Influential teachers focus on their pupils/students futures and help them discover and improve their strengths and passions. They support their potential. My most influential teacher was my German language teacher in the German highschool I went to in 2014-2015. He inspired me to continue writing, a passion that I always had but was downplayed by my previous teachers.
Still Waters Run Deep
This was the most intellectual and sophisticated German language teacher that I ever had. One quote he wrote down in the assessment of an essay was, “Still waters run deep”. This motivated me to use writing to share everything that is hidden in the deepest corners of my soul. Things, that I could not share through speaking, due to my introverted nature.
The role of influential teachers should always be to inspire and motivate young people to become the best versions of themselves. Unfortunately, teachers mostly only share knowledge with no personal/close relationship to their students. They do not interact with them on a personal level to get to know them deeper and try to get out the best of them. This is what my influential German teacher did. He understood me and helped me believe in myself and the passion I have for literature and writing. I thank him wholeheartedly for that.
students and inspirational masters
Students are always motivated and inspired by their masters. Teachers are not always masters of their craft but they can take on the role of a master. I have heard many people complain that they had lost interest for their favorite school subject because of the teacher. On the contrary, I heard stories of influential teachers who made subjects even more interesting. As a result, active participation of young students in a subject increased and grades improved.
Influential Teachers Dive Into the Personal Level
Another positive characteristic of an influential teacher is his ability to read their students and to adapt to their subjective strengths and weaknesses. In addition, he should be able to show that he understands his students. When my teacher added, “Still waters run deep” into the assessment of my essay, he showed me that he sees and understands an essential part of myself, my introversion. From that point on, I could trust him and felt more comfortable walking into the classroom during this subject. A teacher holds great responsibility and power in his hands. He can inspire or discourage a student to a great extent.
The moment of truth has arrived. How far have you gotten with your New Year’s resolutions?
New Year’s Resolutions are great if they are implemented correctly. Their implementation and success start to be visible some months into the year, February and March. How does our life look like at this moment? Most people failed on their resolutions by March.
We need to answer this question with transparency and honesty, that is why it is called the “Moment of Truth”. Being too hard or too soft on ourselves will not help answer this question and adjust our new years goals. It can be helpful to bring a third party into this personal business. It has to be somebody who knows our daily habits pretty well. They will be able to soberly judge our every day live, our habits and our discipline. Nevertheless, I believe that it is not really necessary because we mostly know if we are giving it our best and are implementing the plan we had for the new year.
The probability that one of the readers of this blogpost has failed the New Year’s resolutions and goals he assigned on himself is very high. This is not something that should demotivate us. On the contrary, it should motivate us to become part of the small percentage of people who continue working on their plans for 2023. It is till the beginning of the year. Therefore, it is not too late to reevaluate the list of goals and habits we wrote down at the beginning of the year. Just like most things in life it is only a decision. The decision, though, can be difficult due to everyday-life stresses. That is why correct and thoughtful planning is essential.
thoughtful planning
As already mentioned, thoughtful planning is essential in creating a plan of goals for the future. This can be difficult, especially if we are occupied with a full time job or familial obligations. Creating a timetable or schedule that contains all obligatory occupations is necessary. The free hours can be filled with habits and activities that we want to pursue.
Sometimes Less is More
When we talk about new habits and activities, it is important to understand that too many of those can demotivate us. We will probably not consistently implement them into our everyday-life. Therefore, finding two or three new habits will create the best outcome. Thorough and honest reflection will be of high importance. What are the most important things we want to start pursuing in the future? Gym, writing a novel, build new and nourish old relationships, learn a martial art, create a business? What is lacking in our lives right now? What would we want to have less and what more of? Those are some important questions we need to answer in order to create a precise plan with creative habits.
Attempt and Adjust
The probability is high that we will not be entirely able to follow through with our plan. That should not be a reason to quit but a reason to adjust.
Therefore, it is important to not fear change. Even if we have to delete a new habit or activity from our schedule for some weeks. We need to give ourselves the necessary time to get used to the new schedule. It can be overwhelming at the beginning; for that reason adjustment is crucial. Two hours of working out can be too much for at first. Bringing it down to one hour or half an hour will probably help us keep the activity in our schedule until the end of the year.
Due to higher motivational levels at the beginning of a new year, we tend to overwhelm ourselves with a plan and habits that are untenable for the months to come. We need to understand that and not be too hard on ourselves if it does not fully work out as we imagined it. Visualization can be destructive when used unreasonably. Thoughtful planning and controlled visualization of our future self will increase the outlook of success.
conclusion
New Year’s resolutions, and new goals and habits in general, can be hard to implement. That is why so many people fail their resolutions. It is important to understand that it is a long term process. You will become the human being you want to be in a couple of years, not weeks or months. Consistency is key. It does not matter if we do not follow through with the whole plan and schedule at the beginning. To attempt and to adjust is a routine that will follow us until the end of our time here on earth. We should not be afraid or too proud to change our plans. Good luck!
Why is change perceived as negative when it is suggested by someone else?
Remember that to change course or accept correction leaves you just as free as you were. The action is your own; driven by your own impulse and judgement, indeed your own intelligence.
markus aurelius, Meditations
We all probably have heard the phrase, “Never change for anyone” a couple of times in our lives. But why is that so? Why shouldn’t we change for other people? Should we never change for other people or only in certain occasions and for certain people?
an INTRINSICALLY authentic self
“Never change for anyone”, implies that we have an authentic self, that should stay authentic and not be altered by outer forces and influences. How was this authentic self created?
This authentic self is not as “authentic” as we think it is. From the day we are born, we are influenced and shaped in ways we cannot consciously remember. Our close environment, meaning, our parents, our grandparents, and our siblings – the people we spend most of our early time with – subconsciously shaped our personality and interests not only short but also long term. A different environment would have created a different human being. Even the same environment with the same people but in a different time would have created a different human being.
We are not as authentic as we think we are, so changing should not be something we should not do; even if it happens due to the criticism of someone else. Criticism is something I have talked about in an earlier blogpost. There should be certain criteria that we should take into consideration when evaluating the proposition for change.
Criteria for change
First of all we should evaluate the person proposing the change. What is our relationship with them? How long do we know them? Do they have our own good in mind when proposing change, or do they have their own interest in mind because they would benefit from the change?
Oftentimes, it is difficult to evaluate the other person and our relationship with them because we cannot enter their minds. We cannot be entirely sure of what the person is thinking and what its intentions are. That makes it difficult for us to decide whether or not to take the proposition seriously. Especially if we talk about a change in personality or a specific personality trait. When somebody tells us they do not like an aspect of our personality or behavior we tend to react negatively because we perceive it as an attack on our “authentic” self. Our personality is the essence of our being. Therefore, when such a proposition occurs we REALLY should spend time thinking about our relationship and the extent of the interdependence we have with this person.
Relatives
Parents, siblings, and relatives of any kind seem to be people we more often than not can trust to have our own good in mind when proposing a change. Nevertheless, we cannot just blindly follow their advice without evaluating the change and its consequences. Because we do not know the emotional state they were in when they suggested the change. At this time, they may not even believe in it anymore. Therefore their judgement should be assessed. Do they even have success in what they are proposing? Should one take relationship advice from a relative that does not have a long and successful relationship? Should one take health and fitness advice from a relative who does not look healthy him-/herself or take advice on happiness and satisfaction in life from a person who does not look happy and satisfied him-/herself?
The advice may be productive and eventually have positive consequences. Nonetheless, it needs to be thoroughly analyzed before being implemented. Under those circumstances, it should not as much matter where the advice is coming from, but instead the advice for change itself should be evaluated.
Change does not equal losing freedom
Markus Aurelius says it best, “Remember that to change course or accept correction leaves you just as free as you were. The action is your own; driven by your own impulse and judgement, indeed your own intelligence.”
Many times, when the proposition or the thought for change comes from our own selves, we are proud of having figured out something that will improve our lives. When someone else gives us advice we tend to react negatively out of arrogance as well as pride.
A proposition and the action are two different things, though, because somebody making a proposition for change does not immediately mean that we are going or we should act on it. The action itself happens because we have decided to implement the suggested measures. It is purely our decision to act. Therefore, as already mentioned, merely the advice itself should be analyzed no matter where it comes from. We should always act as reasonable human beings and not let our inferior emotions be the masters of our mind.
Do not be afraid of criticism – It is part of every process
“Criticism is something we can avoid easily by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.”
Aristotle
This is a famous quote by Aristotle on criticism. If one does not want to be criticized then one needs to say nothing, do nothing and eventually be nothing. This concludes that if we want to become something, no matter what, we need to be able to receive and deal with criticism. Oftentimes, that is difficult. Criticism carries a negative connotation, because it implies that something has been done badly… even if that is not always the case. Our perception of criticism is important.
negative perception of criticism
Here, a personal story fits perfectly. In my first semester of my studies I wrote a term paper and got a pretty decent grade. My professor added feedback to the grade. I did not read the feedback until I entered the fourth semester. I had an arrogant stance towards the feedback, because I thought that it had been a very good term paper. There could not be anything written in the feedback that could help me become better. This is what I thought at least… and that was far from the truth.
After reading the feedback I realized that it was a stupid decision not to read it immediately when receiving it. Eventually, it contained a lot of useful criticism that I could have used in the following term papers I needed to write. I made some of the same mistakes multiple times, even though I could have prevented them if I had not been so closed minded.
This is the negative perception of criticism. A person thinking that criticism will hold one back instead of improve their skills and enhance their knowledge. The truth is that in most cases it is the other way around.
positive perception of criticism
Positive perception of criticism, contrarily, helps us improve our skills and enhance our knowledge. Feedback usually comes from a person with experience. In my case it was my professor who assessed my term paper, therefore I could have trusted him of being objective in his assessment. He is the professor and I am the student. He is in the position I may want to be in the future, that is to say that I need to use his knowledge in order to improve. My professor is the product of the people that taught him what he knows. I write about the accumulation of knowledge in an earlier blogpost called “Limitless Potential“. In my academic future, I will be the product of all my professors. Therefore, I am in a lucky position to learn from experts, for this reason I should feel grateful getting helpful feedback and criticism from those experts.
Ultimately, the criticism that we will get from experts will be the one that will turn ourselves into experts in the future. We will be the ones giving feedback and we may also one day be in a position to criticize our own critics, even though that should not be the primary goal. The primary goal is to use the criticism to our advantage by evaluating it.
Critical Evaluation
Criticism, even the one coming from experts, should be analyzed and critically evaluated, because experts are not perfect either. In a “teacher/professor – student” relationship the power clearly belongs to the first group. But criticism does not always come from people who are necessarily more knowledgeable than us.
Cumulative Knowledge
By actively criticizing someones criticism we are throwing the ball back at them. They will (hopefully) be in a position of explaining their criticism in more detail and reevaluating it. This process can be continued until an impasse has been reached. A third or fourth critic would enhance the process and enrich the end result. This is why an active analysis, evaluation and criticism of criticism is the ideal approach.
Finally, any work that we have created is now its own entity. We will undoubtedly have a more intimate and affectionate perception of it. Nevertheless, we should see it as an entity separate from us. Criticism of the work, therefore, is no personal criticism. Being open to negative feedback will help us improve the work that we have created. Just like a boy turning into an adult, gentle man, and a girl turning into an adult, cultivated woman, our original work will mature into something more sophisticated.
Conclusion
Acknowledging and having a positive perception of criticism is the right mindset to have, because it will help us increase the knowledge and improve the skills for more productivity.
In addition, analyzing, evaluating, and criticizing criticism itself, will create a process of cumulative knowledge. This is not always possible, but when it is, we should use it.
Imagine being on the beach and building a sand castle. You are spending hours focusing on every little detail of your construction and then finally it is finished. You are in front of your creation; admiring your work, doubting if it was you who built it. During your admiration, a bird flies by and drops a rock on the left side of the castle. You start cursing at the damn bird and running to the site to see the extent of the damage. You get some sand, mix it with water and repair the destruction. Slowly you start realizing that building and maintenance are two different things.
While doing that, a kid walks by and thinks it is funny to poke at the castle with a stick it found somewhere on the beach. You cannot go there immediately because you are still repairing the previous vandalization. You are angrily screaming at the kid – it should take its stick and go find its mum. After you are finished at the first construction site you go to the next one. Luckily you can only find a couple of small holes that are easy to fix.
If you want to keep this sandcastle alive for a long time, that is going to be your job; keeping a close eye on it every day and preserving what is in your power to preserve.
Building and maintaining Relationships
The same principle applies to relationships. Relationships start with a common interest; similar personalities finding each other and having great chemistry at the beginning. It is easy to find somebody with whom we can spend many hours with, without having a problem, because we have not become acquainted with all their characteristics yet. This is the phase of building the sandcastle.
When a type of relationship has been established, problems will start to arise. Misunderstandings, due to the still unknown to us other. Different people have different habits, manners, and patterns. Those habits, manners, and patterns may not align with the aesthetic compass of the person we started a relationship with, may it be friendly or romantically. This will lead to friction of the two aesthetic compasses and eventually to a battle. The battle of the aesthetic compasses will leave behind damages, just like the ones that needed fixing on the sandcastle.
Maintenance of the Relationship
If we judge the relationship worthy of our efforts, we will try to find a way to maintain it. The maintenance, of course, needs both parties to be equally determined, otherwise, it will most probably ultimately fall apart. While the kid was poking the sandcastle with the stick, you could have asked it to fix the damage together instead of doing it alone. It could result in the kid starting to appreciate the sandcastle and take care of it itself. Making all parties part of the problem solving process makes maintenance easier and long-lived.
Many people feel that their relationships are secure and will last for a long time without adequate maintenance. Because of that, they start neglecting them, not giving them enough attention. That is a big mistake and leads to the slow but sure demise of the relationship. Starting, or building, a relationship is relatively easy – maintaining it is hard.
Maintaining in general life
Maintaining a sort of status is necessary in every aspect of life. Career, health, fitness, we already talked about relationships.
All of those fields need our day to day attention, otherwise their development and success will stagnate or they will stop existing if we neglect them entirely.
Setbacks will most probably occur and that is fine. Nothing works perfectly for the entirety of its existence. That is why we should be attentive and ready to take care of those setbacks.
In fitness, an accident can be a dramatic setback. There are many examples of professional athletes who got injured and stayed out of games for the whole season. Some injuries can be fixed more easily and the athlete stays out for just some weeks. Nevertheless, even at the smallest discomfort in a body part they stop what they are doing, in football they ask the coach for a substitution, and they immediately do scans to find out what the cause for the discomfort is.
Those scans are lifesaving. If a footballer ignores his or her physical discomfort, they will not go and let their body be scanned to find out the cause of the injury. In the long run the injury will be worse than it would have been if the problem had been dealt with earlier.
Reaction to Discomforts – Essential Step to Maintenance
That is how we should react to all discomforts in life before it is too late for the problem to be solved and a damaged to be repaired. Maintenance means non-procrastination, non-accumulation of problems. What needs fixing should be fixed immediately. Some problems cannot be fixed immediately. Nevertheless, the recognition and analysis of the problem is something that can be done right at the first sign of discomfort.
If you build the sandcastle and let people walk by and vandalize and damage it, like the little boy with the stick, and you think, “Well I will just fix it later”… you will arrive at a point, later, when you will not be able to maintain the sandcastle. It will be destroyed entirely and you will need to build it up from the start. On the other hand, if through daily maintenance you fix what needs to be fixed immediately, you will have that beautiful sandcastle every day to admire and be proud of. If that is not the goal then why build it at all?
Before I started creating this Blog some – not so motivational – questions crossed my mind. “Why should people read my blog? There are so many writers out there, why should people be interested in what I have to say?” Those are legitimate questions and the process of thinking about and answering them is a helpful process.
Right before any big project doubts cross our minds. We start comparing ourselves to other people doing our craft, writers in my case. This process oftentimes demoralizes us. There have been great people doing what we are trying to do, very successfully. Should kids stop dreaming of being great, or the best footballers one day just because of the existence of Messi and Ronaldo? Messi and Ronaldo reached their status even though before them great players created magic with the ball. They were probably inspired by them, otherwise they would have never reached the level they have reached and they have not even gotten to the end of their careers yet. Both have the opportunity of becoming even greater by winning the coming World Cup. But enough of football and back to the actual topic of the blogpost.
doubt as a mechanism of stagnation
Doubt is not creative but destructive. It does not achieve anything more than failure or making the activity unpleasant.
Every time we doubt ourselves to any degree we are slowing down the process of improvement. Doubt is a waste of time that we could be using concentrating on improving and learning. Doubt, at the end of the day, is born by the feeling of not being good enough, not having the necessary skills to successfully execute the project.
Doubt is not creative but destructive. It does not achieve anything more than failure or making the activity unpleasant. That is why thorough examination and research is important before making the decision to spend time on a serious project. Starting with doubt means not being convinced of the project’s potential. Then why start at all?
Accumulated knowledge and wisdom
Accumulated knowledge and wisdom bring progress. Our society is a product of all previous societies. Our generation is a product of all previous generations. We create the future by using the tools and findings of previous generations and some of the prior knowledge and wisdom from the past do not apply to the time we are living in.
Great writers of our generation are the product of previous writers. They have read the literature and theory that helped them become great writers. Nobody is self-made. The possibility for greatness and success is out there. If we find it or not depends on our willingness to learn, adapt and create.
If the existence of great writers in the past makes our desire to be great writers useless then we would have never had great writers after the first great writers some thousands of years ago.
The opposite is true. Great writers of the past created great writers in the present, and great writers of the present will create great writers in the future. This applies to all occupations. There would have been no Plato without Socrates – there would have been no Aristoteles without Plato and Socrates, and there would have been no Alexander the Great without Aristoteles, Plato and Socrates… at least not as great as he truly was.
present over past
Our current generation has the advantage over previous generations. We have more sources and resources to use for our occupations and sciences. Economists in the seventeenth century did not have a John Stuart Mill, a Karl Marx, a Vilfredo Pareto or a John Maynard Keynes. Philosophers of the fifteenth century did not have a Voltaire, a Descartes, a Rousseau or a Nietzsche. We have all of them, but we do not have the big thinkers of the future. That is why coming generations will have an advantage over us, just as we have an advantage over previous generations.
Different times, different problems, different solutions
Furthermore, our generation has to go through different struggles and problems then all the previous generations. The modern time is a time of dynamic changes and people are oftentimes overwhelmed by those changes. As a writer I have to deal with different issues and aspects of the human nature and mind.
Especially the youth carries a heavy burden. Great writers, mainly in fiction writing, have the obligation to deal with contemporary issues, problems, and questions. Past thinkers, idealists and writers will give present thinkers, idealists and writers the theoretical and conceptual basis to help the current generation go through their struggles. In addition, they will add to the theories and concepts of the past to help future generations go through their struggles. We cannot solve their problems, because solving a problem is only possible while being present when this given problem exists. The least we can do, though, is thinking about future generations and not giving them problems that we could have prevented.
conclusion
There is always potential for success and greatness. Past success and greatness does not mean that there is no room for present success and greatness. That applies to all fields, sciences and occupations. Different times bring with them different and new types of problems. Those problems can only be solved by contemporary thinkers and experts.
The potential for success and greatness is even higher in modern times due to so many centuries of previous thinkers that we can study and analyze. Technology makes it easy for us to acquire all knowledge that we need for our projects. We should use this opportunity and create something beautiful.
What was really needed was a fundamental change in our attitude toward life. We had to learn ourselves and, furthermore, we had to teach the disbarring men, that it did not really matter what we expected form life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life – daily and hourly. Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual.
viktor e. frankl, Man’s search for meaning
This is a long quote, but it is important for me to present to the reader this brilliant passage, written by Viktor E. Frankl in his book “Man’s Search for Meaning”. I recommend every man – and of course woman, but particularly man – to read this book.
As a Holocaust survivor, Viktor Frankl witnessed the brutalities of the Nazi regime in the Second World War and spent time in the concentration camp in Auschwitz. His psychological insides are based on his observations of the inmates, their life, their experiences, their attitudes towards their fate as victims of the most brutal war humanity has ever witnessed. How can you continue living your life like this, when a group of people sees you as inferior to them and uses you only for work, just like humanity has used animals throughout all of history? What gives your life the necessary amount of meaning to not just commit suicide?
what is meaning and its purpose?
Meaning could be defined as the things, people or ideas that we live for. “Meaning” are the reasons we live and create for. The reasons that motivate us to leave our bed every morning, even if we do not really feel like it. Meaning can be an idea, like God or a materialistic thing like a car, or a book collection or it can be a person like someone’s family, wife, husband, son or daughter or a romantic relationship. Our “meaning” changes throughout our lifetime. What we consider important today will probably be replaced in some years by something else. Meaning, like all other things in life, is temporary. Even something like our belief in God can change. I live through times when I stopped believing and times I started believing again. In the moments of faith I just could not imagine a future without faith… but it came. In moments of doubt, I could not imagine a return to faith and yet here I am. Meaning changes, and that is something that we should be conscious about in order to not just go through life searching for some everlasting meaning that will keep us content until we die.
the development of meaning
Meaning Outside of the Individual
It seems like a change occurred in the minds of people throughout history. In earlier centuries, humans seemed to find meaning outside of the individual, outside of themselves. Firstly, people needed to work every day because their life depended on it. Nowadays, especially in more industrialized countries, we do not witness the fight for everyday survival like people did a hundred, two and more hundred years ago, since the development of the first human communities. Survival makes one put meaning into the community, something outside of the individual, because without the community one could not survive. The importance of family also falls into this category, because the roots of the institution begin with the establishment of the first communities. One can find meaning in the maintenance of a family and the survival of the partner and the children; things outside of the individual.
Meaning, in older times, could also be found in belief and religion. The meaning of life itself is the entrance into paradise and, hopefully, not hell. God himself is an idea, an entity who one can rely on in the most difficult of times. An idea outside of the individual, outside of oneself.
Some more ideas that were important to people, in the past more than in the present, are national identity, tradition and culture, ethnicity and race. Those ideas seem to go through a restoration in some European countries due to the cultural war that is taking place for the last decade, especially in the west. This cultural war does not seem to be ending any time soon. The return to nationalist ideologies will probably become stronger in the decade to come. Those nationalist ideas again, are something outside of the individual, outside of one’s self. Even though one is defining himself by his supposed heritage and genetic make up that is in himself, those ideas are represented in the outer world. In the music, the art, the architecture, the language, the literature, the physiognomy of the people that belong to the same ethnicity. Even religion and God can be put into this category. Furthermore, family can be put into this category because of the preservation of the nation but also the preservation of one’s name. The parents, more precisely the father, want to give their last name to a son who will then continue the name’s history. Those were motivations outside of the individual.
The ways in which human beings of older generations found meaning in things outside of the individual, outside of themselves is very visible here. How does that look like now – in our modern, capitalist, commercialized societies?
Meaning Inside of the Individual
In our modern, materialist, capitalist, commercialized societies institutions like community, family, social hierarchy, faith and religion, God himself, marriage and birth have all lost their earlier high value.
The devaluation of those institutions has its routs in the fight for freedom of marginalized social groups that were discriminated and disadvantaged by those same institutions. Patriarchy and social hierarchy lost its value when women, and some men, started fighting for women’s rights. With the rise of big corporations after the capitalist revolution women were needed as workers for the system and they were of big advantage for states because more workers means more taxes. Self-actualization, in form of a successful career, is now more important for many women than finding their meaning outside of their selves by creating and serving a family and their husband. Meaning inside of the individual with the help of personal achievements and materialistic purchases. Achievements not to please someone else, but primarily one’s self.
The devaluation of God and Religion, as an institution that has power over our actions also came in the name of personal, individual freedom. “I will not let some God, whose existence is not even proven, dictate how I should live my life.” Many people in our time lose their faith in God. The pseudo-intellectual narcissism and arrogance of our time make it easy for an individual to give up their self-control and humbleness. Becoming a victim to the pleasures of the flesh is seen as a revolution against the tyranny of God. I have been a victim of that myself, until I realized that I was acting just like the biggest revolutionary in the history of the universe, Satan himself. For an atheist all those things will sound absurd. Just skip this part and take with you the main argument of the paragraph, namely, that meaning has left the world outside of one’s self and entered the sphere of the individual in our modern times.
The church has mistreated many marginalized groups, especially women and homosexual people. The church has lost much of its power when the governance of a nation went from the church to the state. The separation of church and state in most countries of the west in the name of individual freedom has opened opportunities of self-actualization to marginalized groups. Those groups will live out their individual freedoms as excessively as they can. This is the an understandable reaction to the hundreds of years of persecution and discrimination.
The fall of those institutions in the name of individual freedom and self-actualization has made the search for meaning more difficult for human beings. We are limited in our capabilities which means that we will fail often. If we base the meaning of our lives on personal success and self-actualization we will spend a lot of time trying to acquire something that will give us this meaning. More often than not, we will fail. That is why balance is important.
the golden mean
The golden mean, or the golden middle way, is the balance between meaning outside and meaning inside of the individual. Our personal freedoms and self-actualization are important drivers for a happy life. Nevertheless, at the end of the day if we only think about our individual happiness and success and strive everyday to achieve this happiness and success we will run into a thick wall of Nihilism because at the end of the day those are the things that have the least meaning. Happiness is temporary. Not being happy is the goal, but being content; having no regrets when we go to bed in the evening. Finding a meaning of life that exists outside of ourselves, will make us feel content with life. Community, family, friendship, religion, God, culture, tradition. Those institutions will stay with us forever. The things and people that they consist of will probably change throughout the course of our lives but we can refill them. There is never a lack of people worthy of being part of our community, family and circle of friends.
Conclusion
Many times conclusions are not concluding anything, especially when writing about an ambiguous topic like the meaning of life. I will have to conclude with one sentence of Viktor E. Frankl’s quote.
We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life {…} Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual.
Maybe there is no meaning in life. Maybe the creation of the universe, and therefore the creation of human beings, was a big coincidence. We are thrown into this world and we will leave this world after some (hopefully many) decades. Or maybe life has a meaning. Somebody created the universe and human beings with a specific purpose in mind. This purpose we will probably never get to discover during our lifetime on this planet. We can philosophize about the meaning of life until we grow long white beards (males) and long white hair (females). We will not come to a conclusion. The meaning of life is what everybody defines individually. At the end of the day, coming back to Viktor E. Frankl, we have to ask ourselves what we can and cannot control in life. Then take what we can control and start creating the best out of it.
If we still try to define a meaning for our lives, let it be something higher than the mere individual. We, ourselves, are not the pinnacle of creation. Only in combination with something outside of the individual can meaning have value. What are we doing this for?
Four Things I lived and learned on my Vacation in Greece
Statue of Alexander The Great in Thessaloniki, Greece
In September I had a beautiful, one-month long vacation in Greece, my home country. After an accident I had at the end of June, I used this time in Greece as therapy for my body and mind. I wanted to come back stronger and more focused on my goals in life. I did not write anything for the blog during that one month, but I still wrote down many things that I witnessed and experienced. Things that helped me understand life better and how to create a successful and happy life. Sometimes those things one already knows, but one has to witness them firsthand to copy and implement them into their own life. I will mention the four things I learned and lived in Greece. Some will be short as a reminder to myself to never forget, others I will spend more focus on.
God exists
The beauty of the nature, the special atmosphere in Greece and some special signs proved to me ultimately that God exists. The Christian faith is the one true faith and we can come to the truth through the Orthodox religion. I will not further elaborate on this because everyone has their own view on that topic. The opinions differ and it is of no value to argue the existence of God and through which religion one can recognize him. Whoever wants to believe, will believe.
Drastically change daily habits and routines
I learned this from my uncle in Greece who does everything at the same time every day. Breakfast, lunch and dinner, watching TV, showering, brushing teeth, shaving, all of that at the same time every day. My uncle served in the Greek military. We all know that the one thing that they learn in the military is to have discipline in your daily routines and get things done whenever there is the smallest amount of time to get them done.
Daily Routines
Daily routines are very important in everyday life. Creating daily routines and to-do lists will help manage our time better, and eventually help us save more time for the things we essentially enjoy doing the most. That is why we have to start with the tasks that have an anticipated amount of time to be finished. There are tasks that we know beforehand will take us approximately one hour, or two hours, or three hours. Reading a text and underlining the most important passages, vacuum cleaning, making a doctors appointment. Now there are tasks that we do not know how much they will take and they have to be pushed back to the end of our to-do list. Writing a blog post, fore example. We cannot really say how long it will take to finish a blog post. It may even take several hours a day for five days for the writer to be happy with the end result. That is why tasks that do not have an anticipated amount of time to be finished should not be the first tasks of the day because we will not be able to finish the other tasks on the list and that is when procrastinating comes into play. “I have been sitting here writing this blogpost for six hours, now I am too tired for more work, I will just do the rest tomorrow.”
Create smart daily routines. Order the tasks from least amount of time to finish to most amount of time to finish. The end of the list will contain the tasks with the unknown amount of time needed to be finished.
Morning Routine
Say to yourself first thing in the morning: today I shall meet people who are meddling, ungrateful, aggressive, treacherous, malicious, unsocial. {…} and I have reflected that the nature of the offender himself is akin to my own. Therefore I cannot be harmed by any of them {…}
Markus aurelius, meditations
The morning routine is essential for a peaceful and calibrated start into the day. The morning routine gives all the power to us. We can clean our mind and make it ready for the difficulties and stresses that will most probably appear in our day. How can we prepare ourselves for those difficulties? Meditating on our day and what it will probably have to offer us is one way of doing that. Imagine your day, like a movie playing in your mind. We mostly know how our day will go. In this play we should add irritations and how we are reacting to them in a calm way. Someone takes our right of way on our ride to work. We should accept it and calmly continue our ride and be happy that there was no accident. At work, the manager or a customer is impolite to us. So what? Stay calm and be polite. When we are impolite to somebody we often feel guilty when we think about it afterwards, so they will feel guilty about having been impolite to us. Continue meditating on your day up to the moment you come home, finish everything that needs to be done at home and start your evening routine.
Apart from meditating we can move and stretch our bodies a little bit. Maybe combine that with some music. A body that was lying in bed for (hopefully) 7-8 hours, needs some movement to get the blood flowing. The music will energize us mentally and psychologically.
Drinking coffee, juices or water and eating breakfast are also essential to a good morning routine.
Daily habits
Our daily habits make up the aesthetic of our everyday life. Daily habits are the foundation of a structured and aesthetically pleasing life and everything starts by making your bed in the morning, as Jordan B. Peterson and other intellectuals urge us to do. It is as simple as having already finished a task in the first minute of the day, even if we are not feeling like doing it.
The importance of daily habits got visible to me when I lived with my uncle for a week during my vacation in Greece. What really got to me was that every time he used some kind of crockery, plates or glasses he immediately washed them. Drinking one glass of water? Wash the glass directly afterwards. It will only stay there, used, with no particular use, just catching dust; until someone uses it to drink water again. During my student life I procrastinated this task every day. I ate breakfast and left my crockery in the sink to wash it in a couple of hours because university work is more important. That was my way of thinking. But it is not. Tasks of everyday life are the most important tasks that need to be finished right then and there. Making it a daily habit to tidy up and keep everything clean immediately will make our lives more structured and our homes more aesthetically pleasing. A place that we enjoy living in.
Quality time
Another thing that I learned is the importance of daily quality time. Quality time can be spent with others or our selves alone. A combination of both is important during the week. Quality time with friends and family is mostly done on the weekends and with ourselves alone during workdays. Nevertheless, one or the other needs to be done every day.
Quality time with friends and family is important for mental health. People get sick if they spend too much time on their own, without socializing on a regular basis. I have been guilty of that. Concentrating too much on my career, my writing, my workouts, my education and too little time on friends and family. Even though those other things were going well, I still felt like something was missing. Socialization. We do not consciously recognize it, but it leaves its marks in our psychological well being and our personality. Rarely say no to quality time.
Quality time with one’s self. I underestimated the quality, the worth of quality time with one’s own self. Being able to sit down, watch a movie/show or sports event, drink a beer or a glass of wine, read poetry and listen to classical music, or just read a book with only the presence of our own selves is the demonstration of a healthy and mature inner world. It is as important as quality time with friends and family. Enjoying quality time with one’s own self, indicates that we are spending the appropriate amount of quality time with others.
we do not need much for a happy life
The last thing that I not necessarily learned, but lived and recognized in Greece was that we do not need much for a happy life. Except for nutrition, shelter and clothes it is little that makes life worth living. A job, an occupation that we love doing, even if it pays us less money than a job that we would not enjoy doing. A small, but sufficient amount of good friends that we can spend quality time with regularly. Family, that gives us a feeling of belonging, no matter what happens. And at last, a good relationship with our self. Someone once told me, “if you want others to accept, love and want to spend time with you… you need to first accept, love and want to spend time with yourself.”
Our parents are the first people we interact with in life. They influenced our conscious and unconscious mind, knowingly or unknowingly.
The apple does not fall far from the tree.
As we grow older we tend to think that we are living our independent lives without any outer influence on our personality, character, habits and way of thinking. This is far from the truth. Of course we are making our own decisions and our lives look different than those of our parents, but our decisions and the course of our life has been strongly shaped by imitating the actions and habits of our parents. The possibility that overweight parents will have overweight children is high. The possibility that parents who smoke or drink will have children who smoke or drink is high. This is why it is important to learn from the mistakes of our parents and try to be different in the bad and similar in the good.
I was walking some days ago and thought about my personal fitness. I haven’t really been active in the last couple of years. Luckily, I have been working out with my father from a very young age and my overall fitness looks good, even when I am not doing much physical training. I am 27 years old and when my father was 27 years old he had been in much better shape than I am currently in. My father worked out everyday. He was known for his strength and physical endurance. Later in life, after he married my mother and created four children, he let himself go. He got overweight and did not workout for many years. He was not the man he used to be. He started having physical issues because of his lack of movement. I am standing here now, at 27 years old, lazier and weaker than my father at 27. If gaining weight and becoming lazy could happen to my father, then worse things can happen to me if I do not take care of my physical health and strength. That is why I have to learn from my father’s mistake. Try to find at least half an hour everyday for the minimum amount of moving my body, even if it means taking a walk.
This, of course, is only one of many examples in which parents can be fallible. Looking at the mistakes of our parents is beneficial because we witness the consequences of their actions first-hand. Later in life we will meet other people and observe their mistakes and the consequences that will arise, but it may be too late for us to gain wisdom because we may have already been through the same problems. The problems our parents face are mostly problems that arise when people have become comfortable with their lives and they let themselves go. The notion that they have achieved whatever there was to achieve, especially after creating a family… a notion which they regret eventually.
What needs to be considered is that oftentimes, finding out the mistake can be very difficult. We see the negative consequences but where did they come from? Analyzing the negative consequences and following them back to their causes is laborious, but once achieved, it will open up a path for destroying generational trauma. Mistakes that are repeated from generation to generation. Those mistakes are obstacles to the success of many people who fall victims to the bad habits and mistakes of their parents.
Parents are our first role models. We need to learn from their mistakes in order to become better versions from generation to generation. When we have our own family, we should talk to our children about our own bad habits and mistakes. Teach them to be better and not repeat them. They will be thankful.
Hard times create strong men, Strong men create good times, Good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times.
G. Michael hopf, those who remain
We all probably have heard of this quote at least once during our life on this earth. I never had the urge to analyze it because I mostly agreed with it. During a YouTube podcast someone mentioned it again and all the guests nodded their heads in agreement. In my head I thought of the scenario of being a guest on a podcast and the host asking me, “What is your opinion on this quote? Do you agree?”
What would I have answered? I never really thought about this quote deep enough to have an intellectual opinion about it. My answer would probably look like this, “Yes I agree a hundred percent. You know, we live in easy times and all humans are weak. The older generations are strong because they had to work hard.” This answer is not a sophisticated one. I would be disappointed of myself talking like this. While this scenario kept playing in my head I thought about the quote and the problems it carries with it. I want to further elaborate the problems I found.
Problems of the original quote
It may be that the author further explained the quote in the book. I want to analyze the quote on its own because this is how people find it on all kinds of media. The context is hardly mentioned.
Symptoms and Causes
One of the problems I have with the quote is that “weak” and “strong” are symptoms and not causes. The causes are not mentioned. What makes people strong in hard times and what makes them weak in good times? When we are talking about hard times, we are talking about times of discomfort, of involuntary activeness. This discomfort, this activeness, makes people strong and resilient, not only physically because of physical labor but also mentally because it is hard to know that you have to go to work everyday because you will not get paid. In hard times it is more difficult to just take one day off and the shifts are longer than in good times. With activeness comes knowledge, wisdom and the urge to create a better future for ones children. In hard times people cannot afford to just relax for hours, watch movies or shows, scroll on social media etc. The “strong” in the quote, therefore, could be replaced by “busy” or “active”.
“Weak” is also problematic because it does not mention the causes of being weak. I will not go deeper into the aspects within people can be weak – mentally, physically, educationally, morally, intellectually, etc. What makes people weak? The opposite of what makes people strong, laziness and inactivity. “I do not have to do it, so I will not.”This inactivity is mostly voluntary, which I will further amplify later on. Good times make people not feel the urgency of having to act every day and learn skills. I do not have to work physically or hunt so I do not need to work out and be in shape. The mental toughness is also in decline for the same reasons. Comfortability is the catalyst of inactivity. Inactivity is the catalyst of weakness, whether physical, mental or technical. Therefore, I would replace the term “weak” in the quote with the term “inactive” or “lazy” and the term “good” with “comfortable”.
Finding the causes for those symptoms is essential in the later stage of finding solutions to destroy the causes of weakness and establish the individual and social basis for strength.
Determinative Character of the Quote
Apart from the “cause and effect” problem, another problem is the determinative character of the quote. “Good times create weak men”, therefore, “I live in good times, I am a weak man”. Who decides what a good time and what a hard time is? If the economy of a nation goes well, the majority of its citizens live financially stable and peacefully, and they can fulfill their needs and entertain themselves in multiple ways, we could say that those are good times. Those good times would create weak men. The individual hardship of life is kept out of the equation. Someone could live in a comfortable time but be on the “poor” side of the economical spectrum. His or her life would be filled with different hardships than the comfortable life of people who are positioned on more privileged side of the spectrum. Somebody who is rich could be having health issues and go through a tough life full of pain and medication. The personal hardships of every individual define the content of their character and their toughness. In general, it could be true that good, comfortable times create inactive men or women. Taking personal hardships into consideration destroys the determinative character of the quote, which brings me to the solution and conclusion of my analysis.
Solution
The solution to the first problem of “cause and effect” was the replacement of the terms in the quote. “Strong” was replaced by “active” and “weak” replaced by “inactive”. Furthermore, I want to replace the term “good” with the word “comfortable”. Comfortability is the cause for inactivity and inactivity the cause for weakness. I will now present the lengthened quote with the replaced terms.
Hard times create active/busy men, activity and hardship create strong men, strong men create comfortable times, comfortable times create inactive/lazy men, inactivity and laziness create weak men, weak men create hard times.
The solution to the second problem of the “determinative character” of the quote is in close relation to hardship. In hard times people had to go through involuntary hardship that made them strong and resilient. In comfortable times it is up to us personally to create our own hardships – “voluntary hardships”. The creation of a personal daily routine and the obedience of productive daily habits will add to the naturally occurring hardships of life that are present even in generally comfortable times.
Conclusion
As already mentioned, I interpreted the quote outside of its context in the book. This is how we find it in all kinds of social media. It has been weaponized by different ideological parties as a critique of society and governments. That makes it even more important to interpret, analyze and explain it. Terms like “weak” and “strong” need to be further explained. Finding the causes of those symptoms is essential in the later stage of finding solutions to destroy the causes of weakness and establish the individual and social basis for strength. One can be a strong man or a strong woman even in supposedly good, comfortable times, and vice versa a weak man or a weak woman in hard, uncomfortable times. It is up to the individual, even if it oftentimes does not seem like that.
