‘‘Starry Nights’’… a painting by Van Gough…
Easily one of the most recognized paintings in the world…
but at its heart, what is ‘‘Starry Night’’ about?
It is a painting of the night sky, but not a direct painting
of the night sky, but a vision, a viewpoint about the night sky…
it is a creative viewing of what the night sky could, if we so
imagined, be the night sky…
and in many diverse ways, this is exactly how we see the
universe in general… Our vision, or viewpoint of the world,
like in ‘‘Starry Night’’, is impacted by our internal viewpoint…
We can see this by our very different vision or viewpoint
of the world around us…IQ45 and his MAGA followers
see the world as a dystopian nightmare… we can look at
the exact same neighborhood and see a vastly different
vision or viewpoint… the viewpoint we see the world with
is not an external vision, but an internal vision…
That vision lies within, from our experiences, our ism’s and ideologies,
our childhood indoctrinations, our education, and working experiences…
but that vision, that viewpoint is also changeable, not fixed, not set
in stone… we change our vision of the world all the time…
As children, we see the world, reality with child’s eyes,
and as we age and grow, that vision, that reality changes,
because our experiences and aging changes that reality…
A child of 5 sees the world very different than a child of 12…
very different…just as I have changed my own vision,
my own viewpoint of the world as I have aged… my experiences
have forced me to adapt to a new understanding of what it means
to be human… my own vision, or viewpoint toward death, for
example, has dramatically changed over the years…
Today, I view death as a biological event like puberty or
growing old… I can’t change or stop it, so I must accept it…
it is what it is, nothing more, nothing less…
and I can see, even today, my own understanding of death as
be able to change some more… at some point, I may come to
the ‘‘thank god I am finally leaving this clusterfuck’’ understanding
of death…from fearing death, to understanding death to
finally embracing it…
This points out that our vision, our viewpoint of something
as basic as death, is subject to change… and I am able
to embrace death, not as my enemy, but as a deliverer…
and if I can learn to embrace death, what other visions
or viewpoint can we change or adapt to?
We can learn to see, with the eyes of the ARTIST, such as Van Gough,
we can see reality, our world with Artistic eyes…
One of the main problems with people is that they see
reality with transactional eyes… there must be winners
and losers and what is in it for me, attitude…
I don’t act unless there is some benefit in it for me…
and that is how they approach the world, ''What is in it for me?"
that is transactional thinking and believing…
But that is not how many people view the world…
Did Jesus promise heaven with transactional thinking?
No, the promise of Jesus lies within transformational thinking…
View the world differently, view the world with a new vision,
with a new understanding…
‘‘Love your fellow man’’
that is not transactional thinking, that is transformational thinking…
and we can, if motivated, change our viewpoint, our vision…
My own vision has changed because my reality is that death
is not that far away from me… it is my constant companion
these days…and I use that to motivate me into my ‘‘work’’
my philosophical reading and writings… for at some point,
not too far from now, I will be unable to engage in philosophy
as I do now… and that motivates me… drives me to work
on philosophy every chance I get…
The truth of the matter is that we can, if motivated, we can
change our own vision, our own viewpoint of the world,
we can see the world with very different eyes, if we only
would look…
The change in our vision, our viewpoints can happen,
should and must happen, if we were to overcome our
childhood indoctrinations and education…
the famous ‘‘reevaluation’’ of values… as Nietzsche called it…
What values do have? As opposed to what values have
been indoctrinated into me by the state, society, media, church,
and education…and if we were to honestly ‘‘reevaluate’’
our values, we would see how many values and beliefs, we have,
are simply indoctrinated values of the state/society…
and that in turn impacts, influences how we view, see
the world today…false indoctrinations as a child, can lead
to false beliefs and values today…and by having
a false narrative of actions and values, we are misled into
leading false lives…to change the narrative is one way
to change our vision or viewpoint of the world…
Change is transformational, static is transactional…
to change one’s viewpoint or vision is being transformed…
too overcome one indoctrinated values is to be transformed…
and in this overcoming, this is directed change…
most change in terms of vision, is done randomly,
but the change I am talking about is done deliberately,
with forethought and understanding…
Who do I want to be? Perhaps the Kantian question that should
been asked… “What am I/we to do?”… ''What can I/we know?"
"“What beliefs/values should I/we hold?”
Making a choice as to the person I want to be… not as I was,
or as I am, but who I want to be… we have choices as to
our future… not the past or present, but we clearly can choose
the future visions or understanding we have of the universe…
And philosophy is one means by which we can review our
prior choices of values…and work out new values and
beliefs, as they take us forward into the future…
We can make that choice… if we only had the courage
to become who we want to be, not who we were or are,
but who do I want to become? What values I hold or should
hold to make that choice of ''who I want to become?"
We are far too passive to our future possibilities…
What future possibility do I want to pursue, to engage with?
but for most of us, we blindly follow a vision or understanding
of human beings into our future… without ever asking, is that
vision or understanding really MY understanding of the universe?
Our future, our possibilities, our vision is simply one of
making choices as to what kind of future do I/we want?
What choices are you going to make and why that choice?
Kropotkin