Home « WHAT ARE YOU DOING FOR YOURSELF?
Now that 2009 is ending, the time is right to ask yourself: what have you really done for yourself this year? Maybe you will say that you achieved many things, a, b, and c, and that you are very satisfied because of that. Perhaps, the other letters of the alphabet did not let themselves be conquered and you feel frustrated because of all the things that got away from you.
Your list of achievements will probably be long and generous perhaps you will even decide to treat yourself to a holiday at some privileged place of the planet. Your love life is doing well, financially your are stable, and your health is not too bad.
Your children, if you have any, are behaving themselves, your partner is wonderful. Soon you will be able to move into a bigger house and install a Home Theater with a giant High Definition Full plasma screen and a games room for your children so they will install their console table and be able to fully enjoy all that this technology can do.
All in all, the world isn’t that bad, global warming is nothing more than a game. If you are lucky enough to have an outdoor space or yard perhaps you’ll put up a hammock and savor your own satisfaction.
Again: What are you doing for yourself?
Do you know who you are, and what you are like? Do you behave as a human being or like a robot?
For a being that shares 98% of its genes with chimpanzees, it would seem that you are doing all right. In any case, don’t worry if your life is not ideal and you are not able to do what you want, or if you end up doing something you don’t want to do.
Neuroscience has proven that we have no free will and that our brain is never in the present because it is always half a second behind in time.
Perhaps therefore we should content ourselves with the levels of pollution, poverty, crime, child abuse, violence, war and depredation of the planet’s natural resources.
In any case, if we have no free will, then we aren’t guilty of anything, since, “something” we are not aware of, thinks for us and chooses for us, which means that we are “obliged to do.” The truth is that our own identity is fake, and our brain belongs to an unknown being that controls our lives.
Worrying, don’t you think? We move like puppets, and we ignore who the pupiteer is.
In any case, we must not lose hope as there is this guy who goes around saying that it is possible to know thyself, recover your real identity and cut loose the strings.
This is why, this Christmas, I wish you all the highest good: know thyself, find your real identity, and all that this entails.
Fraternally,
Dario Salas Sommer,
Philosopher,
December 2009.