I have discover the meaning of life. After reading Hegel's thoughts on consciousness and how consciousness may either be a passive screen or an instrument for which to obtain what is real what exists. Hegel believes that this world outside of our senses is essentially meaningless and has no substance because it is not shaped by the mind. That the real world is nothing... Not in the way Decartes believes but that the real world though it exists is essentially meaningless. I have come to discover that I somewhat disagree with this. I would say that the real world is not meaningless but rather the universe/the real world is pure meaning. The eye is only so big that i can only see so much. The ear only so big to hear so much. So why can the mind not be big enough to contemplate the entire universe. The meaning of the universe is all around us at every stage but it is irreconcilably large. At present we only have so much knowledge in order to contemplate it.
A simple analogy of life may clarify it. Imagine we are all sailors with our own little sail boats adrift in the ocean. The ocean is pure meaning. It is the universe. Their are certainly islands and pockets of land in this ocean. Sometimes the water is clear. Sometimes it is murky. Now in our life, we can never encompass the entire ocean. We can never as single human being see all of it. Cover every inch of its mass. So us with are small sails must choose a path. But this choice is not a absolute it is influenced by both the wind and sea in our sails. We have certain choices but other are what the universe/meaning gives us. In this simplification of the universe, art is the map and the compass to sea. It is what guides our feelings and thinking. it helps us clarify what we see, hear and feel in the context of bigger world projected on to a smaller one. It helps us navigate our feelings and our thoughts that we experience along our sailing and by guiding us it also allows us to make plans for the future. For us to seek forth with it. To look forward at the places we will go. The only wrong choices in this life at sea is stoicism/asceticism and a return the animal world. Stoicism is the giving up. The nihilism of a different name. It is the same as cutting our sails down and drifting away. It is the choice of no longer making choices. It is to choose to be forever lost. To be a stone. To never live but mere die before death. To becoming nothing and do nothing. To stop traveling. The return to animal instincts is similar in that it is nihilistic. It is in the analogy the choice only to sail a small distance between two islands everyday for the rest on ones life. Because it is safe. It is not as bad as stoicism because some variety can be found in this lifestyle. And this is certainly not a critique on those who life a systemitized life. But rather a critique on those who choose also to no longer make choices. But rather merely go back and forth. To do makes outputs as a precise reaction to inputs. To no longer consider oneself part of a whole ocean but rather consider only thyself and thy needs. The greatest of us navigate a path that ventures forth to seek out that which is not been seen. To make the choices. To choose to live. and to feel the universe as fights against us or pushes you forward. To feel the ocean water break along you or push you forward. This meaning... This pure meaning surrounds all of us. But we cannot have all of it. So we must choose a path through it. And we must constantly contemplate our choice through it. We must live and think. We must go through it and think of where we are going. The greatest life then is the life of Oedipus. Oedipus made his choice and he suffered the arrows of misfortune. But to end only on the end of Oedipus would be a mistake. The meaning of life is not suffering. Though suffering is part of it. but rather. the meaning of life is to suffer and continue to press forward to go beyond but not blindly act but consider and reconsider in the gaps of the moments of action. In Oedipus at Colonus. We see that Oedipus wise through suffering continues his path through life and is ultimately taken to somewhere serene. Oedipus truly lived because he felt acted and thought about the world in which lived. This is why tragedy is so profound. It is because we suffer that we empathize.
Also though we may all navigate different paths through this ocean of meaning. We are all a part of it. We are surround by this whole of meaning. We may derive different and particulars from it only because we exist and individuals with particulars but ultimately we all sail in this whole. In the hopes of seeing what we must see. Feeling what we must feeling in order to truly have lived. The meaning of life is both objective and subjective. It's meaning is objectively around us but we have subjective means of contemplating it.
1 comment:
Agreed
Post a Comment