Searching the
basics
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NOTE: This was translated from
spanish with the help of one of those automatic translation programs
... I was too lazy to do it on my own ... so several things might
sound quite funny :)
Introduction:
Through this analysis, I am in the search
of some basic concepts, redefining some of those that form me
as a person... I am looking forward to achieve a starting point;
with the aim of seeing farther, starting from my current position,
and by this way being able to device a plan that will allow me
to transit the best road that the destiny determines for me to
settle down. That is to say, I am crazyyy:) ( I don't know why
did I put this Document in here. Anyway, it only represents (of
course) MY CONCEPTS).
Content:
There still lack infinity of topics, which
I am answering them when I can (I need time for this!). I will
integrate new stuff in here, as soon as I write it :) or not!
... hmmm...
The goal of life:
If I get hurried, I would just say that
it is to be happy. . But (not to be confused) this is no excuse
for me ... in the following sense: I believe that in the personal
realization it is the key for the happiness. Or at least great
part of the solution to this equation. It is not valid for me
to surrender with the excuse that it is the destiny, or that
a superior being determined that this is the way that things
shall develop for me.
For that reason, I believe that one should
(attempt) to manage all the variables which are within each one´s
reach to achieve to live in the most completely and positively
possible way... and as last goal, to be happy (although this
is not an objective, but rather it is a consequence of the first
thing, I suppose that together with other things).
To
return to the superior part of the document
Realization (personal)
I find that the personal realization begins
with a clear vision of what we want to be, in each field (professional,
family, friendship, etc), enumerated as objectives or goals.
The road towards the realization is cleared
through the fight, the instruction and the patience... Ingredients
without which I don't believe that it is possible to advance
!!!.
Therefore, to be able to be realized personally,
I have to have very clear WHAT is it what I want, and to be willing
to apply all the necessary energy to achieve it (to me, this
is a problem, of course).
As I manage to achieve the different goals
that I have self-proposed in search of my realization, I manage
to see more far away, and therefore imposing me new objectives,
more and more severe as for the effort that is required to reach
them.
This can generate a problematic situation,
as you get the risk of intending goals that might exceed our
personal capabilities... I am aware that this sounds mediocre,
as it is clear that it is always necessary to look as far as
possible... but it is also sad to observe all those individuals
that evidently are in the search of their personal realization
during all their lives, being permanently frustrated or blindfold
that they only live to feed these proposed objective-goals. Is
this an extreme limit ?
I think that this also meets with a problem
of limits and mean points. In finding the appropriate balance
among the proposed objectives, the available tools and our very
own lives with their own -dangerously capricious, but queerly
not so random--variables.
To
return to the superior part of the document
The destiny:
Whim or randomness... or... the will of
one or more superior beings? ... or... a simple law of the chance?
At this time of my life I am sure that
there is a component of randomness, perhaps, but alone in the
small, daily things, and without more transcendency... But the
life has given me infinity of tests that the medullary facts
that mark the road, definitively obey a whim that the definition
of chance transcends!
This is an important reason to study each
one of these facts in search of the teaching that they have implicit.
Summarizing, it is not probably correct
to attribute to the randomness, without more study, each fact
that is the sufficiently powerful to generate in us a real change...
and not in vain we suspect sometimes (or we have the certainty)
that the same ones are work of a whim, defining to superior as
any point from the range " God " to " Nature "
(although this range is surely only one being)..
To return to the superior part of the
document
The religion:
I don't want to make the error of designating
to a religious current as OFFICIAL, because I don't believe that
no one of them have the " TRUTH " in this!.
Thousands of religious currently exist.
Some expire in their concepts and they die, others they go modifying
to be continue effective, others are born responding the different
necessities of certain region or ethnic group, others are really
solid in their bases and they last, and lastly those that are
pursued are and eliminated by all the other ones (because they
surely attempt against their stability or credibility).
For me, practically all are views in oneself
plane:
The religion has been and it is the main
motif of wars and deaths in the humanity. Regrettably, this it
is an unquestionable fact.
It transmits a truth (almost always extremist
in their concepts) as "THE TRUTH", demanding their
followers an observance and subjection to the same -so punishes
of being sanctioned moral or even physically -. But the -the
worst - punish that they might offer is absolutely overwhelming
for the blind followers of their faith: The non acceptance of
their God and the fatal consequence of finishing in the HELL
(or their diverse variants). There is not apparent escape from
this. A threat of these characteristics subjects any faithful
follower to the wiliness of the religion, being a very powerful
weapon in its ´administrators' hands!.
It is also an excuse of many people to
accept without bigger study or rebeldy; positive or negative
change that the destination interposes before them. If the change
is of positive nature, they give thanks to the entity (or entities)
that command its religious current, attributing them the authority
in the fact. If the change is negative, they conform to adducing
that this entity had to make it because it was necessary as lesson,
or test of some type or simply because was the layout for their
destiny -that of course- obeys to the secret and undecipherable
designs of the God. PASSIVE individuals, CONFORMISTS... Another
sad factor that transforms all this blind-faith people into manipulable
masses.
I conclude that the limitless faith in
the different religions is truly dangerous since it takes to
the individual to a plane many times quarreled with the reality,
the reason, the common sense and fundamentally the freedom (particular
and flagrantly that of the free thought).
To
return to the superior part of the document
the truth
The truth, like absolute and abstract element,
independent of the human being, does it exist? So that a truth
can exist, won't it be needed an agent obligatorily (human being)
that has the possibility to consider it logically and to enunciate
it as truth? If this outline is correct (summarized that the
truth for if alone it is not such, as it rather needs at least
a person that confirms it and it enunciates it), then it passes
the following thing:
People say that there are so many truths
(facets of the truth) as thinking beings there are in this world.
From the moment in which the individual is fully convinced of
his truth, this is a fully valid statement. This means that -depending
on the convictions, beliefs, education and each human being conditions-,
each person will form his own truth.
This is a double edged weapon, since you
can take an individual (or a group, or even a nation or whole
ethnic group) to believe in a " truth " pre-furbished
through the education and the appropriate publicity. This can
be seen today (to mention an example) in the hate that the towns
siblings of CHILE, BOLIVIA and PERU have between them. Or we
can also study cases like those of the Jews and the Palestinian.
Then, and returning to a philosophical
plane... Is there an absolute truth? I think that some simple
truths can be enunciated as an universal starting point... but
there is another condition that attempts against any truth (even
the simple ones), and this is not another thing that the time.
Today we have a completely convincing truth... but tomorrow this
can be crashed down with easiness by any fact (even fortuitous)
that we still ignore at this time. Therefore, the truth is also
SUBJECTIVE ... and EPHEMERAL.
Going deeper in this, any individual, institution
or organization that tries to proclaim or to promote their truths
like "THE TRUTH" in an absolute, general and irrefutable
way, are attempting against the other ones, since such a thing
doesn't exist. This focus gets really dangerous in direct relationship
with the quantity of people that accepts their "ABSOLUTE
TRUTH" speech (E.g. Pinochet, Hitler, Franco, etc.)
To
return to the superior part of the document
the Ignorance?
The lack of knowledge. And, of course,
the worst ignorance is to ignore ours own. In fact, from the
moment in that we plan to have the total knowledge on a topic,
we are lost. For several reasons:
The first one is that we begin to abandon
the continuous search of new solutions, elements and variants
that characterize to all good one studious in any order. To lock
completely in what one understands as truth and not to listen
new options with an appropriate spirit it is the principle of
the problem. It is indispensable to be open-minded to the new
thing, even when this implies to throw away our old concepts,
since this will happen equally sooner or later, since the new
thing replaces to the old thing in all the orders, with or without
our acceptance.
In second place it is necessary to notice
that the behavior exposed in the previous paragraph is very notorious
and irritant for all the other people that surround them, and
they immediately begin to run away as they start to be disbelieved
about the capacity of those which adopts this road.
Another terrible form of the ignorance,
is the one that hides in the conformism and the comfort. There
are those persons that doesn't look for the knowledge because
he/she understands that it is not required for their form of
living. This people are already condemned. The lack of search
easily transforms them into a manipulable and docile human being
in the hands of those that have the knowledge!
Lastly, those are (more and more) that
don't have the tools to understand these ideas. The adquisicion
of knowledge is well beyond their scope, since they are excluded
from the society. This people were born convict without possibilities
of being integrated to everything that is even BASIC for us.
Summarizing, for me (and I find this very
difficult I know!) the correct position to adopt is always that
of "I only know that I know nothing" accompanied by
a lot of humbleness, and to be in permanent investigation and
study with the purpose of learning. These two things allow to
illuminate in great measure my road in the search of the knowledge.
To
return to the superior part of the document
the publicity and the consumption
Since we insert ourselves in this society,
the same one goes modeling us artificially through different
means, but particularly by the means of publicity. A great deal
of effort is advocated to the design and production of publicity
with the goal of generating in the masses the interest, or better
yet, the necessity to consume, although the products are impractical,
faulty or even harmful.
On the other hand, the individual's life
is dedicated to the work, with the objective of obtaining money
to acquire the biggest quantity of things because he/she has
to have them. The credit systems appear, and with them the acquisition
of these products is even easier, but in fact the individual
is mortgaging their work (many times in an irresponsible form).
When uniting the two previous paragraphs,
we conclude that most of the people works with the objective
of consuming, unfocusing his real objectives of life, and taking
the whole matter in a simple question of "I am better",
or I feel better because I have or I use this" (nucleus
of the message in the great majority of the advertising proposals).
A mechanism that can serve the individual
so that it is not deceived by this system are the CONSUMER PROTECTION
societies. To educate him on the variables that really influence
in the benefits of each product and to notice him when certain
brand is not satisfactory. Pity is that you cannot avoid the
limitless consumption, but at least you can protect the individual;
alerting it this way.
To
return to the superior part of the document
those that create vs. those
that consume
What is it worse? a cinema
movie, one of television, or a written fiction? In all them the
individual that absorbs them raisin to live and to participate
in the fantasy that is the life of the participants of the work.
If one enjoys this, does that mean that in fact he/she enjoys
the situation or world outlined by the author? If this is the
way, and the story is a fiction, does the person prefer a fiction
then to the reality? What does it happen when the individual
is fanatic of an author in particular? "You tell me what
do you read or watch, and I will I tell you how are you ?"
When one consumes this
type of material, can it be said that he/she is subjecting somehow
to the will and ideas of the fiction´s creator ?
As it is commonly said:
there are two types of people in this world: those that think,
and those that not; The shepherds and the flocks; those that
make television and those that consume it; those that write the
stories and those that read them; Those that innovate and create
and the conformists. I want to think that I can aspire to be
in the first place!
For that reason I don't
have clear until which point is good to be identified at a higher
level than that of interest and/or simple recreation with a certain
author -which is a human being after all-, that in the worst
of the cases he/she tries to subject his consumers to its ideas...
To
return to the superior part of the document
the Honor
The honor is that thing which allows the
people to measure if they can or cannot have the certainty that
one will carry out its words. This concept doesn't accept a graduation
or scale, but there of the binary one. White or Black. The honor
is inserted in the life even in the simplest attitudes and it
marks a high percentage of the image that we expose toward the
rest of the people.
To
return to the superior part of the document
the Work
Everything points out that the work is
necessary, not only that it dignifies the man (I suppose that
to discuss this becomes a question of moral identity), but rather
beyond the doubt, the work discharges a series of tensions and
energy in the mental plane. The question becomes IN WHAT DO WE
INVEST OUR WORK!. There are diverse situations:
The working hours can be invested in commercial
or lucrative tasks. In this case two cases can be given: In the
first one, the concept of "Employee". Here the invested
hours generate a lucre for a third entity that is The "Employer".
The same one will pay a constant figure to the "Employee
of".
The second case implies that the individual
works for his own benefit. This work generates a gain that he
gathers for himself. Then his time is worth the exact price of
his work (being east of subjective character). The topic that
is relevant here (that in the previous case of "Employee
of" it also exists, but relegated to one second or third
plane) it is the individual's ability to be sold to his customers.
One sells his image through two mechanisms:
The first one is the experience directly obtained by the work
itself (usually testified by the conformity of the consumers
of it) that is measured in the quality of the service and the
product in question. The second mechanism of sale of oneself
is the publicity of the merits and studies that one has, in direct
relationship to the work that he/she carries out.
A last situation is that of the honorary
work. If the individual invests hours of his own work in a cause
of his sympathy, then the retribution for the same one won't
be in money, but equally we can say that its work generates dividends
that is gathered under the realization form and personal satisfaction.
To
return to the superior part of the document
love
It is a pure, abstract feeling that for
me, it enters inside the range of such concepts as the infinite,
the goodness, the badness, etc (Plato) that seems to be recorded
in our minds from our very beginning, evidencing rakes of non
terrestrial and non material concepts in our souls (that they
are not acquired while we are in our material transit in this
world). The different faces of the love can segment in the following
way: The love for the neighbor, to the siblings, to the parents,
to the friends, to the couple.
To
return to the superior part of the document
the physical plane
I go to the basic thing. I am an organic,
flimsy machine. I have countless factors, out of my reach most
of them, that define the time and the quality in which I exist.
Also, seemingly, on the contrary, I have
the control of some of these such variables as my person's care,
on that which I exercise certain control.
To
return to the superior part of the document
the mental plane
My body acts in function of my soul or
spiritual being that I can separate it in the following categories:
The logic, the will, the imagination, the instincts and the morals,
in a delicate balance.
To
return to the superior part of the document
the limits
Here I shall immediately arise the question
that until what level is reasonable (what is it to be reasonable?)
to take the control of the few variables on which I have the
power to act and try to take them to the most beneficial limit
for my person. How much time and efforts can I consider appropriate
to invest in this task?
Avoid the limits! Will my objective be
in the life to take the control of these variables and to be
devoted to that the same ones act perfectly? No, I don't believe
in this.
It scares me to arrive to an extreme or
limit. But I find clear also that the person that takes as a
way of life being held to the exact half point in each variable
of his life, it also incurs in an error. It is that this is a
relative concept, and due to it the half point is not such.
In fact, it oscillates more or less in
a very flexible way that even allows you to arrive to the limit.
The secret resides in being able to spread, yes, toward a half
point, but without leaving aside the necessary flexibility to
be able to support the blows, as it is necessary to maintain
the good sense in front of an extreme situation.
To
return to the superior part of the document
my origin
I am the result of the works of nature.
This is the same for all the living beings as they are meant
to find a way of reproducing and perpetuate themselves. Also,
my parents didn't have opportunity to define me at their will.
They created a human being; and here we shall not discuss the
love or the effort it took. That is another thing. Concretely,
again, my creation is product of the nature. This is something
that is coded in all the alive beings, and one of the primary
and unavoidable objectives for any animal and vegetable. Will
it be then our first debt with that mechanism of the nature ?.
To
return to the superior part of the document
to fall in love
Evidently it doesn't go by something measured
or calculated which obeys a previously devised plan. The moment
in that one perceives that is entering in the state of love can
be very subtle, and transparent to all those that surround you,
but -maybe- for the other part. Something clear enough for me
is that it unchains a series of reactions and feelings (that
can be used as thermometer): Let us define it like a general
interference at a mental level, with antagonistic effects of
fear, happiness, anxiety, etc. that unbalances the person's normal
operation, that usually makes him/her to act as a fool:)
To
return to the superior part of the document
the Morals
There are such moral concepts such as (for
example) those justified or defined by the instinct that include
the pure and abstract of the good and of the wrong, of the fear,
of the pleasure, etc that evidently accompany us from our beginnings
in this world. The rest of the moral concept is acquired through
our walk on the society. The ridiculous thing is that this moral
concepts vary thoroughly in the different societies ... but -then
again- I cannot choose where I am born and where I educate myself,
not having more choice than to absorb what it is given to me.
This borrowed morals is the subtle generator of prejudices and
discriminations in all the orders. It is indispensable to train
oneself in the ability of observing all what surrounds me, evidencing
these last cases.
To
return to the superior part of the document
the conformism
This is a dangerous concept.
Truth is that human beings can adapt to extreme situations of
pressure and stress, definitively adverse for them, or on the
other side, to undergo sedentary forms of life (as much in the
physical thing as in the mental thing) to mention two of the
possible ends. Here one runs the risk of taking a conformist
attitude in both of these roads and by this way adopt it as a
way of life. It is necessary to be in permanent alert so that
this never happens !. But then, another problem arises, and it
is that it is very difficult to perceive an attitude of this
type when one himself live inside it !
A comment that I have,
is that almost without exception, all the big brilliant ideas,
art, cientific discoveries and inventions have been produced
by individuals that were in a situation of pressure, censorship,
stress and/or extreme unconformism (dictatorships, the inquisition,
ethnic discrimination, indifference, materialism, etc.).
Once that one is conscious
about if he/she either takes or not a conformist attitude, it
is also necessary to ask the question that if there is an official
way of living the life, or if one really has the whole freedom
of living it strolling among the ends that I most like, although
it is clear that the last judge of any type behavior -in the
case that this judge is meant to exist- it does not exist in
a material form on this earth, with the only exception of myself.
To
return to the superior part of the document