philosophy, and lack thereof (17)
Hi visitor.
I've never really been one to have a specific philosophy for life. When I'm doing well in some aspects of life, I'm usually just driven by willpower and what not. But lately, I've been thinking a lot more about what it means to be alive and what's real and what's not. I might have the philosophical knowledge of a 6-year-old, but I'm gonna share with you anyway. Grab a cup of coffee and listen to my rambling. I guess it's very ironic that I'm using chatGPT to ask me questions about philosophy, lmao. That might speak to my character a bit, unfortunately.
Anyways, the first question I have on here is what makes life worth living? I would say many things make my life personally worth living. The number one, by far and away, is my mom, dad, and sister. They are literally everything to me. Other than that, I'm really living for the future, in terms of travel and career. My friends also matter to me so, so much. I used to be really into materialism and getting excited over nice things, but that's faded a lot lately, and I live for more simple, desirable things.
I think your life should have highs and some lows, instead of being stable yet boring. However, it's not like all stable lives are boring, and some people really enjoy their routine. I'm not one to tell others how to live their lives. Me personally, I want my 20s to be dramatic and life-shifting. I turn 20 very soon, so I'll put that into action ASAP.
I want to speak on a Buddhist principle that really stuck out to me. It's called Śūnyatā, or emptiness. Basically, imagine you have a car. A Honda is a car, while a piece of leather is not. When you have the leather, the metal, the gas and oil, and the plastic in front of you separately, you don't have a car. When they're put together, a "car" suddenly forms. However, there is no car. The "car" is not an independently real concept, and you can't pinpoint what is technically a car and what is not.
As such, nothing in life is independently real, metaphysical or physical. This includes ourselves; we often think that our bodies are us, but a body doesn't have a finite start and end point, and we can't really say that we are definitely real as humans. An example of this is the debate around abortion, and where the line between cells and a human is. I won't state an opinion on that matter. All I'm saying is that no one on Earth can dictate what is real and what isn't, because nothing truly is.
Pictured: This hunk of metal is called a "car frame", but it could just as well be a very large paperweight. Or, more accurately, it can't be defined in real terms at all.
I think Memento Mori is one of my favorite simple concepts in philosophy. You should read the comic book Daytripper if you want a trippy examination of this concept. Thinking about death very frequently is a great way to waste your life being depressed. However, if you never think about making your time meaningful, you might let your life slip between your hands. There's a balance to be had. Thinking about when, why, or how death will happen is powerfully depressing, but thinking about the fact that your life will be around for up to 120 years is incredibly important, IMHO.
I feel like culture is very important to me in life. I'm admittedly not very well-educated on other cultures, but as someone with Pakistani immigrant parents, I absolutely adore my heritage, even if I don't like a lot of it, you know? I got really into Icelandic culture for a while, and I want to explore what Brazilians live like and eat like. I think some people consider tourism and education to be mindless indulgence for first-worlders, which might be true. All I'm saying is, if you have the opportunity, diving into other nations can be a way to experience many different lives instead of one. Being in France during the world cup in 2018 completely changed my life to be honest, and I wouldn't trade that experience for the world.
I think we as humans, in general, are here to have fun. By fun, I don't necessarily mean amusement parks or whatever, but I think a general sense of humor and lightness can completely change the world. We don't need to be killing people, or making trillions of dollars, or doing hardcore drugs. We need to be sitting in the sun and laughing about nothing. I know this is very naive! I don't really care. While having a lot of lighthearted fun isn't always an option for very many less fortunate people, we should make the world more enjoyable and easy for all people, because that's why we're smarter than animals. We build things. We help each other.
I think I would live very similarly to the way I do now if I only had one year to live. My therapist taught me that change is gradual, so even if I had very little time, I wouldn't really be able to completely shift things and make the most of it. Making the most out of your time is a choice and a process, not a quick band-aid for existential dread. I make the most out of my life by putting effort into things that matter to me and receiving rewards from my effort.
That concept of Śūnyatā that I was talking about earlier also applies to people's nature, in my opinion. Everyone thinks that they're a bad or a good person, hard-working or lazy, clean or messy. But no one has to be the person they were a minute ago. People shouldn't get stuck in these meaningless words that are just sounds, and can't describe anything in true reality. I think that I like to drive fast and I hate chai, but no one can tell me to hold those opinions in a few minutes. While it's important to have grounded values, most of these feelings are not actually important to us.
I know Kanye definitely hasn't been a good guy lately, but something he said a while back really spoke to me. He was talking about a 2-year-old jumping on a coffee table, feeling like a superhero. He said that the adults around the kid told him to "act right". The kid doesn't care about a coffee table, but now he's running a bunch of calculations on how to act. Later, suddenly, he's 40 years old, and there are infinite coffee tables stacked around his life, and he's acting and acting and acting helplessly. It's a very clever metaphor to describe the simple concept of open-mindedness. If we don't let our children explore in their own ways, we could absolutely never open our own minds and feel things we didn't know were possible.
I could go on and on, but maybe that's for another day. Turn off your laptop or your phone and go dance! I'm serious. Put on your favorite song and do a little jig. Enjoy the day! Seize the moment!!!
Ok bye,
Ayaan