First of all, I would like to apologize for any typos and punctuation errors you may (WILL) find in this credo. I am writing on a French keyboard, on an almost ancient Dell laptop. Half the letters on the keys are erased, which just adds to the whole confusion of things. Also, the internet is obscenely slow and I have no dictionaries nor thesauruses at hand to make myself sound more eloquent.
That said, I want to start off with the fact these past two days and the circumstances have made it very difficult for me to sit down and reflect on my life, because all I can think of now is how much i ,iss the program. I dont think the program itself, just the people, the dynamic of things, the routine. Now, I feel badly misplaced and alone in a strange city, with an abundance of beautiful Gothic churches and horribly confusing keyboards. I have been in and out of sobbing fits for these past two days (or dare I say, day and a half) so I dont really feel like I am in the best reflective and profound mood, instead I just want to fall asleep and wake up two weeks ago. So this is why I have been living my past two days in a feigned First Nature, to get my mind off the void I feel, I have been trying to concentrate very hard on anything immediate, without reflecting nor reminiscing. Because, when I do, the sobbing once again begins. I am trying to approach things as Mersault did, attempting to live these days via sensory input, but I cannot help it. I have alxays been an overwhelmingly reflective person, I love just sitting alone, thinking about anything that finds its way into my head, and pouring these thoughts and feeling into a notebook, or a conversation. That is why trying to avoid reflecting has been very difficult. On the topic of Camus as well, I have learned that we as humans must welcome pain and sorrow, because without it, it is impossible to recognize happiness. What his theory of the absurd teaches us is that out of the sad clash between our rational want for justice, solidarity, and truth .. three beautiful things are begeted : passion, freedom, and revolt. These three concepts are crucial in my life, and in the whole idea of staying alive (not killing yourself). Once you have understood that this is just the way things are, that without this lack of rational wants, it is impossible to ever feel passion, or freedom, or take part in a revolt, the balance beam basically weighs itself out. With the sorrows that come from not having truth, solidarity, qnd justice… also come the previously mentioned, and that in itself is a reason to keep living. I do not know what I would do without these three concepts in my life. I refuse to live a life of coarse comfort, like those who have comitted the pathetic act of philosophical suicide, through things like religion or pure ignorance. I believe we as humans need this clash for us to evolve as people, and in fact, as humankind. I think this is perhaps why I cannot stand the character of Mersault (though at this moment I am attempting to live like him to be able to tolerate this overwhelming sadness). I feel like he has killed himself philosophically, by submitting himself to this First Nature lifestyle, he feels contempt with the ways things are, and thus there is no clash present. Without this clash, he then is unable to experience the absurd, and thus no passion, revolt, nor freedom. Then I ask myself, where did all this fervor in his voice in the second part come from? And the answers I am sure to get will probably be as vague as anything else in existentialism.
As a middle class woman, i am not too sure I should be a fan of Nietzche. Though there are many statements and quotes he has said that I agree with.. I often feel like punching him in the face for his lack of any sort of respect for the lower classes. He says those in higher classes would be considered superior because they can forgive their enemies, the lower class. Well, thats not too hard, is it ? After all, they are the ones who produce the money, food , etc that fuel society, whilst the upper classes spend it. They bring those in higher classes no harm, of course it is easy not to hqte them. Whilst, it is a lot more difficult for those in the lower classes to forgive those in the higher. They are constantly mistreated and forced to undergo injustices, hard labour , etc. Nietzche also mentions that lower classes, out of their ‘pathetic’ resentment for the higher classes, create morality, the ethics of good and evil. They also create false realities to be able to bear their own. Though I do agree, that we should affirm our realities, be them difficult or not, some people do desperately need a degree of escape. Alright, to quit sounding like a peasant during the French Revolytion, and so it doesnt seem like i hate Nietzche in every single aspect, ill leave you with some quotes of his that I do agree with.
A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything.
After coming into contact with a religious man I always feel I must wash my hands.
And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
Is man one of God's blunders? Or is God one of man's blunders?
As the Romantic that I deem myself to be, (and by Romantic, I mean Romanticism, Sturm und Drag sort of thing , not what Hugh Grant feigns to be in his horrendous films) I of course like Kierkegaard. He gives importance to living fervently, as do I. Though I do disagree with the fact that he places Abraham in such high esteem. Or at least, defends him, deeming him to be above the ethical. Abraham, for me, is a murderer with selfish and fanatic intentions. Regarding his levels of immediacy, ethical , etc.. I believe that all mankind, definitely including me, will forever be suspended in the awkward limbo between the first two levels.
Well, I must be off now, as there is a crowd of french adolescent strangers (one of them is the daughter of the woman we are staying with) who have to bring me back to the hotel so they can go on listening to their French rap, making out amongst each other, and doing other ehrm Lyonnais adolescent things.
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