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The meaning of life. Apathy. Happiness.

A question to answer for life: What do we do with it?

Darkness or Hope.

I sat down for an interview with a philosophy professor from Cambridge University. He told me about his journey from apathy to happiness through the teachings of Camut and a parable about Sisyphus.

“We CAN imagine Sisyphus happy.”

“However your life is going – you can do this.”

“This is something human beings have – they are able to make themselves happy.”

lyrics

When comes to the meaning of life, the reason that I became a philosopher and became interested in the meaning of life was because I was just full of apathy.

I just couldn't care less whether a company earned more or less money. I couldn't care less if a football team won over another team.

Because I didn't have an answer, that posed the question. I suddenly realized there was this question to answer – I don't have an answer for it.
What am I actually going to do?

Albert Camus, for instance, wrote a book about this. And he starts very depressingly; the initial question of philosophy is: "Should I commit suicide?"

So then Camus starts you off even more depressingly by telling you about someone else's life, which appears so much worse than our own.

Sisyphus, who's angered the gods gets condemned to pushing a rock up a mountain forever and ever and ever. Every time he gets it to the top of the mountain, it rolls back down – he has to push it up again.

He pushes the rock up. After that great strain...it comes flying down again. And then Sisyphus has to walk back down the hill, seeing the rock at the bottom, trudge his way down it – and that's when Camus says, "but in that moment, Sisyphus is much more powerful than we can possibly give anyone credit for."

But crucially, the book ends this way –

Camus says, "We can imagine Sisyphus happy."

And the word I want to focus on is the 'can.'

You CAN imagine Sisyphus happy. It's not a contradiction to say that Sisyphus was happy about his lot.

And the fact that he CAN be happy means that no matter how bad your life is because it can no way be as bad as his – you can manifest happiness in your life.

Now that is a profoundly positive and optimistic message to give to people. That however your life is going – you CAN do this.

This is something human beings have.

They are able to make themselves happy.

credits

from Chris LaRue: Lo​-​Fi Meditations, released February 11, 2020
( ©️ Chris LaRue Horton & Evergreen Prefecture)

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Chris LaRue Tulsa, Oklahoma

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