Over the last ten years, I’ve come to cherish my life without god.  I go about my daily tasks with a deep sense that I am alone in the universe, and it makes my life all the richer.

I know it sounds odd, but I have really come to believe that this world is all there is.  Sure, there COULD be a god, there COULD be an afterlife, and there COULD be an esoteric dimension to our corporeal existence. But…

what could that dimension/afterlife/god add to what we have without them?  I mean, what could any of those aspects/things possibly add that we don’t have in life?  For me, I can’t find anything that they add.  I love deeply, respect life, enjoy others, and care for other human beings and all of the above without any reference whatsoever to anything other than my own humanness.

Furthermore, I have come to believe that living this life as it’s the ONLY one, adds so much and provides for a much deeper experience than the converse.  If I KNOW that this world is IT, then I’ll care more and cherish more of the things in the now:  I’ll love what surrounds me and eschew all idealism in favor of the real.

Nietzsche’s concept of AMOR FATI intrigues me for this very reason.  He saw that when we cherish the NOW, the HERE, and don’t look for something beyond it, we are able to live freely and see it more sharply.  We can, in short, truly live if all that surrounds us is of our making and not the making of some malevolent/benevolent god.  We can truly love our lives the more we are accepting of its circumstances.

I, for one, believe that life is better without god.  I love it.  I live it. And, most of all, I own it.

Brett

I think one of the most fascinating and uplifting aspects of Stoicism is the assertion that happiness is not dependent upon our circumstances.

This notion is so far from what we’re taught by our society to almost sound farscical.  Every time we turn on the T.V., radio, internet, etc we are bombarded by advertisements detailing just how much we need product ‘x’ in order to be happy.  There’s apparently a huge hole in my life that only cialis can fill, or what it the fantastic shamwow cloth?  Regardless, we’re conditioned to believe that happiness and peace of mind are products of having just the right configuration of external circumstances, and then doing all we can to maintain the latter so as to go on being happy.

What has this done to us as a society and as individuals?  Plainly put, we’re a bunch of sissies and crybabies!  We go around blaming everyone and eveything for our lack of happiness.  We go to great lengths, oftentimes immoral ones, to gain the ‘things’ and ‘stuff’ that we just know holds the key to our happiness.  All the while we are moving farther and farther away from true happiness.

Happiness is nothing more and nothing less than fulling understanding what we can control and what we can’t.  it’s really quite that simple.  In intimately knowing the difference between what we can and can’t change, we find rest and peace.  No longer do we force ourselves to look for the latest thing to bring us peace; we know that peace is already there.  It’s already there in our minds and always has been.

It’s a beautiful thing to know that the collapse of the economy, the election of the wrong candidate, or the development of cancer in our bodies can not take away our peace of mind or permenantly steal  our happiness.  It provides a freedom that knows no bounds and that opens up potentialities hitherto unrecognized.  Not only are we permenantly happy, but we’re also free to bring joy and happiness to others.  We can bring a ray of light into an increasingly dark world.  that gift of light can mean the difference between peace and war.

yes, we can be happy regardless.  It’s up to us.

Brett

I’ve been giving a lot of thought to the whole notion of control.

It’s probably a safe bet to assume that we’re, as a society, obsessed with our control over even the smallest aspects of our existence.  Take, for example, our morning cup of ‘joe’.  Here’s the scenario:

I pull into Starbucks at 6:45a.m. for a grande cup of house blend.  I’m three cars behind.  Three minutes go by.  Now four.  After the passing of the fifth minute, I begin to lose my patience as the ‘incompetent’ barrista is on the fast track to ruining an already red letter morning.  I finally get to the window, 7 minutes into my now more than annoying trek for morning caffeine,  hastily grab my coffee, pay the young man behind the counter, and speed off to work.

Throughout this 10 minute stretch of my day, my mind is constantly providing commentary on the unfolding scene.

Jesus, don’t know they I’m in a hurry?

what the hell’s taking so long?

I just wanted a cup of coffee!

We’ve become so accustomed to having things as and when we want, that the notion of accepting the things we can’t change is about the farthest from our minds.  Our society, a technocratic one, is all about how to fix ‘x’ in the fastest and most efficient way possible.

I’ll humbly submit that I think this mode of thinking is more far reaching than just a vignette from the local coffee shop:  it’s a way of approaching the world that is fundamentally flawed.  While there are many ways for us to influence our circumstances, the most significant opportunities for influence are the least expected.

As a matter of fact, our ability to influence reality is nowhere more powerful than with our own minds.  There is a power that’s been hidden by the over-specialized, utilitarian world in which we live and which, when accessed, can be the difference between living a fulfilled, aesthetically pleasing life, and living one in which frustration and disappointment are the norm.

This power is simply this:  choice.  We have the power to choose how we act and react in every single situation in which we find ourselves.  Now, this might seem contrary to our current victim psychology.  We’re so keyed into believing that we SHOULD have control over all things, that we fall into a victim mentality when they eventually and inevitably DON’T go as we please.  We say things like this:

I couldn’t help myself

He made me so angry

Why me?

If only ‘x’ didn’t do this, I’d be happy

When we’ve fallen into this paradoxical trap of believing we SHOULD have power yet ascribing all failures to achieve to being victimized, we’ve set ourselves up for constant misery and heartache.  We’ve fallen, unwittingly, into a life of servitude to both false expectations AND the exigencies of life

What to do?  It’s quite simple:  realize that there is only one true thing over which we have control:  ourselves.  When you’re sitting in the car waiting for your coffee and you begin to get all pissy because it’s taking a while, remind yourself that you have NO control over the barrista, the car in front of you, or the myriad other factors that contribute to each moment in your life.  Remind yourself that only you can choose what level and degree of happiness you have from moment to moment.  Look inside and see that you’re really not going to find happiness because you shaved 4 minutes off your commute or you got that extra bonus at work.

A funny thing will happen:  you’ll influence your environment in ways you never expected.  There’s a transformative power in folks who know the extent of their power and they tend to affect their situations in deep and interesting ways.  In our constant struggle for manipulations of our circumstances, we affect those around us in ways we can’t imagine and in ways that make our lives even MORE unpleasant, rather than less so.  As we settle back into ourselves, those around us sense our evenness and steadiness and magic occurs:  they start acting differently and reacting differently to us.  they no longer feel the fight from us and are more apt to cooperate rather than instigate.

We come full circle.  We have both more control than we ever imagined and far less.  It’s a matter of putting our eggs into the RIGHT basket rather than breaking them over the rocks of life’s circumstances.  Our lives will be enriched to the degree that we can clearly see and fully develop our ability to control our assent to those things we cannot control.  So, being a control freak ain’t so bad.

Best,

Brett

i’ve been thinking a lot lately about my love of stoicism.  I began my love affair back in my junior year of college, about ten years ago.

I was an exchange student of sorts in Zagreb, Croatia at the time.  I was really questioning my faith in a personal deity.  There was an english bookstore in one of the hotels in downtown, and I loved to go in, grab a newspaper or book and chill out.

One day I happened upon ‘The Meditations’ by Marcus Aurelius.  Almost immediately, I was drawn to the posture I read about in the pages of this 2k year old memoir of sorts.

What was so attractive?  One quote stuck out at me:

Vex not thy spirit at the course of things; they heed not thy vexation.

WOW!  I had been fighting for SO long over my religious quandry:  to believe in a god I didn’t to keep my friends, my career, my girlfriend, etc, or to follow my reason and jettison an ancient structure of beliefs that no longer seemed relevant?

As I read the meditations, I began to see another way:  to rely on MYSELF, on my rational faculty, and to begin to stand upright on my own.  And that’s exactly what I did.  I came home to the States 3 months early and braved what was the harded period in my young life.  I lost friends, a career, lots of experiences, and had crippling moments of doubt.

Would I go back?  Nope.  I now see that there are only so many things I can change in this world.  Those things I have control over are limited to myself.  All else comes as it does, and accepting it and moving with it make for a more calm, pleasurable human existence.  No longer do I worry that a pugnacious and petulant god is punishing me for whatever reason by ruining my earthly existence.  Negative AND positive outside circumstances come and go, and only my equanimity is in my grasp.

Living naturally, or going with the flow of nature, provides a reasonable and rational existential stance toward the world that allows us to truly enjoy the ‘play’ of life in ways that few other philosophies allow.  Far from being dour, depressed etc, Stoicism provides us with a beautiful tool for dealing with anything that comes our way.

thanks for listening,

Brett

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

I’ve been reading a bunch of Nietzsche lately.  If you’ve never read any of his works, he can be a bit obtuse.  It’s not that you have to be really smart to understand him; you have to have a certain ‘vision and ears’ to see and hear the way he does.

I’ve read every single published english language version of  his works, and most several times.  I was reading thus spoke zarathustra again the other evening, and this passage, which has struck me like a heavy mallet before, resonated:

They meet a sick man, or an old man, or a corpse [Editor’s note: the three sights that, according to Buddhist tradition, first set the young Buddha on the path to renunciation] — and immediately they say: “Life is refuted!”

But only they are refuted, and their eyes, which see only one side of existence.

Shrouded in thick melancholy, and eager for the little casualties that bring death: thus do they wait, and clench their teeth.

Or else, they grasp at sweetmeats while mocking their childishness: they cling to their straw of life, and mock at their clinging.

Their wisdom speaks thus: “He who remains alive is a fool; but we are all such fools! And that is the most foolish thing in life!”

“Life is only suffering”: say others, and do not lie. Then see to it that you cease! See to it that the life which is only suffering ceases!

Now, reread that passage THREE times before you go on…

How many religions fit this mold.  The buddhists, christians, muslims, etc, etc, etc….  they each teach us to downplay the flesh and to seek for something ‘real’, by which they mean something you can’t touch, see, smell, hear or taste.  invariably, it’s something THEY hold the secret to and THEY can tell you all about.  Flesh is bad, and spirit is good for them.  In short…

“LIFE AS IT IS IS DIFFICULT AND THAT DIFFICULTY POINTS TO THE FACT THAT LIFE SUCKS!!!”

BULLSHIT!  Life is not bad, it’s not ALL suffering, it’s not something you tame.  Life is ALL we have.  Rather than accepting and embracing life as it is and LIVING it, so many pretend it’s a dress rehearsal for something better.

“Well”, you might say, “what’s wrong with that?”  Well, nothing, if you want to miss out on the only 80 years you have on this planet.  Nothing, if you want to devalue all that makes this life good.  Nothing, if you can’t get past your childish crying and moaning because you can’t live every day in plush surrounding and with no pain at all.

Pain, suffering, heartache, etc are what makes life worth living. Imagine a boring, perfect, and painless existance.  What a bore!  Those who are strong LOVE the pain, not in sado-masochistic abandon, but in the same way a good student loves a difficult book to read:  the harder the text, the more fulfilling the treasure that’s gained.

So, in short, GROW UP!  Suck it up and LOVE your life.  Live it like you had to live it AGAIN, and AGAIN, and AGAIN.  Only then can you truly live your life from a center of strength, power and will.  Accepting and LOVING our lives creates a strong center.  When we cry and bitch and moan, we lean to one side or another and we fail to be rooted in ourselves.

Root yourself in yourself.

Brett

You know, there are times when life appears to be going too fast.  We wake up early, only to feel as though we’re already late.  We work harder, only to feel behind.  We try harder, only to feel that we’re failing.

I’m not sure it’s a common feeling among all socio-economic, regional, etc lines, but in America, it’s all too common.  We see the unemployment rate rising and we start to look in the mirror:  am I next?  Will it be me standing in the enemployment line, waiting for my handout?

At base, we’re a people who pride ourselves on making a go of it and succeeding.  We aren’t programmed for failure.  That’s part of the problem; failure is a part of life.  For many, failure is a part of EVERYDAY life.  They live a daily existence where the other shoes is constantly dropping, and it’s dropping into the same old hole.  Again and again.  It’s certainly not fair and there’s really no easy explanation.

For those of us who are used to succeeding, the answer is easy:  try harder and you’ll succeed.  For those who are used to failing, the answer is much more grim:  no matter how hard you try, you’ll NEVER succeed…..so why try?

Who is right?  I believe it’s a little of both.  It’s really about momentum.  Those who have ALWAYS succeeded have a tendency (in the physical sense) to keep so doing.  It’s like a ball that is rolling down the side of a hill.  It’s constantly moving.  Sure, it will come to rest at some point, but up til then it’s been in constant movement.  On the flip side, those who have always failed also have a tendency.  That tendency is to think about life, and each situation therein, as one expected failure after another.

In the end, how we think about ourselves and our lives is a major deciding factor of how things turn out.  It’s not 100% so, nor event 50%.  There’s no formula for success.  What IS true is that our mindset and how we think about life IN A CONSISTENT WAY, colors the way we approach situations and hence unconsciously guides our actions.  Taking on obstacles as one more stop along the way to success directs our actions in ways that TEND to be more conducive to overcoming those obstacles.  The opposite is also true:  the more we EXPECT failure, the more we TEND to in fact fail.

Is life difficult?  It certainly seems so. As a matter of fact, it’s SO difficult at times, that to force ourselves into failure by our controllable reactions is LUNACY.  However, in reality, Life is really NOT any one thing.  Life is as it is.  Life can be beautiful, difficult, fulfilling, crushing, and the list goes on.  So much of how we experience life is a matter of embracing it and loving it as it is.

Could it be that the old adage is correct?

‘It’s not whether you fail, but what you do with the failure that counts.’

take care,

Brett