There’s a quote by nietzsche that I used to have on a magnet on my fridge. It read thus:
One must have chaos in oneself in order to give birth to a dancing star.
It always struck me as a very poetic was to say that it’s ok to be a little nuts….:)
You know, the more I think about it, the more I think that’s EXACTLY what he meant. Let’s face it, there are VERY few of us who learn life’s lessons without falling flat on our faces at least a thousand times.
Our society says that we should be perfect all the time. Our tits should be perky, our wieners always hard, our teeth as white as can be, etc, etc,…you get the point. We can’t DARE to be a little off center; to be such would be to be a failure at the game of life.
On the contrary, it’s the folks that have really stumbled, fell, scraped their knees, etc who really create. The creators in life mold themselves out of a chaotic lump of human decisions and experiences. The most beautiful masterpieces are those pieced together and made out of the most discordant remnants. Anyone can make something nice out of a perfect piece of marble. Not everyone can make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.
And that’s the point: those who TRULY succeed in life are those who CREATE themselves. We are those people who create something beautiful, something that dances, out of chaos: we turn water into wine. This can only happen when we harness those discordant powers and force them, every so effortlessly, into something that begins to take the shape of la vita bella.
Nietzsche may have been crazy, but he knew what he was talking about. It’s funny that the metaphor he used was a stellar one. Besides the notion of harnessing chaos, he pointed us in another direction: upward. So often we think of the heavens as the abode of god. We reserve those heavenly metaphors for something wholy and completely unhuman. N. turned that practice on it’s head. Humans create THEMSELVES into dancing stars; we create and mold ourselves into heavenly objects.
That’s crazy, right? Hell, we can’t be heavenly, right? Shit, blood, piss, boogers, toejam, bones….those are base, inane, everyday things. How can they be heavenly, stellar even?
That’s the beauty of it all: those things are all we have. It’s only out of those base elements that we can create anything of meaning. The only things that really mean anything are those things that come and go and then are gone forever. Meaning, Nietzsche would say, is in the appearance of things, in the very literal sense. This thing APPEARS and then is gone. It’s on the stage of life for a blink and then it fades away. Precisely that act of coming and going gives things their real character. heavenly and unchangable is boring as hell. Give me a dancing star that’s formed from chaos, that burns brightly, and then fades away, and I’ll give you a beautiful human life.
Burn on my friends. Dance this dance of life and reach up to the heavens: there you will find your real self.
Brett
Wanderings on the Way 
So what is that oh-so-human quality of foisting meaning upon every little thing? That’s not a rhetorical or leading question. Attempting to find meaning in tea leaves, ancient writings, or even the cosmos seems bizarre, instinctual, and hopeless all at the same time.
The sometimes difficult (for me) task of reconciling the chaos around us, in all its forms, to the order that seems to shape so much is my Sisyphean struggle. Perhaps its not intended to be reconciled or perhaps it is possible with further advancement, but that reconciliation vexes me.
I think I know what you mean.
Meaning is a funny thing: it’s IMPOSSIBLE not to find. Our entire existence is a search for meaning. From trying to understand the actions of those around us to ‘reading tea leaves’, as you say, each search is one for meaning. It’s IIMPOSSIBLE to NOT find meaning. Those who say they have no meaning typically mean they find no COHERENT meaning. There’s a difference.
I’m not sure about the whole reconciliation thing. I’ve yet to make that happen. however, I’ll take a stab at YOUR struggle, because it’s oh-so similar to mine.
You live you life between two worlds. You’ve seen the futility and immaturity of the ‘old world’, namely the theistic one, but you can’t quite seem to make sense of reality without a god, organizer, deity, etc. it’s SO damn difficult to believe in order without consequently believing in an orderer. I know. I’ve been there, and am there all too often.
however, there comes a point where you have to drop the search. You begin to see that the search for a god, orderer, etc is FUTILE. It’s not futile just because it’s an unanswerable question. It’s futile because it just doesn’t matter.
You push off from the shore of cosmology, and you land on the shore of personal meaning. You begin to see that life’s much richer when you are able to accept it as it is and LOVE how it unfolds. You gain strength from realizing it just doesn’t matter if there’s a god, so long as you have yourself.
It sounds odd, but it’s more of an existential truth than a logical one. When humans turn from searching for a big child to blame their shit on, they begin to take responsibility for their own meaning. Unless they are crazy or mentally unstable, it usually ends in a desire to be who they are; to be FULLY human and enjoy and drink in their existence without all the braces and crutches religion tries to throw at us.
Our lives as humans can be rich, deep and fulfilling WITHOUT all the baggage of religion, cosmology, etc. The path there is one of evolution: from looking up to looking within.
I know it’s such a personal thing, this search. One person’s destination is another person’s starting point. You have to find guides and companions you can accompany.
Look within and you’ll find the greatest heights. Look without and the highest you can look is how high your eyes can lift to the ‘heavens’.
Brett
I have found “looking within” to be quite pointless. It’s not that there isn’t anything to find, it’s that I’ve known about what’s within me all along. I’m not making any new discoveries.
I don’t really think it is possible to only look within. Or rely on any external anything. There is an interplay between the two that, for me, seems to lie at heart of the matter. “What is my purpose in life?”, “What is life’s purpose?”, “Where do I fit in the grand scheme of things?”. These are large questions and I think at best we can only find or, rather, construct a framework of thought that suits us and makes us sane. Because, really, looking within or looking for a god or looking at science is just helping us formulate that framework. And each individual only has 80 or so years to exist in whatever framework(s) he constructs. Most of the work done relating to that framework only seeks to deconstruct opposing frameworks and/or recruit more to yours. Humanity has gotten pretty good at developing and codifying these frameworks so that large groups fit nicely within them.
I have two more interesting points on the effects of our limited life span and these competing frameworks. But they will have to wait.
Good stuff,
~elBrando~
Very interesting. I guess for me, the questions of purpose, where I fit, etc are just not very interesting.
Not believing in an orderer, I don’t believe there is a purpose, at least in the cosmic sense. If there is, at the very least, I sure can’t see it. If I can’t see it, at least in regards to this issue, I don’t care to spend my time on it.
I’ve spent years looking for the purpose of life. I’ve come to see that I’m far more satisfied when I’m looking within my own self. Not in a narcisistic way, mind you.
Frameworks are a funny thing: they are constructable out of almost anything and can culminate in almost anything. Muslims, Buddhists, Satanists, scientists, etc, all have ‘logical’ frameworks. I might think them crazy, but they have their own logic. Where you end is completely dependent upoon where you begin. If you start with z, you’ll end up in a different place, than someone who started at blue.
In the absence of a solid framework, there’s not much to work with. We can scrounge around looking for something, but in the end we are creating our worldview. We end up creating that worldview out of internal drives and personal responses to stimuli. That’s why I say I look within. My starting point, and anyone else’s, for that matter, is right where you would think: within. Sure, there’s an outside world, but how we respond is shaped by our minds: through language, genetics, etc. Some of those are from external components, which is why you can NEVER rule out the external. But how they culminate in a worldview, or meaning if you will, is how they are formulated by YOU.
And, in the end, frameworks are meant to be broken. Those in history who were most interesting, were the men and women who broke the prevailing frameworks and replaced them with something novel. Were they right, better or such? Who knows. But they were interesting.
Brett
Do I understand you that to have purpose, you have to have an orderer? If that’s the case, then I guess we are kind of talking about this from different angles. I think our “looking within” definitions aren’t the same. Damn relational frameworks! LOL
No, for me I think the questions of purpose, etc. are interesting because they stem from within in a way. By that I mean if we must impose order on everything (and we must, seemingly) we are the orderer therefore our purpose is ours to impose on ourselves. Frameworks are both the result of and contributor to this imposition. I’m sure I’m talking myself in circles here.
I’ve never viewed the Purpose of Life as some end result, be it enlightenment, heaven, or whatever else something so grand should be exalted as. If there is such a thing I would probably have to label it, loosely, “Technology”. Or perhaps, “Ideas”. Again, talking in circles, no doubt.
Moving along, I think frameworks are a wondrous thing. They are remarkably flexible, utterly fragile, completely necessary, and intuitive almost to the point of invisibility.
This is definitely in my realm of not being able to communicate my thoughts properly, writing or otherwise. Sorry if it doesn’t make much sense.
Later,
~el Brando~