Martin Heidegger argued that humans are thrown or geworfenheit into an existence we didn't choose a specific time, place, and historical destiny and we are constantly hurtling toward death. Most people live in inauthentic anxiety, hiding from this reality in comfortable distractions.
The authentic human accepts their thrownness, looks death directly in the eye, and consciously chooses to author their own fate.
This is an almost exact philosophical parallel to the Norse concept of Wyrd. The Norseman does not cry about being thrown into a harsh, freezing world doomed to Ragnarok.
He accepts his geworfenheit, steps into the shield-wall, and claims his authentic destiny through action. A martial civilization is a collective of authentic individuals who refuse the sedative of safetyism and choose instead to write a heroic destiny in the face of inevitable mortality.
Арнольд Шварценеггер: "Знаешь, почему большинство талантливых людей так и остаются никем? Они включают фальшивую скромность. Они говорят: «Я творец, я просто делаю свою работу. Пускай мир сам меня заметит».
Это чушь. Ты можешь быть гением, создавать лучшие продукты или писать шедевры. Но если люди об этом не знают, у тебя ничего нет. Абсолютный ноль. Твой талант просто умрёт вместе с тобой.
Умение продавать, продвигать себя. Доносить свою ценность до других и убеждать — это не грязное ремесло. Это величайшее искусство, без которого ты никто.
Чем больше людей узнают о том, на что ты способен, тем ближе ты к вершине. Перестань прятаться в тени. Выходи и учись заявлять о себе на весь мир. Твой успех зависит только от этого"
“A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul.”
-Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
I'm finally reading Dune. This quote, which is in the first few pages, hits hard:
"Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them."
"I am losing precious days. I am degenerating into a machine for making money. I am learning nothing in this trivial world of men. I must break away and get out into the mountains to learn the news."
— John Muir
Intelligent people struggle with addiction. Their minds need more. They have obsessions nobody around them shares. Philosophy. Astronomy. Dostoevsky. Jazz. Quantum physics. Things they know deeply. Things they've gone so deep into that anything else feel like small talk. And small talk feels like suffocation. So... they drink. Work until 2 am. Doomscroll until they're numb. Because there is a gap. A gap between who you are and the conversations available to you. And it's one of the loneliest places a person can live.
A man who reads old books cannot be fully captured by modern stupidity. He has dead kings, prophets, poets, killers, saints, drunks, generals, and madmen whispering in his bloodstream. The feed has no chance against this.
i regret to inform you that personal growth rarely comes from acquiring new knowledge and almost always from:
• getting humiliated
• showing up terrified and doing it anyway
• admitting you might be the problem