Hell is other people …

It’s the voice in our heads that makes us suffer more. Because for whatever reason, because it still eludes me, it’s that inner monologue that’s keeping the weight down creating our own personal version of Hell. There maybe no torturer, no flames to burn your soul eternally, no fire or brimstone, pain and suffering is there all the same. And no matter what you do, you can never escape that perpetual ontological struggle of putting oneself as an object from the view of another consciousness even when there is no one around. There is no need for red hot pokers, as Sartre once said, because Hell is other people. Or even the realization of their existence would suffice.

And the rain doesn’t help at all.

Perfection through Art

Art of the Soul

The aim of art is to project an inner vision into the world, to state in aesthetic creating the deepest psychic and personal experiences of a human being. It is to enable those experiences o be intelligible and general recognized with the total framework of an ideal world.

Bruce Lee
Tao of Jeet Kune Do

Bruce Lee writes that “Art reveals itself in psychic understanding of the inner essence of things and gives form to the relation of man with nothing, with the nature of the absolute” and that “Art is an expression of life and transcends both time and space. We must employ our own souls through art to give a new form and a new meaning to the nature of the world.” It is an open challenge for all of us to rise above mediocrity and search for the ultimate. To give rise to a new state of human awareness through self-mastery of one’s art.

“The artistic activity”, he goes on, “does not lie in art itself as such”. Artistic skill, therefore, does not mean artistic perfection as it is not bounded by time or space but rather a continuing medium or reflection on the stages of the development of self towards self-actualization, the perfection of which is not to be found in shape and form, but must radiate from the human soul. There are no bounding rules to be followed rigidly, only the ultimate goal of emancipating the human mind and transcending the limits of our physical bodies.

The embodiment of truth is not just on what art, religion, philosophy, mathematics – or whatever it is that one prefers to use in his search for the ultimate – has to offer. Truth penetrates into a deeper world on which all art forms (of things inwardly experienced) flow together, and in which the harmony of soul and cosmos in the nothing has its outcome on reality.

Art paves the path to the absolute essence of human experience, as do other abstractions. It’s aim is not on the one-sided promotion of the spirit, soul and senses, but rather the opening of all human capacities – thought, feeling, will – to the life rhythm of the world of nature. So will the voiceless voice be heard and the self be brought into harmony with it.

On articulating the conception of human perfectibility

“Nobody is perfect” says the popular saying and hardly anyone stops to question the sentiment. Most go through life hanging on to the belief that nobody is perfect and it is perfectly normal to mess things up. They fail to grasp the meaning of life, that to transcend its limits, one must pursue perfection instead of letting himself be bounded by the accepted truth of his time.

As Nietzsche would put it, “Do not accept what almost two thousand years of history have taught you to call evil. The existence of the human race is justified only by the exceptional among us – the superman, the Übermensch, whose self-mastery, self-overcoming, sublimation, creativity, strong will to power and ultimately self perfection frees him from the common prejudices and assumptions of the day.

It is arrogant to suppose that we are at the end of our evolutionary chain. Our species is nothing more than a link on a long sequence of evolutionary events towards the Omega point where abstract notions of truth and perfection is manifested physically and realized in living systems. It is imperative that the ultimate goal of humanity, therefore, should be placed on the rearing of a race of Supermen instead of world domination and/or accumulation of riches. Only then can we get back to the metaphorical Eden or Heaven or achieve the state of Nirvana.

Within the total event – the evolutionary process, every subordinate event represents a contribution to the whole. And our contribution, should be something that can lead us to true sapience.

Thinking outside the box (?)

Perhaps the most common form of fallacy is the argument by authority – Argumentum ad Verecundiam as it is formally called. It is a form of inductive-type argument where the person advances his argument by presenting a statistical syllogism, which argues the case from general to specific. Although certain arguments by authority lead to strong inductive arguments, the appeal to authority carries little weight – the history of human kind is consistent with one fact : that is human error.

Sometimes fallacious arguments from authority are obvious because they are arguments from false authorities. These are often used in marketing – supermodels who push cosmetics or pro athletes pushing home loans or even sports equipments are likely false authorities. Like Pacquiao’s billboard, which I frequently see on my way home, with the big slogan saying “Pheonix ang gamit naming mga champeon!”

First, how does a boxing superstar have authority on what a good petrol product is? No offense to Pheonix and Pacquiao intended, I just wanted to point out a very common fallacy not just in marketing that is very misleading (intentional or not, it is wrong and should be taken care of). Or in the case of the supermodel or athlete, do they even use the product at all?

Second, we can assume that the supermodel is beautiful without the product and the pro athlete was successful without the equipment. And the millionaire athletes don’t need the kind of home loan you would.

To a degree, we also do well to differentiate between the different definitions of “authority”. Authority can mean either power or knowledge. In the case of knowledge, we often find we must trust people to help us make sense of the vast complex array of knowledge surrounding an issue – we do well, for example, in courtroom trials to consult psychologist and forensic specialists or trained meteorologists, geologists, physicists, chemists, etc. when debating global warming – but we should view these people as resources for understanding the logic and evidence, rather than as those given the final say concerning the issue.

We always face uncertainty – we can never see the whole picture no matter what we do as there is a limit to the capacity of data our brain can store and process. We, also, oftentimes draw erroneous judgements from circumstantial facts and no authority is exempt to that. Humans as we are, we are all infallible.

So, instead of blindly following an ideology, it is best if we step back a little and assess the picture for ourselves and test the validity of the notion not just from our perspective but using a larger scope using other point of views. Doing so can never be detrimental and on the contrary, it will pay you mountains of dividends in the long run.

If all of us blindly accepted what the Authority is dishing out, there would never be any real advancement in any field. The sum of human knowledge would be bounded by the preformed conceptions and notions of our forefathers and cultural upbringings. We may even believe, up to now, that the earth is flat. Exercise your sense of what is right and what is wrong rather than just relying on anybody to tell you what which is which.

Think outside the box.

Red pill and blue pill…

We should never replace the rigorous open-minded skepticism of science with an inflexible certainty of ideological commitment.

–Denialism: How Irrational Thinking  Harms
the Planet and Threatens Our Lives

Nobody can be correct 100% of the time and the first step towards true change is admitting that neither I nor you – nor your parents, nor your spouse, your children, school, boss, your government, nor your church know everything.

Dont get me wrong here. I am not advocating the overthrow of a government nor the conception of a radically new one but a rather a more personal form of revolution – a revolution in your own way of thinking.

Instead of blindly blaming national governments, international corporations, ethic groups, sexual preferences, multicultural organizations, ideological beliefs, religious institutions or political parties, what if we change the way we think?

That means to challenge all preconceived notions about right and wrong and looking beyond the limitations of your culture’s way of thinking.

• you change the way you think, you change the way you act;
• you change the way you act, you’ll be able to change the way others act and think;
• if you can change the way others think, you can help change the world one person at a time. And it all starts with you.

There is no shame in not knowing everything but there is shame in pretending we know everything when in fact we don’t and more in denying the truth in because of the inflexible ideological commitment one has adapted. We can and must learn from each other, regardless of what we look like, where we live in or what we believe.

As Michael Specter puts it, “No amount of data will convince climate denialists that humans have caused the rapid, devastating warming of the earth. And no feat of molecular genetics will make a creationist understand that our species has evolved over billions of years, along with every other creature. Common strains of denialism are even more troubling, though, because they show what happens when unfettered scientific achievement bumps up against the limits of human imagination.”

Open honest communication is the only way we can change this world for better. Books, computer and the internet can open your mind to new worlds that you’ve never dreamed of – or turn your mind and funnel your thinking down the narrow confines of a fantasy world that you only choose to see.

Either choose the blissful ignorance of illusion or embrace the sometimes painful truth of reality. The choice is yours.