Chapter 14: Happiness
A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise. - Aldo Leopold
Pessimist claim that happiness is impossible. These people: think that human nature is an uncontrollable beast who pushes us to seek new conquest. They think we are always unsatisfied, find life frustrating and psychologically upsetting, and fail to see that we are more complex than simple frustration. I can understand why a person in civilization is frustrated. His natural desires cannot find satisfaction. The unnatural conditions of civilization may teach him to pursue goals that his body cannot feel as pleasurable. He constantly falls short of pleasure and constantly feels desire. Civilization will punish him and make him stumble when he tries to let the beast out. Eventually, he learns to keep the beast locked up and accept frustration as normal.
Our psychology is interconnected with what we are. We have evolved to be happy, if we live as we are biologically designed to live. People are heavily dependent on psychological well being to survive in Nature. Happy people survive in Nature. We break down if our psychology is upset. For us to be stable, we must feel natural. We seek happiness, because it is a great comfort. The beast within is not bad, he only does what he is programmed to do. He seems unable to find happiness, if he is out of his proper environment. Put him in his environment, and you'll feel pleasures of all kinds. Everything fits where it was meant to fit. We are a hunter-gatherer.
Some psychologist will tell you that using the word "instinct" the way I do is improper. The way I equate animal instinct with passion annoys these psychologists. They want more specific definitions, which can be tested scientifically. I wish there were such words, but no one has yet found them. Too Many people write against following our instincts. I have no word to defend instinct other than the word "instinct." In the wild, it makes no difference what word you use. If you make a mistake, you die. Let your cravings tell you what to do.The body takes care of itself, if you learn to read the signs that it gives you.
Whether you are good or bad has a lasting effect on the heart of your personality and will determine the quality of a person you are. This quality will affect what you do. The path you choose will affect whether your life is good or not. What you are will come back to you. Being bad will hurt you. Being good will help you. This idea may sound vague and open to interpretation. The real world might be different or they it be exactly the way I have described.
Some people think that the good has to be taught to a person. We do sometimes learn good cultural ethics, but I think that some good comes from within a person. It is part of our nature to desire the good. Apparently, some kind of selective advantage in the human econiche has made desiring the good a successful evolutionary trait, perhaps because the good is socially beneficial and a strong social structure makes a society survive. Perhaps our instinct does not provide us with an exact picture of what the right way is. The instincts only guide us partially. We must find the rest of the way ourselves. We seem to start learning the mystery of the good as young children. The learning process is a significant part of our life experience.
We seem to develop a sense of the good, which is more idealistic than realistic. We wish to do good, but might not be sure what it is. Also, we make mistakes and discover that we failed to do the good. Still, when wrong is done, we still feel that good could have been done. It is as if the good is a model that we try to imitate as closely as possible, but do not always succeed in doing so. If we keep failing, we might assume ourselves to be no good and somehow separate from the idealistic good. We might also see the good outside of ourselves in objects or events we call good. We might assume that achieving a harmony with these things is a key to achieving perfection. I admire Nature and wish to be part of it. We might find that the key to achieving the harmony is already inside us. Our instincts and our passions are full of good powers, which are naturally set to fit Nature's way. We think the good creates harmony, which lets us feel happiness. It all seems to fit. I call this harmony justice.
Many religions make achieving the good the ultimate goal. They might believe that a good God intends the good. They might think that the good is part of the big plan of the universe. They may even think that the good is an absolute form that actually exists somewhere. They might even think that the good is God, and that a vision of the good would be the ultimate answer to the ultimate question. I am not sure whether the good really is the answer. For humans, the good is an important part of life, but I am not too sure how another life form which evolved differently might feel about it. The ability to idealize the good may just be unique to humans and may not even be an important part of the universe.
The ideal of the good can become evil. Some people think that Nature is a corruption of the good light. They might try to change the world to make it fit their ideals. I tend to think that the natural world is good as it is. People who think the good is separate from the world have taken a natural human need and turned it into insanity. These insane people might fail to see a natural good and might never archive natural harmony or happiness. Beware that you are not fooled into becoming one of the insane.
Sometimes people do evil to accomplish a greater good. The greater good never happens, and all that is left is the evil they do. A lot of destruction is caused by people who care but fail to do right. We should try to make our search for the good also good. The good does not exist as a single end. The world is constantly changing, and we must constantly care, search, do, and learn. The good may be a continuous process. For this process to be successful, you must find a harmony.
The seed that causes you to care is always young. Each moment is different, and you must always start again. The seed is always inexperienced and can make mistakes. The seed can grow inside you in a process called love. The growth is an activity. The activity is a search. Life gets meaning by playing this game. They say that it is the thought that counts, but there is also active application, as we choose our steps and make our lives what they are. What we actually do is more important than the thought. You should have done it right not just thought you did it right. Sometimes, we get a feeling that tells us when something is wrong. We should listen to these feelings. If you were good, your soul would feel good.
Some people think that the universe operates by love. Love makes the world and puts beings like us in it so we can strive to find this love. This way of thinking makes love the whole purpose of the universe. A lot of people pray to an ideal love, which they believe is separate from the world. They might search for the true love by asking this ideal what to do. These people fail to realize that the true, right way can only be found by looking at and searching the real world. Perhaps we are supposed to find ideal love, but I believe that to do this, we must search the real world. We do not create the ideal just by being idealistic.
It is possible that love is only a material instinct inside you, caused by your biological nature. Love is another human trait and possibly not universal. We only idealize love as a thing, because we are human. It is part of our biological nature to see the world this way. It is part of our universe and our purpose, but is not part of the universal purpose. A lot of people wonder if being a loving person will help them get to Heaven after they die; I do not know about that, but I do know that love can create a Heaven inside you and also a Heaven in your relationship to other people. Heaven can happen if you follow the purpose love gives you to create a good life.
The seed of true love is the pointer, pointing in the direction of the world. Sometimes, the pointer might point at the whole world as one; sometimes, it might point at specific objects in the world. If you fail to explore the world, you will fail to find this good. The God who does the pointing is a loving God. But do not assume that he is love. Anyone who claims that the source of love is the only love is missing the point. A lot of religions bow to love and miss the point. The Buddhist concept of wisdom is similar to a nun who gives up her sex life to be married to God. Maybe God wants these people to do something else. Such people are the dog who stares at the hand doing the pointing.
The word "religion" means to relink. For some religions the divine marriage is a union of the faithful with God. Their Goddess is an understanding of their God. This understanding can become evil, if they forget about the Earth and let the union give birth to an idealistic babe. In my religion the relinking is sex; the Earth is never forgotten, the artificial laws are unimportant, and the divine child is simply life. The Old Testament has the Jews married to God, who acts like a jealous, abusive husband. In my religion we are married to the Earth, but are not supposed to act like an Old Testament God. Love the world for what it is, not for what you want it to be.
If you love a person, you will try to find harmony with them. You will not try to force them to be something that they are not. A person might love someone and then try to force that person to fit his ideas of what he wants that person to be. He actually does not love that person. He only loves what he wants that person to be. He might even make the other person unhappy. Loving a person in a wrong way is not love. If you truly love a person, you would care enough to find the real person and then ask yourself if you really love that person. It is possible that you actually hate the person, or at least hate the way he is. The abuser still assumes that he loves the person. He may feel the need to love, but does not know how to do it right. He abuses the other person. He might even think that his abuse is a good thing to do, since he is trying to correct what he thinks is wrong. He might think that he is helping the other person. He might assume that his need to help is love. This help can become abuse, if the other person does not need help. Love has a way of making people lose their better judgment.
Caring feels good. Being cared about feels good. Happiness is connected to how well you are loved and how well you love. we are a social species. We do best when people cooperate with one another. Our social instincts are deep. We feel best in a working society. Your true place is most likely as a contributing member of your society. Only a few people are meant to live outside a society. Getting love is a process connected to how well you fit. You will have a better time adjusting to life, if people love you. Those who fit are going to be happier than those who do not. Happiness can make you feel like accomplishing anything. Unhappiness can upset your whole life. Those who don't fit might feel that the world is working against them.
The person who fits you is someone who mixes well with you. You and that person can develop a happy life together. Everyone's path in life is different. It is possible that someone might have a life that does not connect to yours. His love does not involve you, and yours does not involve him. In order to find the people whose paths cross yours, you should find the place you fit in. Here, your abilities work best. Here, the world seems to work for you. Here, you might find people who fit you. In this place you would have more to offer other people. You would be a more complete person. You would be a good catch. You would be someone worth loving.
Some people can easily find a place, others have to search long and hard. Some people might have to practice and train themselves. You might even change yourself to be yourself. Or perhaps you must stop changing yourself. When you have found the place that you belong, you have found yourself. The right place for you might be where you never expected it.
Many people are unhappy because they are in a role, where they do not really belong. A person may have placed himself in this role because he thought he might get something that made another person happy. What makes one person happy will not necessarily make another person happy. You cannot fit roles that do not fit you. Other people can help you find part of the way, but they cannot help you all the way. You also cannot tell another person what his right way is. Each person must find their own way.
As a contributor to society you will find rewards. Being useful will make you feel good and give meaning and purpose to your life. Other people will care for you, and you will find people who you can care for. You will have a lot to contribute to them if you are who you truly are meant to be. When I say a society of people working together, I do not mean a civilization. Some natural, primitive societies have dreamer cults or places for different people. A civilized society is one that makes people separate from their true nature. To free people from civilization would allow people to naturally be what they are.
The path we take is the world we make, and what we do is where we are. You hurt yourself if you hurt the Earth. Your future is the Earth's future. Your nature is the Earth's nature. The one true connection is even deeper. Each person has his own place in the world. If you can find it, then you will have found yourself and also the Earth. Inside of us there is something that wants the Earth. There is an even deeper secret. The Earth wants you. Does each person really have a place in this world? I have not offered any evidence to show that they do, I just think they do.
Remember that you can only worship Nature if you worship yourself, and you cannot worship yourself unless you worship Nature. You are both connected as one temple. How you treat Nature is how you treat yourself. Remember to protect your Sacred Grove. Like a person, a society also must find its way. You should try to make your society best fit Nature, so the society will be happiest. As a Holy Anarchist, you should act in a natural way and inspire people to follow your example.
Some ancient Greeks equated mind with spirit, considering it separate from the material body. Modern scientists have discovered that mental information is processed by a material organ in the body called the brain. This discovery seems to disprove the Greek view. If the new scientific view is true, then psychological processes such as love are all part of the material world. Energy, information, activity, mind, and Nature are all part of the prime material plane. Spirit is something more obscure, which includes God. The mind might be no more spiritual than your foot.
The song "Material Girl" by Madonna uses the ideal that love is good for the soul and that the pursuit of money and material wealth is harmful for the soul. This modern idea is a descendant of the Greek idea and may very well be true, but gives a limited definition of a materialist. A materialist could be someone who loves material nature. He is not necessarily someone who loves money. Money is a mathematical fiction. A businessperson who destroyed Nature for money does not necessarily do it for the money. He might have ideals that guide him. These ideals allow him to think that money actually exit. It seems that in my definition, love is materialistic and money is religious.
I try to make it clear that my definition of Nature is the kind of Nature you would find in the woods, such as trees growing and animals eating each other. This definition of Nature has been around since ancient times, but is not the only definition. Before the 20th century, people had definitions of Nature, which were idealistic and religious. They viewed the ways of their civilized culture as natural. For example, they thought the divine right of kings was natural.
Eventually, new technologies created new problems, which the old way could not solve. The system started making the poor poorer and the rich richer. Humanists broke way from the old dogmas by emphasizing the importance of people over the system. Some humanists claim to love people, but do not see the human connection with Nature. They do not love Nature and think that people could live without Nature. In a way, they do not love people. Many 20th century thinkers have made this mistake. They built industry to serve people, with little concern for how it affected the environment. In the next century we will see how hurting the environment can actually hurt us. We will keep learning more, as the effects of progress on the environment keep getting worse. The environment will be a major concern in the next century.
You might say that my view of people is superficial, since I think of people as biological machines and do not appreciate the free being inside the machine. My definition of freedom means to be free to be your nature. I believe that our American founding fathers had a similar notion when they said that all men have inalienable rights, which include life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Existentialists deny that these rights exist and want to be free from the bondage to the Animal. Communists, Christians, and Buddhists also want freedom from Nature. The belief that people have no essence gives civilization a reason to mold people into any form. Communists want you to surrender your individual rights and freedoms, which they consider illusionary. They want you to become part of the collective, just like the Borg on Star Trek. I would rather be superficial.
Civilization might seem to offer a lot, which might seem to be a new freedom, but this will just take away our natural freedoms and trap us in an unnatural cage. I like the American kind of freedom that appears in the writings of Thoreau, Whitman, Kerouac, Lame Deer, Robert E. Howard, and Edward Abbey. These people wanted to be their Animals. Perhaps no one but an American could understand this kind of freedom. For several centuries America was a wilderness in which people were free. Perhaps some of the wild thinking remains. I recommend that you follow this wild thinking, or else you might be assimilated into the collective.
Some scholars claim that capitalists, who believed in private enterprise, invented individual freedom. They do not think that individuality exists in a tribe. These political writers do not know about the personal Animals and Dreams of primitive people. Social theorists love to make reasonable sounding theories, without ever checking to see if what they say is true. You do not have to worry about me being reasonable. All my theories are invented by emotion. Occasionally, I do check to see if these theories are true, but I let my emotions tell me what is right.
Poststructuralist pyscologist claim that we have no single self. They even go as far as blaming physiological conflicts on trying to be one self. They believe in multiple selves created by different circumstance. That may be true of poststructuralist, but is not true of me. I know my real self. I do not allow circumstance to change me.
How do I know that the self that I choose is the real me? How do I know it is not a false ideal? We are all guilty of inventing a wrong image of ourselves sometimes. This false image can lead us down the wrong path, but you will know your true self when you need it. If you accept this self, you will find the right path. Don't listen to Marxist who might tell you that the image is always a lie invented to support capitalism. Sometimes the image is true. Marxist ideas have made intellectual literature quite perverted. I never cease to be amazed at the intellectual rubbish being passed around academic institutions. They even go as far as denying historic or scientific facts if it contradicts a limited Marxist view of the world.
People who believe in Structuralism and the philosophical schools that derive from it, including postmodernism, think that we can only know what Our cultures language lets us know. They see knowledge as limitation. They ignore the fact that every one of us could discover something new that can completely change the picture. We all have more than one picture to choose from. We are not limited to any one structure. We can modify the structure to suit our needs. We can compare different structures. We can pick and chose whatever features work for any situation. Practical people such as engineers and inventors see knowledge as potential. The academic philosophers are usually not practical people. They think everyone is as incompetent and lost as they are.
Postmodernist think that the modern age is over. They try to ignore the fact that Modernism is alive and going strong, particularly in the United States and Japan, where science, democracy and capitalism are the result of the renaissance and enlightenment. Marxist societies were inflexible, single minded and malicious. Modern capitalism thrives on diversity. It also has the ability to reform and change. It is possible that modern societies will one day evolve into places where people can live as complete beings. In order for that to happen we must first learn to accept the nature in us.
The whole purpose of postmodernism is to try to trick you into rejecting your dreams. They want you to believe that your dreams and desires are the product of a capitalist culture. Some of your dreams might actually be a product of the culture you live in, but desires are not all social constructs. Some desires are cause by biological instincts. Everyone has a picture of themselves. This view may or may not be correct. You must learn to find the biological you. You must learn to find what people really are. Try to find the object itself. Civilization wants you to become a person your not. They want you to be domesticated.
Finding the real you might seem hard. We spend a lot of time trying to fit social norms and concern ourselves with what other people think about us. Our desires are influenced by the norms within our culture. For example, fashion can influence what someone considers desirable. Those influences are not all bad. Some can be accepted as part of yourself. No reason to fight something that does not need to be fought. Cultural trends might seem important to a social species, but I have noticed that the core of human behavior remains more or less the same in all cultures. A story from a foreign culture might seem to be full of strange traditions. If you look deeper you will see similarities to your own culture. Good drama such as Shakespeare can be understood by anyone.
Start by saying yes to whatever desire feels right. The fetish you choose might seem unnatural, but you will not know if it is the right one until you try it. You might take several wrong paths. Perhaps you will discover that some desires were bad habits caused by psychological confusion. These can cause all kind of trouble in your life. Anyone raised in a civilized society will have lots of psychological confusion. Don't reject all desires just because of a few bad ones. Keep going. When you find the right one you will notice that everything seems right. You will be able to say that your life is the best of all possible worlds. Long live the Old Flesh.
Do not mistake the fact that a person can enjoy more than one event as evidence that there is more than one Animal. No one has ever proven that one Animal can’t enjoy more than one thing. You could say that there is more than one Animal. But really they are all part of one Animal. The Animal is a foundation on which you build during you life. It can take on all kinds of directions. You cannot define it. Instead you have to live it. I have found that the world consist of various services. Some services I give. Some services I take. I am able to set access privileges on what I let in or out. I am a collection of privileges. The biological instincts guided me to choose the foundation for these privileges. The foundation became the seed pattern that helped me to grow the real me. I became the real me as I integrated more services. Eventually I discover other people like myself. I realize all the fun we could have if we shared services with each other. Eventually I discovered life on Earth and how much fun it would be to share services with the world. It just seems to keep growing everyday. I have no idea how far I will go.
Years ago I walked down a beach in Florida. I walked into a swamp. I looked at a civilized city. I asked myself what I knew that they did not know. I know the potential for everything. I know that desires are a key that can unlock a door where everyone gets what they want. I was able to see the object that was the universe. I was able to see the object that was me. I accepted the object and became a complete objectified being. The next day I went and got some pizza and a large Coke. After discovering the universe, the body needs junk food.
The advertisement for Coke says that it is the real thing. All kinds of intellectuals have tried to claim that it is not the real thing. They believe that the image of the real is an illusion created by the hype-reality of consumer culture and advertising media. I am holding it in my hand. Sure seems real to me. Not good for your health, but definitely real. It taste good. In a natural environment the body takes care of itself and only craves what it needs. Coke was designed to seduce you. This changes the situation. It is a good example of an unnatural pleasure that can cause problems. Normally I do not recommend discipline or self control. I say that we should do what ever feels good, but in situations like this I will make an exception. It is best to avoid civilized products. They only seem good.
The image someone tries to portray to other people might be different from the image that a person portrays to himself. One might be true and one might be a lie. Sometimes they’re both true. Sometimes they’re both lies. Sometimes other people can see the lie. Sometimes other people will encourage you to live the lie. This issue is complicated. It helps to ask other people what they think. A person who tries to figure this out on his own will go crazy, like I did on the beach. The longer someone spends alone the more confused his thinking will become. We are a social species. We need each other for a happy healthy life.
Someone who likes Star Trek might imitate mister Spock. It is possible that he is letting a cultural influence prevent him from living in the way of his Animal or it is possible that the cultural influence just happens to fit his Animal. It is up to each person to decide which is right. Do not let a college professor tell you what is right or wrong. The opinions of college professors tend to be politically motivated. They want you to join their cult rather than letting you be yourself.
Some people might say that just because we have biological instincts does not mean that we all have a personal Animal that will lead us to happiness. They might think that what I mistake for the Animal is really just a product of psychological confusion that people develop as they grow up. I prefer to believe that it is something we are born with. Everyone has a favorite fetish and you will greatly improve your life once you accept it. Just try it and you might like it. You lose nothing by giving it a chance. You will lose everything you could be if you never accept it.
Postmodernist are not completely wrong. On of the dangers of modernism is that the dream is sometimes considered more important than anything else. They destroy everything around them to accomplish the dream. Some people might choose to follow their own bliss and ignore the need of the world around them. They do not realize that you can follow your own bliss and still give a little. I have found that happiness happens when people share with each other. Perhaps a problem with modern civilization is that it never learned how to share with the rest of the world.
Talismans
Making a talisman is a kind of magic spell. I like to draw what I think a force should look like, using symbols rather that detailed pictures. These symbols help me to bring out ideas. Sometimes, after I draw the picture, I realize that it is incomplete, so I go out to find more information. I do not let my ideas become dogmatic or I would never learn anything new. I am always redrawing my picture. Sometimes, it seems that I never get it right. Usually, I realize how wrong my picture is after I have drawn it, so I throw it away. I save only a few of my drawings for future use. Sometimes, I am not sure what I want. Occasionally, I end up with a picture of a force which is completely different from what I had originally intended.
Making a talisman can be a way of exploring a force. Perhaps it is not as good as watching the real world, but it has given me good results. Many of the designs of in my temple came about, as I drew and redrew the pictures. A vision of a concept is a name, which can be used in prayers. The Talisman can act as a reminder of the vision, when you need it.
As you experience the world, the unconscious mind organizes a lot of information that you never consciously, realize. Perhaps you do not need to realize this information, but sometimes it is fun to explore. People who give psychological interpretations to Gods believe that you must contact and develop these forces inside yourself to make yourself a more complete person. Some people might also believe that they must develop these forces in the world around them. These forces can be used in wrong ways, such as the way that progress and civilization uses these forces. I tend to believe that there is a right way to use them. Included here is an example of what talismans could look like. Shown are talismans of the 28 days of the lunar cycle. They may look simple, but I sure had to go through a lot to choose them over other drawings.
Postmodernist and such
Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition. Published by Manchester University Press, 1984. http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/fr/lyotard.htm
Michel Foucault, Madness and Civilization. A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason, 1961. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/foucault/
Allan Bloom, Republic of Plato. New York. Published by Basic Books, 1968.
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