I guess I'm living my life. Confused, interested, aware, seeking, living. There is simply nothing worse than knowing how it ends. (Oh hey Panic! At the Disco I borrowed your words thanks you're awesome)
I'm happy, at least as I write this, I am happy. And that's how I view this day's life.
I hope that at least even for today, yours is awesome too.
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Started this entry 2 Mondays ago, continued it today. One of those nights that we're up and thinking. Or hey wait, I had a box of chocolate chip cookies earlier. Yeah, sugar rush I guess.
