Einzelgänger

WHY DO PEOPLE WASTE THEIR LIVES?

Lately, I’ve been seeing more and more people online opening up about how they’ve wasted their twenties, thirties, or even forties, making bad choices, missing opportunities, chasing the wrong things, and now living with regret. These stories are often meant as cautionary tales for younger people to avoid the same traps.

In just a few lines, Pink Floyd’s song Time captures something similar. It paints a picture of how we tend to live aimlessly when we’re young, thinking we have all the time in the world, only to suddenly realize the years have passed, and feel a sense of disappointment.

The lyrics of the song, written by Roger Waters, don’t spell out exactly why we waste our lives. But they seem to suggest that it’s a common but tragic part of the human experience; something we tend to fall into.

So the question is: Why do we seem to waste so much of our lives, often realizing it too late, when many opportunities have already passed?

​This week’s video explores why people waste their lives, based on ‘Time’ by Pink Floyd.

1 week ago | [YT] | 2,370

Einzelgänger

WHY BUYING MORE IS NEVER ENOUGH

Shopping isn’t always necessary… or harmless. Often, we buy unnecessary items: impulse purchases, gadgets we saw advertised somewhere, or fancier cars just to keep up with the Joneses.

​The ‘will-to-buy’ comes with sacrifice. Shopping requires money, money requires labor, labor requires time and energy. Some people look to bypass this mechanism by taking loans or buying on installment plans, so they can have what they cannot afford. Yet now they have taken on the burden of debt, which still requires sacrifice to resolve.

​And what to do with all the stuff? Material possessions need maintenance, which often costs money, time, and energy; the same resources we needed to buy what now demands our care.

​Also, we often get attached to our stuff, even the inessential things, loathing the idea of losing what we own. And often, quite subtly, we let our possessions decide our lives. For example, why adopt the healthy habit of walking to work if we have an expensive, fancy car to drive us?

​But at least owning stuff makes us happy… right? Not really. Buying stuff could make you happy, but only for a while. We quickly get used to new possessions, then look for something better. And when we get that, we get used to it too, and start looking for something even better.

​The will-to-buy is an insatiable need that promises much but delivers little, always demanding more, and never really ending.

​This week’s video explores why buying less sets you free.

2 weeks ago | [YT] | 1,643

Einzelgänger

WHAT SPONGEBOB GOT RIGHT ABOUT LIFE

SpongeBob SquarePants isn’t what we would call ‘successful’ in today’s achievement society. He lives alone in a pineapple (okay, he has a pet). He works at a fast-food restaurant. He has no impressive résumé, no status, no ambition to climb. And most people around him see him as a fool, which, by the way, doesn’t seem to bother him in the slightest.

SpongeBob lives in a curious little town named Bikini Bottom. At first sight, it seems like an idyllic tropical paradise, but when we look more closely, it’s actually a pretty imperfect place full of broken people. And it’s not very safe either, considering the natural disasters it faces, like volcanoes and earthquakes, as well as many external threats, like the Alaskan Bullworm or King Neptune, which led to the town’s destruction.

Also, Bikini Bottom’s inhabitants seem to be in constant struggle with themselves and each other. We see this constant danger of a megalomaniac trying to seize power, a greedy businessman trying to enrich himself in any way he can, and a cynical, failed artist who mainly isolates himself from social life, yearning for recognition. Add to this the mass hysteria that often sets in the little town, usually over trivial matters, and we see that Bikini Bottom is a volatile place.

But the constant adversity and the irrational (sometimes downright malicious) people around him never seem to bring SpongeBob down. On the contrary, SpongeBob seems to be the happiest character in the entire show, even when things around him fall apart. He seems an absurd character, sure, a fool who makes us laugh. But could it be that, behind the ridiculousness, lies a secret to living well?

From the viewpoint of Aristotle, SpongeBob might actually be a truly happy person. The upcoming video explores SpongeBob from an Aristotelian perspective to see what he can teach us about happiness.

3 weeks ago (edited) | [YT] | 1,560

Einzelgänger

WHY IGNORANCE SOUNDS SO CONFIDENT

Time and time again, we hear strong opinions expressed with great confidence, without much understanding of the subject. You’ll see it among MAGA supporters, progressives, religious fundamentalists, conspiracy communities, and everywhere in between.

It’s confidence over competence, presentation over substance, and emotional appeal over careful reasoning.

As a result, we’re drawn to overly simplified explanations of reality. We accept claims not because they are necessarily true, but because they align with what we already believe (or want to believe) or because they’re delivered with strong rhetoric. For the same reason, we embrace narratives such as conspiracy theories despite the lack of evidence.

So, how does confident ignorance arise, and why does it spread so effectively in modern-day culture?

One explanation is the Dunning–Kruger effect.

In 1999, psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger found that people with low ability in a given domain often overestimate their competence, largely because they lack the insight required to recognize their own limitations.

By contrast, those with real expertise often doubt themselves because they understand how complex the subject is and how much there’s still to learn.

The upcoming video explores the Dunning-Kruger effect, as well as other reasons why ignorant people often sound so confident and why this phenomenon can be so dangerous.

1 month ago | [YT] | 1,454

Einzelgänger

DON’T CLING TO WHAT’S ALREADY GONE

“You never step in the same river twice.” These words are attributed to Heraclitus, who claimed that everything is in constant flux. The river changes continuously. What appears to be the same watercourse from one day to the next is, in reality, a different river altogether.

And can’t we also say that about the world around us, our lives, and even ourselves? Aren’t we also in a constant process of becoming, never the same from birth to death, only for our remains to turn into something else?

Everything is changing all the time, according to Heraclitus, a pre-Socratic philosopher who, when looking at the cosmos, saw this ongoing interplay of forces, elements, and matter. The changing nature of everything seems obvious to most of us, but, for some reason, we still tend to fall into the illusion that some things are unchanging.

We often take the presence of certain people in our lives for granted, we believe that our success in career and business never ends, and many people in the West don’t give much thought to the fact that peace and stability don’t come naturally.

Recently, I made a podcast episode about Heraclitus’s philosophy, including his idea of “panta rhei,” or “everything flows.” And it surprised me how his seemingly basic ideas on change made me see life differently.

This upcoming video is an effort to expand upon Heraclitus’ main ideas of change and flux and their implications for our lives.

1 month ago | [YT] | 2,314

Einzelgänger

STOP LETTING THE WORLD RUIN YOUR PEACE

In many ways, the world doesn’t look all that great right now. The news has been mostly excessive doom and gloom for the past five years or more. We’ve dealt with a pandemic, a war in Europe, and as I’m writing this, some bizarre events seem to be unfolding on the world stage.

And I must admit, for the last year or so, I have also struggled with all the bad news coming from all directions. Even if I managed not to watch the news, the craziest stories would eventually catch my attention through other channels like WhatsApp groups or people simply telling me what’s going on in one-to-one conversations.

From my observations, many people are worried about where we’re headed; much more so than, say, 10 to 15 years ago. And now, with all the bleakness continually dominating the feeds on our devices, it’s difficult not to be affected by it. The injustice, the animosity, the conflict we witness on our screens; it’s almost as if a time bomb is about to explode with devastating consequences.

These are difficult times, not just because of what’s happening globally, but also because everyone seems to be involved. Clashing ideologies, left versus right, liberal versus conservative, West versus East, and many versions of the truth are spread by countless groups that mainly divide, push many to choose sides, often in battles that neither concern them nor are fought in their interest.

And so, entire nations become polarized, as politics cuts through families and friendships, creating enemies where once existed love and solidarity. And for what? Yes, I’m wondering about that too.

The ancient Stoics were no strangers to social unrest, geopolitical tension, and the slow collapse of political orders. They lived in times of profound uncertainty, which most likely influenced their thinking. And so, they had much to say about these matters.

The upcoming video explores how Stoicism can help us deal with today’s troubling times.

1 month ago (edited) | [YT] | 1,678

Einzelgänger

EVERYTHING IS ALWAYS FLOWING

Heraclitus is often depicted as a solitary figure who despised people’s ignorance and turned his back on public life in Ephesus, the ancient Greek city where he lived. Stories tell that people saw him as mysterious and eccentric.

He was mysterious because what he said and wrote often didn’t make sense to people, which earned him nicknames such as ‘The Riddler’ and ‘The Dark’. He was eccentric because he refused to follow the conventional ways of living. He lived a solitary life, possibly in the mountains, with little social interaction.

Comparable to the philosopher Pythagoras, stories about Heraclitus’ life are plentiful, but hard facts are pretty scarce: for a significant part, he remains a mystery. Yet his work has been highly influential, and later thinkers such as Aristotle, Plato, and even the Stoic philosopher Seneca have speculated about what his strange, ambiguous words actually mean.

From what we can see from the remains of his work, Heraclitus was very much concerned with change. Whereas others saw the cosmos as more static and monolithic, he perceived an ongoing interplay among forces, matter, and elements, making it ever-changing

However, the changing nature of the cosmos wasn’t the only thing Heraclitus was interested in. Like his predecessors, he also had ideas about the fundamental principle of everything: the arche.

His big frustration seems to be that, even though he dedicated his whole life to examining reality and came to profound conclusions about how things actually work, people refused to listen because they were too immersed in their daily affairs.

In this podcast episode, we’ll take a look at the pre-Socratic philosopher Heraclitus, his ideas, his work, and his life.

Substack: journeyofideas.substack.com/p/005-everything-is-fl…
Spotify: open.spotify.com/episode/31ygz7FZY8C8crLY2ASrdW

1 month ago | [YT] | 1,082

Einzelgänger

WHY CARING WHAT OTHER PEOPLE THINK RUINS YOUR LIFE

There isn’t a shortage of human opinion, that’s for sure. People voice their opinions all the time, everywhere they go. It starts with commenting on the new peanut butter brand at breakfast, then it’s about the neighbor’s ugly dress, then it’s about the new employee with the weird moustache, then about the news, then about yesterday’s news, the weather, and so forth.

When we look online, in YouTube or Facebook comment sections, for example, we encounter millions and millions of people sharing their opinions. And they share them as if they’re the most important, profound pieces of intellectual output humanity has ever produced, stating their opinions as absolute facts, while rejecting the opinions of actual experts. And they do it with pride and defend them as they’d defend their own children.

Arthur Schopenhauer didn’t hold back when he criticized people’s opinions, calling them false, erroneous, perverse, and absurd, which, of course, is his opinion. But he explained his opinion by saying that most people’s thoughts are superficial and futile, their ideas narrow, their sentiments mean, which makes their opinions “perverse” and full of error.

Now, isn’t there truth in Schopenhauer’s claims? Isn’t it so that the majority of people who voice their unvarnished opinions hardly know what they’re talking about, and often do so out of anger and a desire to “destroy” their opponents, rather than to have a constructive dialogue?

Schopenhauer also argued that a man speaks with depreciation of his fellow man whenever he’s not obliged to fear him or when he’s not listening. And yes, behavior like this is very common online; we see armies of anonymous trolls who have nothing to fear, as their identities are hidden, saying the most disgusting things. When words have no consequences, people seem to show who they truly are.

The upcoming video explores why caring what other people think can be profoundly detrimental to one’s life.

1 month ago | [YT] | 1,952

Einzelgänger

LIFE ADVICE SOCIETY DOESN’T WANT YOU TO HEAR

Is happiness personal? I’ve often thought about that question while researching different philosophies and belief systems. There are many roads to happiness, and what makes someone happy seems to differ from person to person. What happiness actually means also appears to be a personal matter.

Conventional advice for a happy life tends to revolve around relationships: building a social circle, finding the right partner, having children, and spending time with family. It encourages us to pursue decent careers that offer the financial stability needed to sustain this conventional way of living.

Such advice seems excellent, as it encourages people to fully integrate into the societal machine, which offers plenty of perks. And it’s a formula that has worked for many people, for many generations. “You should do what other people do, unless you have a very good reason not to,” wrote Jordan Peterson, advocating for the ‘established path’ of being useful and responsible.

Yet, in the arena of philosophers, there have been plenty of outliers; people who rejected conventional life advice, who found their happiness in different things, who found ways to be happy and content that aren’t quite socially acceptable.

The upcoming video explores ‘life advice’ that goes against the norm and can even be considered controversial.

3 months ago | [YT] | 2,150

Einzelgänger

WHEN LIFE KEEPS KNOCKING YOU DOWN

Oftentimes, just when you think you’ve got your life in order, something happens that undermines it all. I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s experiencing this. Just when everything feels right, there’s some event throwing a spanner in the works. It’s pretty frustrating.

We’re walking around with these ideal images of how life should be, but we’re never getting there. There’s always something lacking. There’s always something going on, despite our efforts to live well. Life, so it seems, never just works without problems. It’s never as it’s supposed to be.

Prolonged adversity can gradually wear us down. Too many disappointments can make us pessimistic and almost feel destined for misfortune. I’ve felt like that often, myself, as if the devil has been toying with me since I was born. “Why me?” I frequently said out loud and, honestly, I still do sometimes.

But the Buddhists believe that the ongoing stream of unfortunate events isn’t something to be distressed about. Sure, being upset about misfortune is natural, but when we look closely at how things have worked since the dawn of time, we see that our default operating mode for handling misfortune is pretty irrational.

The upcoming video explores why bad things keep happening and why it’s useless to be overly concerned about them, and what we can do to be more resilient in the face of misfortune.

3 months ago | [YT] | 2,176