When I was younger, I once visited an exhibition on the life and the works of Einstein. Besides the famous equation (E=mc2) the thing that I remember most vividly was the visual demonstration of gravity. The tour guide spread a spandex-like material over the four corners of a wooden box (the top had been taken off). She pointed at the spandex and said, "This, is the space time continuum." Next she held up a metal sphere and said, "This, is any old planetary mass" and as she dropped the sphere on the spandex she confidently asserted, "This is gravity - when an object of mass warps the fabric of space and time". She then gently rolled three silver-metal BBs across the spandex and as one of the tiny spheres passed the larger one its momentum carried it right to the edge of the dip in the spandex before it faltered and was pulled into the gravity of the Larger Sphere. I was fascinated.
I feel this to be true of the spiritual as well as the physical.
There is such a thing as Spiritual Gravity. As a person who has been at times driven by selfishness, fear, and anger, I find myself in my worst moments to be very much like the metal sphere. I work so hard to warp everything around me into an extension of myself. I begin viewing books as means of gaining more understanding and things not worthwhile in themselves but worthwhile only in making me seem more intelligent. The people around me become means of satisfying my needs and want and become important to me only in so far as they grant me a better picture of myself.
And my attitude towards the World affects those around me tremendously. Especially those I am in closest contact with, my classmates, my family, my friends, my mentors and teachers.
The opposite is true too. When I feel loved and liked and cared for and at peace with God and myself, my interaction with the World is fraught with joy, wonder, and compassion.
So I commend Self-Awareness to you:
“Self-awareness [as opposed to introspection] is attentiveness to my way of relation to people and things. In particular, it involves understanding how my outlook affects the way I see the world and how it affects the world itself. This self-aware life does not accept that there is a private world of introspection and a public world of action. It insists that my interaction with the world includes my attitudes as well as my actions.”
-Abbot Christopher Jamison “Finding Happiness”
Bottom Line: Insist on living a life that is self-aware and thus alive to ones interaction with the world. Why? Because I can only change if I am aware of the thing that needs changing – namely, me.
Showing posts with label Thoughts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Thoughts. Show all posts
Friday, October 7, 2011
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
On Happiness (Part I)
Recently, I've come across some works regarding Happiness.
First: Consolation of Philosophy, by Boethius
Second: Treatise on Happiness, by St. Thomas Aquinas
Now, I've also been following a blog called "The Happiness Project". It's on the side bar so you can go there to find out what it's all about.
It's late at night and I just wanted to get this thread going so I don't forget in the morning. Here's what I propose to do:
In this post, the author is pretty much allowing happiness to be vague. I think that such relativism at the beginning of a project like this fundamentally misses the point. ...Or something like that. I'm going to sleep on it, but these are the texts I shall be interacting with...
However, it will be an on-and-off thing as presentations are coming up!
In pursuit of Happiness,
Gabriel
First: Consolation of Philosophy, by Boethius
Second: Treatise on Happiness, by St. Thomas Aquinas
Now, I've also been following a blog called "The Happiness Project". It's on the side bar so you can go there to find out what it's all about.
It's late at night and I just wanted to get this thread going so I don't forget in the morning. Here's what I propose to do:
In this post, the author is pretty much allowing happiness to be vague. I think that such relativism at the beginning of a project like this fundamentally misses the point. ...Or something like that. I'm going to sleep on it, but these are the texts I shall be interacting with...
However, it will be an on-and-off thing as presentations are coming up!
In pursuit of Happiness,
Gabriel
Monday, September 15, 2008
Taking a Compliment
I'm not sure if I'm unique in this area or not. You see, whenever someone praises me for something I've done (genuine praise mind you, not flattery), I redden ever so slightly and mumble something like "erm...thanks" or "praiseGod" or even "no, no it was nothing". After which I shuffle off and try to hide from the next person who looks like they're going to say something nice to me.
Now it's laughable I admit, but I genuinely have trouble taking a compliment. The problem is intensified when someone I respect and hold in high regard praises me. Boy! It get's so bad, "oh, you're just saying that to be nice" etc. In fact, I've been told that I often come across as being falsely humble, which is just a small minded form of pride.
So, as always, Dante and Lewis have something amazing to say about this:
"And when the voice had ceased, and all was still,
I saw four mighty shades approaching us
with neither joy nor sadness in their eyes.
'Behold that shade whose right hand wields the sword,'
my worthy Teacher thus began to say,
'who comes before the others as their lord.
Homer the sovereign poet is that soul.
Horace the satirist comes after him,
Ovid comes third, and Lucan is the last.
...
So did I see united that sweet school
of the lord of the most exalted song
that like an eagle soars above the rest.
When they had talked together for a while
they turned to me, and beckoned me to come,
bringing a smile unto my Teacher's lips,
And greeted me, and honored me so well
that they included me among their band,
and made me sixth in that academy."
-Dante, Inferno, Canto Four
Keep in mind that when he writes this, he doesn't know for sure that 700 years from when he's writing he'll still be considered one of the greatest if not the greatest poet of all time. For anyone but Dante, this blatant self praise would be at best ridiculous and at worst falsely prideful. This is but the first of many instances throughout the Comedy where he basically praises himself. But he deserves it! But he's only in Canto Four! How does he have the guts (Even if he is DANTE) to compare himself with Virgil and Homer!
Dante is certainly worthy of the praise he gives himself, but how was he able to praise himself without sinning?
Contrast that passage with this one from Clement I:
"The humble person should not testify to his own humility, but leave it to someone else to testify about him. " -38:2
"Let a man be faithful, let him be able to expound knowledge, let him be wise in the interpretation of discourses, let him be energetic in deeds, let him be pure; for the greater he seems to be, the more he ought to be humble, and the more he ought to seek the common advantage of all, and not his own." -48:5-6
Dante fulfills all of these, but I'm not sure if he makes a mistake in praising himself, if he is praising himself.
In Purgatory, on the ring of the prideful where the penitent are stooped under huge boulders, Dante also stoops down in order to talk to them. In effect, he participates in the penitence. I think he does this two other times, but I shall have to re-read to be sure. The fact is though, that he knew he had leanings toward being pride ful and yet he included himself in the "Academy". Can a virtuous man praise himself?
Now that I think of it, Paul does the same thing:
http://www.biblegateway.com/keyword/?search=follow%20my%20example%20&version1=49&searchtype=all&spanbegin=52&spanend=73
But I'm not Paul or Dante, how should I take a compliment?
Here's one from Lewis:
"I suddenly remembered that no one can enter heaven except as a child; and nothing is so obvious in a child - not in a conceited child, but in a good child - as its great and undisguised pleasure in being praised...Apparently what I had mistaken for humility had, all these years, prevented me from understanding what is in fact the humblest, the most childlike, the most creaturely of pleasures - nay, the specific pleasure of the inferior: the pleasure of a beast before men, a child before its fathe, a pupil before his teacher, a creature before its Creator. I am not forgetting how horribly this most innocent desire is parodied in our human ambitions, or how very quickly, in my own experience, the lawful pleasure of praise from those whom it was my duty to please turns into the deadly poison of self-admiration. But I thought I could detect a moment - a very, very short moment - before this happened, during which the satisfaction of having pleased those whom I rightly loved and rightly feared was pure."
-C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory
I do feel much much pleasure when I am complimented (or as MKR would say, "my ego is stroked" ) But try as I might, I rarely am able to hold on to that first moment of pure satisfaction of having pleased another soul. Which sends me careening to the other extreme of trying to reject praise, which is a problem.
So the question is, how does one take a compliment in a way that glorifies God and allows one to rightly take joy in having pleased someone by good action?
Perhaps I am being too anxious...
Now it's laughable I admit, but I genuinely have trouble taking a compliment. The problem is intensified when someone I respect and hold in high regard praises me. Boy! It get's so bad, "oh, you're just saying that to be nice" etc. In fact, I've been told that I often come across as being falsely humble, which is just a small minded form of pride.
So, as always, Dante and Lewis have something amazing to say about this:
"And when the voice had ceased, and all was still,
I saw four mighty shades approaching us
with neither joy nor sadness in their eyes.
'Behold that shade whose right hand wields the sword,'
my worthy Teacher thus began to say,
'who comes before the others as their lord.
Homer the sovereign poet is that soul.
Horace the satirist comes after him,
Ovid comes third, and Lucan is the last.
...
So did I see united that sweet school
of the lord of the most exalted song
that like an eagle soars above the rest.
When they had talked together for a while
they turned to me, and beckoned me to come,
bringing a smile unto my Teacher's lips,
And greeted me, and honored me so well
that they included me among their band,
and made me sixth in that academy."
-Dante, Inferno, Canto Four
Keep in mind that when he writes this, he doesn't know for sure that 700 years from when he's writing he'll still be considered one of the greatest if not the greatest poet of all time. For anyone but Dante, this blatant self praise would be at best ridiculous and at worst falsely prideful. This is but the first of many instances throughout the Comedy where he basically praises himself. But he deserves it! But he's only in Canto Four! How does he have the guts (Even if he is DANTE) to compare himself with Virgil and Homer!
Dante is certainly worthy of the praise he gives himself, but how was he able to praise himself without sinning?
Contrast that passage with this one from Clement I:
"The humble person should not testify to his own humility, but leave it to someone else to testify about him. " -38:2
"Let a man be faithful, let him be able to expound knowledge, let him be wise in the interpretation of discourses, let him be energetic in deeds, let him be pure; for the greater he seems to be, the more he ought to be humble, and the more he ought to seek the common advantage of all, and not his own." -48:5-6
Dante fulfills all of these, but I'm not sure if he makes a mistake in praising himself, if he is praising himself.
In Purgatory, on the ring of the prideful where the penitent are stooped under huge boulders, Dante also stoops down in order to talk to them. In effect, he participates in the penitence. I think he does this two other times, but I shall have to re-read to be sure. The fact is though, that he knew he had leanings toward being pride ful and yet he included himself in the "Academy". Can a virtuous man praise himself?
Now that I think of it, Paul does the same thing:
http://www.biblegateway.com/keyword/?search=follow%20my%20example%20&version1=49&searchtype=all&spanbegin=52&spanend=73
But I'm not Paul or Dante, how should I take a compliment?
Here's one from Lewis:
"I suddenly remembered that no one can enter heaven except as a child; and nothing is so obvious in a child - not in a conceited child, but in a good child - as its great and undisguised pleasure in being praised...Apparently what I had mistaken for humility had, all these years, prevented me from understanding what is in fact the humblest, the most childlike, the most creaturely of pleasures - nay, the specific pleasure of the inferior: the pleasure of a beast before men, a child before its fathe, a pupil before his teacher, a creature before its Creator. I am not forgetting how horribly this most innocent desire is parodied in our human ambitions, or how very quickly, in my own experience, the lawful pleasure of praise from those whom it was my duty to please turns into the deadly poison of self-admiration. But I thought I could detect a moment - a very, very short moment - before this happened, during which the satisfaction of having pleased those whom I rightly loved and rightly feared was pure."
-C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory
I do feel much much pleasure when I am complimented (or as MKR would say, "my ego is stroked" ) But try as I might, I rarely am able to hold on to that first moment of pure satisfaction of having pleased another soul. Which sends me careening to the other extreme of trying to reject praise, which is a problem.
So the question is, how does one take a compliment in a way that glorifies God and allows one to rightly take joy in having pleased someone by good action?
Perhaps I am being too anxious...
Monday, March 10, 2008
Thoughts on Creation
(This came about while reading Emerson and loathing the twisted shadows of truth which he propounds for the real thing. Wishing to right his wrong, I (though if presumptuous, time will tell) endeavored to articulate feebly an aesthetic which is based upon Dorothy Sayers essay, but also, hopefully sheds some light on what creation of art, literature, or music is.
We esteem great men because of their ability to see what is true and to communicate that truth. By learning from them, we also learn to see the truth and hopefully will see more truth. But the truth is not new, it was not created, it always was. The truth did not come from men, but from God. Why then should I seek truth within when it is without? What I say will simply be feebly articulating what has always been and always will be. True, anything I create will have my unmistakable personal stamp, but what I do either conforms to the Good, True, and Beautiful or it does not. A story may have been born of the author’s personal experience, but we esteem it because it is true, good, or beautiful and because it says something that is universal. The very fact that we can recognize it as truth proves that it is saying what already existed in some form. By conforming to these principles, we articulate some aspect of reality in the unifying context of God’s goodness, truth, and beauty. By the mere fact that another man can recognize what I say as being true, I prove that all truth is God’s truth. When we see Rembrandt’s painting or listen to Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto and rightly agree that it is beautiful and admire the author for seeing what we did not see, we come to know and see what the author saw. Art is communication. Proving that by being able to see what he saw, there is an underlying reality of which he is only uncovering our eyes from. Human creation, if good and true is showing others the reality which we glimpse. If art is creation, then creation is a mirror through which we see God, Reality itself, reflected. A mirror because the there are varying degrees of light and truth which are shed from an object.
This whole argument needs clarification in that I still have not made the important distinction between good, true, and beautiful art and just plain bad music, art, literature, etc. This difference does exist, but I will need further reflection to come to an articulation of its cause.
The passage that specifically prompted this barrage of incoherency and muddled thought was this.
“Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life’s cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another you have only an extemporaneous half possession…Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? Every great man is a unique.” (Emphasis mine, from the essay Self-Reliance page 199) I apologize for the pompousness of this post. Emerson’s radical individualism is starting to affect me. =] I humbly submit this little kernel of mine to the scrutiny of anyone who happens to read this. Feel free to rip, tear, and batter it to pieces, hopefully we will gain a sliver of silver from all this dross.
We esteem great men because of their ability to see what is true and to communicate that truth. By learning from them, we also learn to see the truth and hopefully will see more truth. But the truth is not new, it was not created, it always was. The truth did not come from men, but from God. Why then should I seek truth within when it is without? What I say will simply be feebly articulating what has always been and always will be. True, anything I create will have my unmistakable personal stamp, but what I do either conforms to the Good, True, and Beautiful or it does not. A story may have been born of the author’s personal experience, but we esteem it because it is true, good, or beautiful and because it says something that is universal. The very fact that we can recognize it as truth proves that it is saying what already existed in some form. By conforming to these principles, we articulate some aspect of reality in the unifying context of God’s goodness, truth, and beauty. By the mere fact that another man can recognize what I say as being true, I prove that all truth is God’s truth. When we see Rembrandt’s painting or listen to Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto and rightly agree that it is beautiful and admire the author for seeing what we did not see, we come to know and see what the author saw. Art is communication. Proving that by being able to see what he saw, there is an underlying reality of which he is only uncovering our eyes from. Human creation, if good and true is showing others the reality which we glimpse. If art is creation, then creation is a mirror through which we see God, Reality itself, reflected. A mirror because the there are varying degrees of light and truth which are shed from an object.
This whole argument needs clarification in that I still have not made the important distinction between good, true, and beautiful art and just plain bad music, art, literature, etc. This difference does exist, but I will need further reflection to come to an articulation of its cause.
The passage that specifically prompted this barrage of incoherency and muddled thought was this.
“Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life’s cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another you have only an extemporaneous half possession…Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? Every great man is a unique.” (Emphasis mine, from the essay Self-Reliance page 199) I apologize for the pompousness of this post. Emerson’s radical individualism is starting to affect me. =] I humbly submit this little kernel of mine to the scrutiny of anyone who happens to read this. Feel free to rip, tear, and batter it to pieces, hopefully we will gain a sliver of silver from all this dross.
Friday, February 15, 2008
Excited
Have you ever had that feeling where everything excites you?
Just when you feel like you've gotten over the initial thrill of one thought, another one comes to your attention and boom!
Thoughts on my mind right now (In no particular order and probably not comprehensive):
The Syntopicon
A systematic catalogue of themes (i.e. Beauty, Goodness, Truth) in all the great western classics. Compiled by Mortimer J. Adler and his team over the course of about ten years. Yeah...Awesome! The only problem would be that you actually have to have the books to be able to use it...
The Iliad
Go read it. It's indescribablly fun. I haven't been this excited about an adventure since Lord of the Rings. =]
Anna Karenina
I pretty much melted when I got to part IV. I'm a sucker for happy engagments. =] Anna has definitely degenerated both morally and physically. sigh. Let's see how it goes.
Jesus Loves me and has shed His blood for me
This is most definitely the source of all my happiness. =]
If I do not give myself to God completely (or as much as I can) I am a much worse person. (Believe me!)
Lord Alfred Tennyson
I've read The Kraken and The Lady of Shalott so far. Both very good. =]
The Complete Works of Shakespeare in 38 hardcover volumes
Ahhhhhhh! They are sooo beautiful! Don't worry Shakespeare! I'll get to you! (After Anna K and Plutarch!)
Plutarch
Very Interesting Character Studies...more on that later.
T.S. Eliot
Was my first contact with poetry (of all the Poets, I had to hit one of the hardest!). Last Year.
Love him.
My Baby Cousin
This is how he says my name: Gaeeeeeebeeeoo OR Gabiogabiogabiogabio
So adorably cute. =]
Why it seems like Money is worth more when it's still in your hands
It's because of the potential it contains. As soon as it's converted, it loses potential. (unless you go and be a "red paper clip guy")
Wheatstone Academy
Just about the most awesome summer camp ever. =]
My left hand is like a lame duck on the piano compared to my right hand.
This is especially apparent when I try to play (note emphasis on Try) Rachmaninoff's Moment Musical no. 4 in e minor.
My (incomplete) set of the Harvard Classics
Raided it from the Library for $35. I think I have like 27/51 of the set. Some very good titles. It's an old edition though.
Two volume set of Major British Writers
Very good editorial essays in there.
I'm in debt.
From buying all these books
Yup, that's all for now!
Just when you feel like you've gotten over the initial thrill of one thought, another one comes to your attention and boom!
Thoughts on my mind right now (In no particular order and probably not comprehensive):
The Syntopicon
A systematic catalogue of themes (i.e. Beauty, Goodness, Truth) in all the great western classics. Compiled by Mortimer J. Adler and his team over the course of about ten years. Yeah...Awesome! The only problem would be that you actually have to have the books to be able to use it...
The Iliad
Go read it. It's indescribablly fun. I haven't been this excited about an adventure since Lord of the Rings. =]
Anna Karenina
I pretty much melted when I got to part IV. I'm a sucker for happy engagments. =] Anna has definitely degenerated both morally and physically. sigh. Let's see how it goes.
Jesus Loves me and has shed His blood for me
This is most definitely the source of all my happiness. =]
If I do not give myself to God completely (or as much as I can) I am a much worse person. (Believe me!)
Lord Alfred Tennyson
I've read The Kraken and The Lady of Shalott so far. Both very good. =]
The Complete Works of Shakespeare in 38 hardcover volumes
Ahhhhhhh! They are sooo beautiful! Don't worry Shakespeare! I'll get to you! (After Anna K and Plutarch!)
Plutarch
Very Interesting Character Studies...more on that later.
T.S. Eliot
Was my first contact with poetry (of all the Poets, I had to hit one of the hardest!). Last Year.
Love him.
My Baby Cousin
This is how he says my name: Gaeeeeeebeeeoo OR Gabiogabiogabiogabio
So adorably cute. =]
Why it seems like Money is worth more when it's still in your hands
It's because of the potential it contains. As soon as it's converted, it loses potential. (unless you go and be a "red paper clip guy")
Wheatstone Academy
Just about the most awesome summer camp ever. =]
My left hand is like a lame duck on the piano compared to my right hand.
This is especially apparent when I try to play (note emphasis on Try) Rachmaninoff's Moment Musical no. 4 in e minor.
My (incomplete) set of the Harvard Classics
Raided it from the Library for $35. I think I have like 27/51 of the set. Some very good titles. It's an old edition though.
Two volume set of Major British Writers
Very good editorial essays in there.
I'm in debt.
From buying all these books
Yup, that's all for now!
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