I know this might come off as a sort of pessimistic post, but it seems like all too many of us are falling into the trap of over-analyzing. I know I’m one of them. I know we can’t help wanting to take apart life and figure it out, but should that be at the expense of removing the mystery or the magic from life? Forgive me if this offends anyone, because I know many of you do not feel this way… but it’s just the jist I get from so many people these days.
What I want to know is life not a miracle in itself? Is this right here not something to be marvelled at? Maybe we could all do ourselves some good by stopping looking to the future and start appreciating the present. Lest we all start feeling plastic.
I guess what I’m asking is do you feel like philosophizing and over-analyzing is making you feel like everything is meaningless? Am I alone here? I think our world is in dire need of putting the love of life back into life.
“The mystery of life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced” -St. Thomas
I wasn’t looking for an answer to any question really… just trying to bring together people who are feeling this way so maybe we can share in some kind of mutual angst against the not so pretty side effects of over-philosophizing. Not looking for consolation, but just trying to echo out there that you’re not alone in this feeling, and it doesn’t have to be a dead-end.
It seems like you are hoping that ignorance is magical. It aint.
Meaningfulness is very very overrated, and you shouldnt look for it everywhere. As long as every action you do has meaning, you’re fine methinks, theres no need for you to inject meaning into other stuff or you’ll be disappointed when someone else comes and deflates it.
It’s not overanalysis just because you’re tired of delving deeper and experiencing diminishing returns. But it is overanalysis if I’m tired of delving deeper and experiencing diminishing returns.
Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die!
I don’t feel like going to work today, I’d rather party. (next day) I don’t feel like going to work today, I’d rather party. (next day) I don’t feel like going to work today, I’d rather party.
I’m a bum on the streets, what happened here?
Living for the moment is not the answer, in it lies only destruction. We are not animals with instincts, we were given minds for a reason and we are to find that reason and fulfill it.
I strive for knowledge in all directions so that I may base on facts and stir motives for better understanding and a continual wonder. I’m a normal person who shits, sins, and stands up for what’s believed in. When you get to the bottom line there is no source. In which case, there’d be no reason of trying to encompass a standard when already found. Though this may seem like I would have no inference to any additional curiosity, I consider the ultimate being as made of pieces which create it not as an effect but as a whole cause due to the cycle which holds its contents.
Oh ok, I forgot you were the only one that mattered.
I was simply trying to open up communication on whether or not people think overanalyzing things can be diminishing to their value.
And what is wrong for living for the moment? Can you not live for the moment and still not be a bum? If you’re always living for the future where will you find contentment if time is always now? I am weary of using the word fulfillment, because I know fulfillment is a hollow concept, fullfillment relies on their being unfullfillment. Perhaps it’s in thinking that we are unfulfilled in the first place. It’s like the serenity prayer, having the grace to accept what you cannot change, and the courage to change that which you can.
I can do anything because I believe. Close minded, free spirited.
"because I know fulfillment is a hollow concept, fullfillment relies on their being unfullfillment. Perhaps it’s in thinking that we are unfulfilled in the first place. " Now, why is that? I feel fulfilled through belief. That’s something you cannot take away with logic.
In living for the moment and not for the future you have no purpose for living in the moment, you just are. If there were no meaning to life there would be no desire to search for one, and still there is. This desire uses the past for the present to carry on the future.
Motion creates time. Not the past or the future. Time is a product of motion, but time is an illusion. There is always a present, always an eternal now.
Yes, exactly. The past and the future are our motives for moving. I’m doing so and so now because I’ve done so and so before and I know so and so will happen again.
This statement assumes that there is a purpose/reason/answer for life, and that we can figure it out, and overall, is a lovely example of postmodernism.
Forgive me though, I am a meteorology major, and the first thing we learn is that it is impossible to have a perfect forecast or a perfect computer model because it is simply impossible to know everything, to gather data from everypoint in the universe at every moment, and eventually the butterfly effect will kick in. If you need proof of this, wait till hurricane season rolls around again.
Now the connection: I believe this similar to the problem of being human. There are too many small things involved in life to know what will affect each individual, how, and to what degree. And as such, it is impossible to know the “answer” to life.
Though, if we did not study humanity, if we did not practice philosophy, it would not change the fact that life is a mystery, and would just make us ignore that mystery. Hence we would be governed not by life, but rather by the laws of nature, by rational self-interest, and we would be reduced to a near-animal state.
I guess what I am saying is that philosophy is a paradox. It is the study of something that cannot be understood, a search for an answer we cannot find, but essential to humanity nonetheless.
Give up learning, and put an end to your troubles.
Is there a difference between yes and no?
Is there a difference between good and evil?
Must I fear what others fear?
What nonsence!
Other people are contented, enjoying the sacrificial feast of the ox.
In spring some go to the park, and climb the terrace, but I alone am drifting not knowing where I am.
Like a new-born babe before it learns to smile, I am alone, without a place to go.
Others have more than they need, but I alone have nothing.
I am a fool.
Oh, yes!
I am confused.
Other men are clear and bright, but I alone am dim and weak.
Other men are
sharp and clever, but I alone am dull and stupid.
Oh, I drift like the waves of the sea.
Without direction, like the restless wind.
Everyone else is busy, but I alone am aimless and depressed.
I am different.
I am nourished by the great mother.
I don’t think it’s ignorance is bliss, rather it’s quite contrary.
It’s the realization of the futility of searching for an answer that cannot be found. It’s like always looking for something, when the something was always already there. =)
The pain of it all is that there is no actual answer that we know of…
U can accept something as being true… and believe in it absolutely… but u’re going to have to supress the fact that u can’t be certain…
U can activly search for answers realizing/living by the acceptence of ur own ignorence… or u can accept whatever and live blissfully thinking u know how everything ticks…
OR u can believe there is no answer… and compleatly lose all interrest in “truth”…
The supposed “truth” will never be found, because it doesn’t exist. It’s like jumping in water, trying to grab on to it and drowning. But if you relax and let yourself go, you float.
well… i tend to agree with u… but would draw a different conlusion…
Weather “truth” does or does not exit is irrelevent as we are faulible and cannot have 100% certainty that what we have is the truth or not… even if we had it…
Now given that we must all believe in something… we have to choose weather we jump into our beliefs with care… or if we jump in carelessly…
I don’t know about u… but i feel a lot better if i can defend my views and tell you the reasons for me holding them… Not in an effort to prove their truth… but to define myself…
We all believe in something… we all have a worldview…
Analyzing it might kill a few romantic notions but will give us a better understanding of what we believe and thus who we are… not to mention make us aware (constantly) of our own ignorence…
To use ur own example… I’d say what we’re doing is not strugling to find truth… we’re strugling to figure out why we’re there in the water in the first place… so that we can decide what to do now that we’re there…
