Enjoy Being Wise and Save the World At the Same Time

“You think that I don’t even mean a single word I say. It’s only words, and words are all I have to take your heart away” – The Bee Gees, “Words” (1968).

As has been said before, “the world is a mess and getting messier still” (To think or not: Zen, Tolstoy, Depression and Enjoyment).

The number of problems we face is astounding (UN Global Issues). It’s like the world is going to hell in a handbasket and we’re the cause. Go to any zoo, refugee camp or suburb. See for yourself. How can a person enjoy with a clear conscience when so much is wrong?

Singin’, “All we are saying, is: ‘Give peace a chance.'”

Even though we know, “The whole surface of Earth is a series of connected ecosystems” and “every factor in an ecosystem depends on every other factor,” we continue to pave over ecosystems with joyous abandon (National Geographic).

But a change from soil and water to roads, suburbs and industry has a funny way of affecting plants and on animals depending on those plants.

We have pollution in the ocean twice the size of Texas (source). We have poverty, crime, racism, road rage, distrust, violence and an epidemic of death by drug addiction. We have cancers and viruses and the doctors and scientists who try to help us get death threats (‘I hope you die’: how COVID pandemic unleashed attacks on scientists).

Image by Martin Shovel

It’s like nature is out to get us and humans don’t get it. Plants and animals go extinct as economics drive global destruction. People are more irrational than ever and no amount of intelligence, Artificial or otherwise, seems able to save us from ourselves.

So, what’s the answer? Is it escapism and surrender? Is it global conflict and action? Is it ruining your life worrying and not enjoying?

How can a run-of-the-mill human (one of 7.9 billion no less) make a difference, be a good ancestor, live a good life and enjoy good times with love and a calm state of mind?

In such a messed up world what can philosophy do?

Well… a lot actually.

Philosophy comes from the Greek “philein” and “sophia” meaning “lover of wisdom” (source). A lover of wisdom relates to any area where intelligence is shown. Wisdom is the ability to think and act using “knowledge, experience, understanding, common sense and insight” (source). If we valued wisdom more than money, celebrity and immediate gratification, if we practiced wisdom religiously, as in, “with consistent and conscientious regularity” (Dictionary), we could easily solve all our problems both individually and collectively.

Psychology was born from philosophies dating back thousands of years (source). Philosophy is logic. Philosophy is religion stripped of wishful thinking. Philosophy is understanding yourself, other people, the world, and your relationship with the world and other people (source).

“Understanding” means to “stand in the midst of” from Old English understandan meaning “to comprehend, grasp the idea of, receive from a word or words or from a sign the idea it is intended to convey” (Etymology Online).

The answer starts with attention and self-awareness.

According to Kruger and Dunning (1999) without mental tools we can’t see our own incompetence. For example: “hunters who know the least about firearms also have the most inaccurate view of their firearm knowledge, and doctors with the worst patient-interviewing skills are the least likely to recognize their inadequacies” (The more inept you are the smarter you think you are).

There are so many websites endorsing the Dunning-Kruger Effect most people don’t question it, but they should: “Dunning-Kruger Effect Is Probably Not Real“. Truth is, if we’re not paying attention, we’re all susceptible to cognitive biases, as in, “systematic errors in thinking.”

Research shows, for example, there is an asymmetry in our thinking towards negativity, meaning, we register the negative more readily and frequently than positive (Negativity Bias).

But on the flip-side, we’re also susceptible to Optimism Bias whereby our brains are overly optimistic. “If,” for example, “you were asked to estimate how likely you are to experience divorce, illness, job loss, or an accident, you are likely to underestimate the probability that such events will ever impact your life” (source).

Positive events lead to feelings of well being, while negative events lead to risky behavior and not taking precautions (source).

Consciousness is being aware of your environment and body. Self-awareness is the recognition of that awareness. Self-awareness is how you understand feelings, motivations and desires (source). Whether you think overly negative or optimistic can depend on your mood. People are less optimistic in a bad mood and more optimistic in a good mood (source).

A mood is a “temporary state of mind or feeling” (Dictionary). Thinking is a way of dealing with moods. We can think our way out of a feeling by finding solutions to meet the need behind that feeling (University of Cape Town).

According to the World History Encyclopedia (2005, p. 409) the first philosopher was Zoroaster (aka Zarathustra) who lived somewhere between 1500 and 1000 BC (source).

Bachi Karkaria’s Zarathushtra (1974) 

Zoroaster praised “Ahura” (Lord) “Mazda” (Wisdom) and founded “Mazdayasna” which means “Worship of Wisdom.” Before the 6th century BC, philosophy and science were not separated from theology which probably explains how Zoroaster, the world’s first philosopher, started the world’s first monotheistic religion (source).

Imagine that! The first monotheistic God was Wisdom itself!

Starting with Pythagoras (570-495 BC)—who, incidentally, first coined the word “philosophy” (source)—Zoroaster’s followers taught ancient Greeks about the love of wisdom (source).

Pythagoras influenced Plato and Aristotle who influenced Western philosophy which influenced Christianity through medieval scholars like Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) who developed his own conclusions from Aristotelian ideas. 

Farrokh Bulsara before renaming.

Zoroaster’s religious philosophy is known for its motto ‘Good thoughts, Good Words, Good Deeds.’ It teaches sharing, generosity and kindness. What could be better? Even the rock star Freddie Mercury (1946-1991) born Farrokh Bulsara got into that.

Zoroaster was also the world’s first proponent of ecology through care of the earth (source).

Let us practice wisdom in thought, word and deed! Let us enjoy thinking, Air and a little ping pong.

We can be lovers of wisdom and save the world, one mind at a time.

The Essence of This

“The Essence Of Life” by Christopher Pollari

There’s a phrase found on knickknacks in gift shops that goes, “I’m a human being, not a human doing.” The implication being, that a “human doing,” is not what you want to be.

Better to be than to do—so the song goes. Human doings identify with action but doers (those who do) get so caught up in doing they don’t see the beauty in just being a being being (singing: “Moonshadow”).

Then again, devaluing doing could be a sweet rationalization for inactivity.

“I’m a human being, not a human doing,” is attributed to at least two writers: Kurt Vonnegut Jr (1922-2007), “So it goes,” and Wayne W. Dyer (1940-2015), “Our intention creates reality.”

Kurt Vonnegut in his natural habitat. “Well, here we are, Mr. Pilgrim, trapped in the amber of this moment. There is no why” (Slaughterhouse Five, pp. 76-77).

“To be is to do – Socrates.
To do is to be – Sartre.
Do Be Do Be Do – Sinatra.” ~ Vonnegut.

As Dyer said, “Don’t equate your self-worth with how well you do things in life. You aren’t what you do. If you are what you do, then when you don’t… you aren’t.” Or said the other way around, “If you do what you are, then when you aren’t….you don’t.”

Funny.

To simply enjoy being relates to a line in Slaughterhouse Five (the book, not location): “How nice—to feel nothing, and still get full credit for being alive” (p. 105), or, better yet, “Everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt” (p. 122).

In Your Erroneous Zones (the book, not location) Dyer explains how negative thinking leads to negative emotions (e.g. worry, guilt, anger) which leads to painful consequences via erroneous (read: wrong) actions (singing: “Where do the children play?”).

“Remember those three magic words: You are God.” (Dyer).

Dyer’s path to happiness is based on commitment to oneself. He thought that humans have the potential to live happily, but not everyone does because external influences form erroneous (wrong) zones in your personality that block personal fulfillment.

The idea of individuality is discussed in the movie Harold and Maude (1971).

The question is, “What flower would you like to be?”

Dyer moved from behaviorist psychology—Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy—to a philosophy where positive thinking cures disease, solves problems, and manifests goodness by aligning thoughts with divine intention to create miracles (Psychology Today).

So it goes.

The crux of the matter is this: Let’s say you’re trying to do something on a computer, but no matter how determined you are or how much you want a result to happen, no matter how frustrated and emotional you get, the computer will only respond to your actions. Only when you do what needs to be done, will results be satisfactory.

The same holds true for life.

The world is like a computer that responds to your behaviour. The world doesn’t feel your feelings. Feelings come and go as they will.

As David K. Reynolds put it in Playing Ball On Running Water (1996), “Reality doesn’t respond to my will or my wishes or emotions. To believe that positive thinking changes the world directly is childlike naiveté. To be sure, my thoughts and feelings may influence what I do (my behavior), and that action, in turn, may influence reality. But it is what I do that affects my world. And it is the same for you” (p. 16). 

Shoma Morita, “Life flows from being natural” (A River to Live By, pg 39).

Insight isn’t enough. You need to do, so as to be.

As the Japanese psychiatrist Shoma Morita (1874-1938) put it, “Give up on yourself. Begin taking action now, while being neurotic or imperfect, or a procrastinator, or unhealthy, or lazy, or any other label by which you inaccurately describe yourself.

Go ahead and be the best imperfect person you can be and get started on those things you want to accomplish before you die.”

Morita taught that energy comes from everywhere—things, people, words, feelings, nature, places—and as individuals we have the choice to live in positive or negative energy (source).

The question is: positive or negative?

What is your essence?

By knowing your essence, you know who you are, what to do, and how to do it. But essences are tricky. They’re abstract. They exist in thought and not as physical things.

Your essence is your “intrinsic nature” (as in, essential). It is your “indispensable quality” (as in, “absolutely necessary”). Your essence belongs naturally to you. It is essential but what is it? Is it self-awareness?

Existentialists assert that a human being is “thrown into” a universe that cannot be “thought away.” This means that being in the world comes before consciousness and that being in the world is the ultimate reality.

The essence of you is the meaning you ascribe to yourself or, as Sartre put it, “At first [Man] is nothing. Only afterward will he be something, and he himself will have made what he will be.”

And so you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife. And you may ask yourself, “How did I get here?”

You win a lottery! Bam! you’re happy! A loved one dies, Slam! you’re sad. Emotions are natural reactions. It’s natural to feel highs and lows and stress. That’s the ride. Stress motivates. Emotions are your natural response to a given circumstance.

You can’t help yourself from hating people sometimes, but you can stop yourself from killing them. Truth is built upon life experience. Your self is a flow of attention. The real trick is to enjoy reality.

Go from there.

That’s the heart of it.