Romantic Rebellion

Today, Yahoo posted an article on its home page about Daniel Suelo who runs a Blog by name of Zero Currency. It is not his Blog but his rebellious life style that reminded of several events. First time, that I read Leo Tolstoy's short story, "How Much Land Does a Man Needs?", it deeply impressed me and I got fond of reading other Russian writers of that time. This short story was a beautiful illustration of what happens when subconscious mind is in driving seat. Well, Although we experience on daily basis the contradictions between different parts of our brains but usually, it is the culture, the ecology of billions of brains around us that help us to come out with sound judgments with not much difficulties and feel as a single person (- a rational person- of course).

Leo Tolstoy; A tragedy hunter

What I find common between the life style of Suelo and writings of the late 19th century Russian writers are Romantic rebellions. Romantic in the sense that they have emerged from their commitments to their concepts of  morality. When one is committed to morality and wants to live with it, he finds himself in contradictions with the world one lives in and it usually creates tragedies. If one sees the world through moral point of view then his radars are quick to detect such tragedies with magnified details. Romantic (from sense of Morality) writers are usually "realist" and try to present the naked pictures (The contradictions) of society - The parts that people usually like to cover-

Although, we all know that we all are exposed only to limited information and we are ignorant to a large part but it doesn't make much problem as we live and interact with others but when we intentionally seal ourselves from information -conditioned- then we get a picture of world, that is dark and tragic. Love and Morality are two most romantic ideas that we all love to see but the world around us see them as parts not as whole or end goals. Devotion to these ideas are what I call, "romantic rebellion"...

In a field trip, there were some Kuchis (Afghan nomads) tents. While we were passing them by, our teacher said, "Look, they are also living. Human needs are small but human desires have no ends". That was a moralistic commentary on life but I knew, that it is against human nature. Unconscious Mind is the thickest layer of mind and drive us to break the limits instead of limiting ourselves to the minimal survival. If  one is interested that why majority of us do not have the gut to go for romantic rebellion, I refer a short and quick  reading, "The brain… it makes you think. Doesn't it?" in which two neuroscientists give their perspectives on who really govern us? 

While, it is evident that our unconscious minds are the biggest drive even in our seemingly conscious decisions but it is not just a mind or brain that decides all but it is the interactions of brains that influence most of our behaviors and decisions. I don't need any Neuroscientists/Psychologist/Philosopher tells me, how much the interactions with other brains or minds can shape our behaviors. I already know that a group of men that are conditioned can see the world in so a "nightmare like" perspective that they can deny all realities and not even can go to deny the very existence of others but also the large part of the very texts that they have devoted themselves... 

Today's infants are

Tomorrows leaders

The unmatched brutal murders and suicide attacks that students of "Madrassahs ; Religious Schools" have committed for last decade in Af-Pak region is enough evidence for how conditioning of minds can make unconscious mind grow strong enough to overtake the conscious minds and do acts that do not make sense to rest of world but make perfect sense to conditioned minds... Taliban didn't came out of no where but it is the conditioning of hundreds of thousands of minds for last four decades in thousands of Madrassahs that have produced a generation who see the short cut path to paradise by killing non-believers/infidels. 


Abraham Lincoln famously said, "The Philosophy of the schoolroom in one generation will be the Philosophy of government in the next".... 


If Kuchis can live on minimal things, it is because they have grown up conditioned to that life style. It is not the result of free choice as "romantic rebels" like Sadhus   or those who rebel against modern life styles based on their senses of moralities or conscience.. 

While we see occasionally some are having  the guts strong enough to challenge their unconscious minds and society altogether by power of their "moral judgments" and quite naturally we also encounter individuals who have totally given up to their unconscious minds and apparently have subjugated their conscience by their "rationales"... Sometime we see amusing reasoning for it..

The wife of the watchman gets sick and he runs out of money in taking care of her so he goes to owner of the building and asks for a loan amounted  10,000 rupees. The owner replies, "I am more needy than you are. There are thousands of people able to help you with 10,000 rupees but I need tens of millions of rupees to complete 2nd floor of my building. Tell me, how many people are out there who can afford to help me out with tens of millions of rupees?"... 

If there are people who rebel to denounce the normal lives altogether is not because normal lives are evil but because they observe the tragedies all around them... that are mostly the results of rationales in favor of instinctual and subconscious drives. While the rest of us have occasional "Yuk moments" to these drives, their strong moral senses make most of the normal looking things appear as Yuks... I see one more aspect to this and that is "romantic rebels" are mostly concerned with personal well beings than to social usefulness.

While "romantic rebels" are amusing and illustrate the subconscious drives, the "conditioned rebels" illustrate what happens when the minds are sealed off of most information and exposed to particulars... 

Do we need to measure ourselves?

I am confident that every culture has come up with ways to ease out the emotions that result from comparisons.  I was hearing it a lot from my father, “Our elders were saying that, if it happens in life that you feel proud because of your achievements and started looking down to others, visit a graveyard. By looking to epitaphs or tombstones you will realize that much better people are lying there that preceded you and if it happens sometime in you life that you feel down then visit a marketplace or Bazar and you will see people of different kinds that you are much better off than a lot of them”… While, the advice is practical but the question is, do we really need to measure ourselves at first place?

We can’t think to live modestly without measurements. All businesses, sciences and most of the social interactions are based on measurements.  In fact, our sense of fairness and security in our interactions with others dominantly come from our relying on these measurements. If we are relying so heavily on measurements in our daily lives then isn’t it counterintuitive that when it comes to our personal lives, the frequent advice is to not measure ourselves with others??? (Except in the cases of emotional very high or very down; first paragraph). The reason for not measuring/comparing oneself with others is said to be “Differential abilities/talents” and “Differential beginnings” so the comparisons do not makes sense but even more important reason is its cost on the overall wellbeing of the individual. By comparison with others one either becomes illusionary flattered or becomes delusionary depressed.

 While we are advised not compare with others but we are evolved to appreciate refined things. In fact, choices that we make and prices that we willingly pay are dominantly based on the refinements. We know men with most refined works in their respective fields as great men. It is repetition but just to illustrate look at following list,

Shakespeare; most refined drama writer, Einstein; most refined Physicist, Charles Darwin; most refined biologist, Michael Angelo; most refined artist, Alexander the great; most refined general, Socrates; most refined Philosopher, Siddhartha; most refined psychologist, Edison;  most refined inventor, Gandhi;  most refined politician, Muhammad Ali; most refined boxer, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan; most refined singer and so on…

If from one side we are advised to not compare with ourselves with others but from other side we are advised to takes these big names as role models and push against our limits. It seems that we actually got standards for our measurements and we do measure however, these measurements are NOT to find our worth but instead to make ourselves worthwhile.

But it does also have another aspect; looking to this very small sample out of pool of great names, one might wonder, these were the individuals who invested their lives for their respective goals. Does the goal in life is the same as “meaning in life?” or a life worthy of living despite all suffering it asks for? Majority of people are living a mediocre or below mediocre lives. What about their lives? Are their lives are devoid of meaning? Of course, no one agree with this extreme point of view except radical reductionists. But while having said that, if you look back to the list, you find that all of these great names are coming only from one dominant perspective and that is the utilitarian perspective of life; how much useful one is to society? Although it eases out everyone as no doubt everyone finds their niches of usefulness in their respective societies however, again it ignores the very person/individual in question.

For the individual, there is another perspective and that is psychological perspective. I don’t know any other person than Siddhartha who came with best explanation for this aspect of the question. Do not compare yourself at all. Making comparisons and expectations are wrong approaches. Life is not all about racing with others. It is much bigger than that. So, it is no wonder to see the popularity of yoga increases in places where races are more intensive. Although it is ironic but at least it is good that it is working. I didn’t want to suggest anything instead I just wanted to clarify that when it comes to our lives, we usually mix psychological perspective with social usefulness perspective.

I read a lot of complains that Philosophy has a depleting impacts on the meaning of life. It questions everything so brutally that leaves nothing under shades. To me, that is a mistake. Personally, I do not look to Philosophy as a specialized knowledge to provide specific answers. It is a practice of critical thinking in areas or to questions one cares or has interest in and it is not necessary that our areas of interests match. In short, if one wants to get a utilitarian perspective like level of usefulness to society, one might come with good answers. It might actually enrich the life but of course with due sufferings they ask for. But on other hand, if one is not concerned with society but just for wellbeing or with personal life then I am afraid that Philosophy is not a good place. For that, ancient Psychologists provide a template for practice and an explanation that rationalize well to live a content life. I always refer to Siddhartha (Buddha) as he had a secular and practical approach to personal wellbeing. My personal approach so far has been a combination of both. While I try my best to push against my limits to be more usefulness, I do not expect in return or at least try to minimize my expectations to the lowest levels.   

Tiger Mom's interesting analysis of empires' history and lessons for contemporary world

'A Universe From Nothing' by Lawrence Krauss, AAI 2009

Sartre on Intellectualism