The Tragedy of Life

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duszek
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The Tragedy of Life

Post by duszek »

After listening two times to the excellent podcast about the tragedy of life I would like to develop on the following:

It was mentioned that if all our desires were satisfied our life would become boring.
It was then immediately suggested that you can desire excitement.

These two seem to contradict each other: boredom and excitement.

Some people look for constant excitement on the internet and they can find it: games, thrillers, mysteries, conspirational thearies ...
They don´t get bored, but they probably grow weary after a while.
In the novel "Infinite Jest" people indulging in something wonderful on a video tape forgot to eat and drink and died. The video showed not exactly something exciting in the usual sense of the word, but people stayed glued to the video just the same.

Have you made any intersting discoveries in the area of personal excitement management ?
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Sculptor
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by Sculptor »

duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm After listening two times to the excellent podcast about the tragedy of life I would like to develop on the following:

It was mentioned that if all our desires were satisfied our life would become boring.
It was then immediately suggested that you can desire excitement.

These two seem to contradict each other: boredom and excitement.

Some people look for constant excitement on the internet and they can find it: games, thrillers, mysteries, conspirational thearies ...
They don´t get bored, but they probably grow weary after a while.
In the novel "Infinite Jest" people indulging in something wonderful on a video tape forgot to eat and drink and died. The video showed not exactly something exciting in the usual sense of the word, but people stayed glued to the video just the same.

Have you made any intersting discoveries in the area of personal excitement management ?
The satisfaction = boredom is not necessarily true.
Some people are content to have simple desires met and never get bored because they have good imaginations and are self sufficient self amusement.
Under your fingers is the wealth of human knowledge, never before so easily accessible in the history of mankind
Even if you have lost your legs how can you be bored?
duszek
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by duszek »

Yes, I agree, Sculptor.

Internet is a fountain of excitement which we will not be able to explore in our short lives.
But how much of it is right and is it possible to overdo it or to get fed up with it ?
Your eyes can grow tired of staring at the screen, your back will pain after a while.

And apart from this: will you not crave a completely new kind of experience after a while ?
dattaswami
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by dattaswami »

duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm After listening two times to the excellent podcast about the tragedy of life I would like to develop on the following:

It was mentioned that if all our desires were satisfied our life would become boring.
It was then immediately suggested that you can desire excitement.

These two seem to contradict each other: boredom and excitement.

Some people look for constant excitement on the internet and they can find it: games, thrillers, mysteries, conspirational thearies ...
They don´t get bored, but they probably grow weary after a while.
In the novel "Infinite Jest" people indulging in something wonderful on a video tape forgot to eat and drink and died. The video showed not exactly something exciting in the usual sense of the word, but people stayed glued to the video just the same.

Have you made any intersting discoveries in the area of personal excitement management ?


The human being is reluctant to miseries and enjoys the happy situation. The human being can be compared to an ignorant child, who enjoys the sweets only and is reluctant to chillies. Hence, such a human being is ignorant. The grown up adult enjoys both sweets and chillies in the meals. Similarly, a realized soul enjoys both happy situation and miseries in the life. Therefore, it is only ignorance, which is the inability of art of enjoyment. God created this world with happiness and misery. People enjoy the cinema, which contains both pleasant scenes and tragic scenes.

Similarly, people enjoy both sweet dishes and hot dishes in the meals. People enjoy the day and night. People enjoy the hot summer and the cold winter. The whole life and creation is full of alternating happiness and misery. If a person can enjoy both happy times and miseries in the life, he is equal to God. You may say that God enjoys the creation from outside. God also enters the creation in the form of human incarnation and enjoys both pleasant times and miseries in the life span. We see this truth in the life history of Rama and Krishna. Therefore, if you always crave for happiness only and reject miseries, it is unnatural and also ignorance of a child. The knowledge of the Gita preaches that you should enjoy even a top most misery, which is the time of death.


If you enjoy both miseries and happy situations, you are in a continuous state of enjoyment. You think that continuous enjoyment comes only through continuous times of happiness in the life. It is not correct. You get bored if you are served only with sweet dishes in the meals. Boring is misery. Therefore, misery is inevitable like summer after winter and winter after summer. The Indians denote happiness through cooling. The foreigners represent happiness through warming, which is heat. Therefore, the happiness to one is misery to the other. What is the reason? The foreigner is mainly exposed to winter, which bores him. Therefore, for a foreigner, the heat is happiness.

The Indian is mainly exposed to summer and therefore, cool atmosphere is happiness to him. This is a practical proof that the enjoyment is not confined to happy scene or tragic scene only. This also proves that you can enjoy both happiness and misery. Therefore, it is ignorance to ask God for removal of misery and sanction of continuous happiness. Happiness should lie in the process of enjoyment. Whether it is misery or happiness, you will find real happiness in the process of enjoyment of both.

The happiness neither lies in the sweet dish nor in the hot dish. The happiness lies in the process of eating the dish, which may be hot or sweet. If this secret of life is known, you will never pray God for removal of problems and tensions. You will enjoy the problems and tensions and hence, there is nothing to pray God for something. Your prayer to God must be due to your attraction to Him for His excellent personality.

Your praise of God must be based on your love for His divine personality. But, today we find most of the people praying God for sanction of continuous sweet dishes. Therefore, the desire for something gets smashed if you know the secret of this concept. Hence, there is no meaning in wishing somebody for a happy new year because continuous happiness bores and leads to misery only. The aspiration for continuous happiness through out the year is based on foolishness and ignorance.

On the New Year, you must pray God thinking His divine personality and get attracted for His divine quality. You must at least achieve one of His basic qualities, which is enjoying both happy scenes and tragic scenes in the creation. On the Telugu New Year day, people generally take sweets and sour items mixed as offering of God (Prasadam), which shows the same concept of enjoyment of both happy and tragic movements in the life.

This is the divine knowledge in nutshell present in all the divine scriptures of all religions. This is essence of the Gita preached by Lord. He enjoyed continuously in His life and even in the last situation, when He was shot dead by a hunter. This is essence to be learnt and practiced by every human being in this world.



By Shri Datta Swami


www.universal-spirituality[.]org

Universal Spirituality for World Peace
Age
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by Age »

duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm After listening two times to the excellent podcast about the tragedy of life I would like to develop on the following:

It was mentioned that if all our desires were satisfied our life would become boring.
But what happens if one's desire was to never become bored? If that one's desire were satisfied, then that one's life would NEVER become boring, correct?
duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm It was then immediately suggested that you can desire excitement.

These two seem to contradict each other: boredom and excitement.

Some people look for constant excitement on the internet and they can find it: games, thrillers, mysteries, conspirational thearies ...
They don´t get bored, but they probably grow weary after a while.
In the novel "Infinite Jest" people indulging in something wonderful on a video tape forgot to eat and drink and died. The video showed not exactly something exciting in the usual sense of the word, but people stayed glued to the video just the same.

Have you made any intersting discoveries in the area of personal excitement management ?
Walker
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by Walker »

duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm Have you made any intersting discoveries in the area of personal excitement management ?
"They sicken of the calm who know the storm."
- Dorothy Parker, a line from one of her poems.
duszek
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by duszek »

Age wrote: Fri Dec 02, 2022 6:06 am
duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm After listening two times to the excellent podcast about the tragedy of life I would like to develop on the following:

It was mentioned that if all our desires were satisfied our life would become boring.
But what happens if one's desire was to never become bored? If that one's desire were satisfied, then that one's life would NEVER become boring, correct?
This could be a contradiction in terms. Like wishing a square circle.

The opposite of boredom is excitement, right ?
We can get it from surfing on the internet or playing a game. But if you do it every day excessively you need to do more and more to achieve the same level of excitement and after a while the excitement wears thin and you look for something else.

Heidegger developed a theory of three levels of boredom (or was it despair?). I don´t remember the details though.
duszek
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by duszek »

Walker wrote: Fri Dec 02, 2022 6:11 am
duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm Have you made any intersting discoveries in the area of personal excitement management ?
"They sicken of the calm who know the storm."
- Dorothy Parker, a line from one of her poems.
Some could say just as well: They sicken of the storm who know the calm. :lol:
duszek
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by duszek »

Dear Mr or Ms Dattaswami.

Perhaps you are a good person who wishes to make the world a better place.
But you would get more attention if you formulated your messages in short succinct sentences, if I may suggest with all due respect.

Peace.
Walker
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by Walker »

duszek wrote: Mon Dec 05, 2022 7:40 pm
Walker wrote: Fri Dec 02, 2022 6:11 am
duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm Have you made any intersting discoveries in the area of personal excitement management ?
"They sicken of the calm who know the storm."
- Dorothy Parker, a line from one of her poems.
Some could say just as well: They sicken of the storm who know the calm. :lol:
:thumbsup: You're right. Imbalances are obvious, bringing the keel to heel is the tale.
Age
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by Age »

duszek wrote: Mon Dec 05, 2022 7:38 pm
Age wrote: Fri Dec 02, 2022 6:06 am
duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm After listening two times to the excellent podcast about the tragedy of life I would like to develop on the following:

It was mentioned that if all our desires were satisfied our life would become boring.
But what happens if one's desire was to never become bored? If that one's desire were satisfied, then that one's life would NEVER become boring, correct?
This could be a contradiction in terms.
But it is NOT.
duszek wrote: Mon Dec 05, 2022 7:38 pm Like wishing a square circle.
It is NOTHING like this.
duszek wrote: Mon Dec 05, 2022 7:38 pm The opposite of boredom is excitement, right ?
Or 'interested' and 'entertained'.
duszek wrote: Mon Dec 05, 2022 7:38 pm We can get it from surfing on the internet or playing a game. But if you do it every day excessively you need to do more and more to achieve the same level of excitement and after a while the excitement wears thin and you look for something else.
Look, 'you' can 'try to' "justify" just about ANY 'thing' in Life.

If one is just happy living, being alive, and one desire is to just keep living, then that one will NEVER become 'bored', right?
duszek wrote: Mon Dec 05, 2022 7:38 pm Heidegger developed a theory of three levels of boredom (or was it despair?). I don´t remember the details though.
One ONLY becomes so-called 'bored' if the thought, 'I am bored', arises within the body. So, one can still satisfy ALL of their desires, and still that thought arise.

you also say the above like new desires will NEVER arise.
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Harbal
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by Harbal »

duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm
Have you made any intersting discoveries in the area of personal excitement management ?
:|
bobmax
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by bobmax »

duszek wrote: Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:08 pm After listening two times to the excellent podcast about the tragedy of life I would like to develop on the following:

It was mentioned that if all our desires were satisfied our life would become boring.
It was then immediately suggested that you can desire excitement.

These two seem to contradict each other: boredom and excitement.

Some people look for constant excitement on the internet and they can find it: games, thrillers, mysteries, conspirational thearies ...
They don´t get bored, but they probably grow weary after a while.
In the novel "Infinite Jest" people indulging in something wonderful on a video tape forgot to eat and drink and died. The video showed not exactly something exciting in the usual sense of the word, but people stayed glued to the video just the same.

Have you made any intersting discoveries in the area of personal excitement management ?
In my opinion this happens due to the inability to be with ourselves.

Our experiences in the world are the stimuli for our inner reworking.
Even the most banal events can be the occasion for profound reflections.

However, if this phase of re-elaboration is missing, then every experience remains superficial, it doesn't really touch us.
And so it is a continuous search for novelty to escape boredom.

Boredom which, however, is due to ourselves, to our inability to grasp the depth of what is happening.
duszek
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by duszek »

Bobmax

Yes, your theory makes a lot of sense.
And yet, somehow it does not work under certain circumstances. Perhaps due to mood swings or for physical reasons.
duszek
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Re: The Tragedy of Life

Post by duszek »

Age

Your solution makes sense:
New desires arise and we can satisfy them and go on and on.

That´s why so many very rich people are so unhappy, take drugs and become alcoholics (just hear-say, I don´t know them personally),
because they cannot think of anything desirable any more, no more desires arise within them.

This gives me an idea: some people could start a coaching business consisting in finding new desirable things for the rich who cannot think of anything themselves any more.
Some of the desperate rich go to India and join an ashram and work in the fields. John Updike wrote about some such women in the novel "S".
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