Kuba: And if ‘I’ was to get ‘my’ way and things were of a lasting importance, that is not a good outcome at all, life would be a serious business. And if ‘I’ was to live eternally, what about those other human beings that are yet to be born, they would never get to experience the joy of being alive. How weird that the thing which is felt/ believed to be at core what is ‘wrong’ with the universe – mortality – is what in the grand scheme of things ensures a happiness and harmlessness for all. (link)
Hi Kuba,
This is not the only thing where feeling beings have a diametrically opposite affective assessment regarding “the grand scheme of things”. Just for one instance, one of the most common objections to actualism is that there are no feelings/ emotions in actuality, whilst for most people their feelings are one of the most highly valued aspects of being human. The same goes for the imaginative faculty.
Kuba: So it seems what I have been circling here is that even ‘my’ death is not a serious business. I can see that I was able to enjoy and appreciate and to remove seriousness from most aspects of my life but it is as if ‘I’ reserved a special place for it where it concerned arriving at ‘my’ destiny. This 1 thing seemed worthy enough to be serious about, that it was ‘worthy enough’ to forego enjoyment and appreciation for this 1 goal.
But I see now that there was never a need to get serious at all, which means the way forward is enjoyment and appreciation anyways. (link)
You have been busy with the topic of mortality for a long time (for instance here), and understood it theoretically at some point. But it is a different matter when mortality becomes personal as in ‘your’ own impending demise – then all theoretical appreciation of the benefits of not having to live forever (because then every action and decision would have eternal consequences and one could not help but be deeply serious about it all) goes out the window and “this 1 thing seemed worthy enough to be serious about”. And being serious, for whatever reason, empowers ‘me’ and hence actively works against peace-on-earth
Richard: You need to have a keen sense of humour. This business of becoming free is not – contrary to popular opinion – a serious business at all. Be totally sincere … most definitely utterly sincere, as genuineness is essential. But serious … no way. An actual freedom is all about having fun; about enjoying being here; about delighting in being alive. All that ‘being serious’ stuff actively works against peace-on-earth. One has to want to be here on this planet … most people resent being here and wish to escape. This method will bring one into being more fully here than anyone has ever been before. (…) (Richard, Articles, This Moment of Being Alive).
In fact, there is an existential joke in it all, which you can only fully appreciate when you dare to allow the final step, which is that you will then experientially know, and on an ongoing basis to boot, that ‘I’/ ‘me’ never existed in the first place –
Richard: ‘My’ demise was as fictitious as ‘my’ apparent presence. I have always been here, I realise, it was that ‘I’ only imagined that ‘I’ existed. It was all an emotional play in a fertile imagination … which was, however, fuelled by an actual hormonal substance triggered off from within the brain-stem because of the instinctual passions bestowed by blind nature. Thus the psyche – the entire affective faculty born of the instincts itself – is wiped out forever and one is finally what one actually is: this thinking and reflective flesh-and-blood body simply brimming with sense organs, delighting in this very sensual world of actual experience. (Richard, Articles, This Moment of Being Alive).
With that in mind, enjoying and appreciating the final scene of the “emotional play in a fertile imagination” is the only sensible thing to do.
Cheers Vineeto