RichardKennaway has hit the nail on the head. Mass_Driver, the question you ask is an old, old one, and I’m personally glad you raised it in this forum, because it’s so fundamental.
I think khafra is right to recommend that you take a look at the stoics. Classical stoicism is largely about dealing with the disappointments and general shittiness of life in a rational manner.
More broadly, education in philosophy and literature and history and the rest of the humanities were once supposed to help us answer these questions, to give us a role to play in the story of life and a sense of perspective. I don’t know anything about your education in the humanities in school, but mine was typical, and I think very bad.
I don’t know anything about your education in the humanities in school, but mine was typical, and I think very bad.
I’m sorry to hear it, Costanza. Sounds like you’ve managed to repair some of the damage, anyway.
I will definitely take another look at the stoics. I’ve read a full book by Epictetus and another by Marcus Aurelius a few times each, and found it a bit Pollyanna-ish...not so much advice for coping with a shitty world as exercises for tricking yourself into believing it isn’t shitty. There is a strand of mystical optimism even inside stoicism. Still, I will look again, and see what I can find. There was enough practical wisdom there that I can readily believe that they do have good advice for coping with adulthood.
As far as my general liberal arts education, it’s pretty good, but it’s contaminated by Marx and Hegel and Maslow and so on...my sense of perspective is keyed to the theme of very bad things often happening to very good people but everything nevertheless working out OK.
Sounds like you’ve already taken quite a look at the stoics. On another thread on this forum, I’ve seen the advice to check out the works of Albert Ellis. See http://lesswrong.com/lw/3eo/theory_and_practice_of_meditation/ . This would be one more thing on the growing list of things I have yet to do myself.
P.S. And fortyeridania’s post on this very same thread.
RichardKennaway has hit the nail on the head. Mass_Driver, the question you ask is an old, old one, and I’m personally glad you raised it in this forum, because it’s so fundamental.
I think khafra is right to recommend that you take a look at the stoics. Classical stoicism is largely about dealing with the disappointments and general shittiness of life in a rational manner.
More broadly, education in philosophy and literature and history and the rest of the humanities were once supposed to help us answer these questions, to give us a role to play in the story of life and a sense of perspective. I don’t know anything about your education in the humanities in school, but mine was typical, and I think very bad.
I’m sorry to hear it, Costanza. Sounds like you’ve managed to repair some of the damage, anyway.
I will definitely take another look at the stoics. I’ve read a full book by Epictetus and another by Marcus Aurelius a few times each, and found it a bit Pollyanna-ish...not so much advice for coping with a shitty world as exercises for tricking yourself into believing it isn’t shitty. There is a strand of mystical optimism even inside stoicism. Still, I will look again, and see what I can find. There was enough practical wisdom there that I can readily believe that they do have good advice for coping with adulthood.
As far as my general liberal arts education, it’s pretty good, but it’s contaminated by Marx and Hegel and Maslow and so on...my sense of perspective is keyed to the theme of very bad things often happening to very good people but everything nevertheless working out OK.
Sounds like you’ve already taken quite a look at the stoics. On another thread on this forum, I’ve seen the advice to check out the works of Albert Ellis. See http://lesswrong.com/lw/3eo/theory_and_practice_of_meditation/ . This would be one more thing on the growing list of things I have yet to do myself.
P.S. And fortyeridania’s post on this very same thread.