Skip to main content

Me, Myself, and I

Soren Kierkegaard once said that "there is nothing with which every man is so afraid as getting to know how enormously much he is capable of doing and becoming."

This man is identified as the father of existentialism, a philosophy whose proponents hold individual choice as the act that shapes and defines human nature; and who believe that when the individual makes a choice because of social pressure, he or she devalues his or her nature.

It follows that any role we play out of obligation to others fails to give us a genuine identity. We are what others say we are, not what we ourselves have determined.

I have questions, though. What if that role gives us the identity we've always really wanted? Would we be any less genuine just because our motives were not personal? It seems to me that we can, indeed, find ourselves when we choose out of obligation. I'm specifically thinking about service. The man who serves may not want to, but he discovers in the process of service a real fulfillment he would not have expected. This new role he adopts as his identity, one that was "forced" upon him by society.

Sometimes, in fact, it takes being swept up in something larger than yourself to really understand what you're capable of becoming. Consider how many people have discovered in themselves a courage they never thought they had before being forced to fulfill some duty.

Soldiers might come automatically to mind, but there is more to this. The simple person, the one we think not capable of great things, may also be gripped in the throes of obligation and circumstance, and prove himself or herself determined, courageous, and-- ultimately-- genuine.

I've wondered at times whether the organizations I'm part of strip me of my individuality. I find in the midst of these questions, though, that I'm becoming more of who I was meant to become by taking part in them. I may not want to go through the physical labor involved in building a large garden bed, but I find I'm more handy than I first believed; and I may not have wanted to be thrust in the position of leadership teacher at my school, but I find I'm becoming more of a leader than I knew I could become. It was a personal choice I made to take on these roles, but one I made more out of duty than desire.

It may be true that I am misunderstanding the nature of existentialism; but if I'm right, then doing something initially out of obligation or duty can eventually lead a man to become that which he would have intended in the first place. The road this person took may not have been the intended one, but it got him there nonetheless.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Heroes

Although we have several examples of heroes in our day, one of the best known is of a woman named Agnes Gonxhe Bojaxhiu (“Gonja Bojaju”), who devoted her life to sustaining the “poor, sick, orphaned, and dying.” Her venue was Calcutta, India, where she served as a teacher until she began to take notice of the poverty there. Seeking to do something about it, she began an organization that consisted of just thirteen members at its inception. Called the “Missionaries of Charity,” the organization would eventually burgeon into well over 5,000 members worldwide, running approximately 600 missions, schools and shelters in 120 countries; and caring for the orphaned, blind, aged, disabled, and poor. As her personal work expanded, she traveled to countries like Lebanon, where she rescued 37 children from a hospital by pressing for peace between Israel and Palestine; to Ethiopia, where she traveled to help the hungry; to Chernobyl, Russia, to assist victims of the nuclear meltdown there; and to ...

The Nice Guy Fallacy

I read part of a poem recently by one of my favorite poets. It reads: I envy not in any moods The captive void of noble rage The linnet born within the cage That never knew the summer woods. I envy not the beast that takes His license in the field of time Unfetter'd by the sense of crime To whom a conscience never wakes. Nor what may call itself as bles't The heart that never plighted troth But stagnates in the weeds of sloth Nor any want-begotten rest. I hold it true, whate'er befall I feel it, when I sorrow most 'Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all. At base, Tennyson contrasted a life of risk, and consequent pain, with one of security. He sides conclusively with the life of risk, and says he fails to envy those who have faced no hardship. I agree with him; and, for good or ill, his words are just as relevant today as they were in the nineteenth century. Like then, there are those today who choose to live their lives with as little risk as...

Comparative Medical Care

One thing I'd like to understand is why there is such a difference between medical costs here and those in Haiti. At the time the book Mountains Beyond Mountains was written, in 2003, it often cost $15,000 to $20,000 annually to treat a patient with tuberculosis, while it cost one one-hundredth of that-- $150 to $200-- to treat a patient for the disease in Haiti. Even if the figures aren't completely accurate, the sheer difference would still be there. Indeed, the United States pays more per capita for medical care than any other country on Earth. My first guess for why the disparity exists is that there is a market willing and able to pay more for medical treatment, so suppliers see the demand and respond with higher prices. According to at least one doctor (go to http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/2009/05/what_is_the_cause_of_excess_co.php), part of the reason is administrative prices here. People here have a higher standard of living, and so the cost of care is shifted to ...