edit: never mind. I have no idea who you are, you have obviously no idea who I am. Let’s not mix.
Stoic Guardian, simply dismissing you without justification will not do, I must explain myself, also for the sake of this thread and those who value it. I realize very well that your mind forces you to posit that someone who expresses something beyond what you can muster, as passion or as reason, is at fault, and that this forces you to invent the necessary context to sustain this idea. So you express your discontent and defile my thread. But I must make it clear, also to others, that this morality of the resentful is one of the main causes for the division of power in the word as it stands now.
Power belongs to those who do not condemn ambition. It is extracted from the masses by implanting in them the “Christian” idea that power and aspiration toward it is evil. I do not very often encounter so directly as in Stoic Guardian an expression of this morality, this explicit rejection of value-creating. It is one of the most un-hygienic type of encounters. It reminds me of what Nietzsche says about the underprivileged:
[size=90]“Take a look into the background of every family, every corporation, every community - everywhere you see the struggle of the sick against the healthy, a quiet struggle, for the most part, with a little poison powder, with needling, with deceitful expressions of long suffering, but now and then also with that sick man’s Pharisaic tactic of loud gestures, whose favourite role is “noble indignation.” It likes to make itself heard all the way into the consecrated rooms of science, that hoarse, booming indignation of the pathologically ill hound, the biting insincerity and rage of such “noble” Pharisees (once again I remind readers who have ears of Eugene Duhring, that apostle of revenge from Berlin, who in today’s Germany makes the most indecent and most revolting use of moralistic gibberish - Duhring, the pre-eminent moral braggart we have nowadays, even among those like him, the anti-Semites). They are all men of resentment, these physiologically impaired and worm-eaten men, a totally quivering earthly kingdom of subterranean revenge, inexhaustible, insatiable in its outbursts against the fortunate, and equally in its masquerades of revenge, its pretexts for revenge. When would they attain their ultimate, most refined, most sublime triumph of revenge? Undoubtedly, if they could succeed in pushing their own wretchedness, all misery in general, into the consciences of the fortunate, so that the latter one day might begin to be ashamed of their good fortune and perhaps would say to themselves, “It’s a shameful to be fortunate. There’s too much misery!” . . .” [Nietzsche, Genealogy of Morals][/size]
Pezer - I see anarchism as equally “within the system”, if not more so, as the creation of a philosophy that transforms its laws. “The system” is simply “the world”. None of us is in the position to define exactly what, at this point, the ruling principles of government are. On the one hand we have Authority Figure, to whose beliefs I grant a lot more credibility than to the ideas of those who ridicule him, even though I can certainly not support all that he says or what he proposes as a horizon to thought. It stands beyond question for me that AF has some useful information to share, notably on orgonite and related matters. Years ago I purchased some of the stuff because of a thread by him I read, and it is very powerful in its effects. That was a significant discovery and enough reason to respect AF more than most on this forum, in terms of the value he has to offer. On the other hand there is the sceptic idea that the government represents simply the unorganized conflict of interests, where there is no room for conspiracy, and which is sort of transparent. I find this idea appealing but not very credible. We need only to call to mind the speeches of Eisenhower and JFK, who were likely a bit more informed than we are, to realize that there is a bit more going on. A well organized, insidious and persistant force aimed at drawing power to itself. This is of course consistent with the idea of will to power. Anyone who dismisses conspiracy theories out of hand can not at the same time have understood Nietzsche in any significant way. But my point is that Nietzsche speaks of the desirability of “evil” power-unions. This is the matter on which political philosophy should concentrate at this point, and the matter to which neither AF nor James S Saint (easily the most powerful analytical thinker active on this board) have anything to say, so far. How can we deal with the status quo as anything but rebels? This is where value ontology comes in - but to understand how this works you have to understand what it means to create values. I recommend the posts by Parodites in production.
I don’t think ambition is inherintly evil, but Ambition with no Wisdom or Fortitude is just foolish.
Many a man has destroyed his own life along with others by simply allowing his passions to rule him.
Do life effortlessly; engage in activities just for the sake of engaging. Don’t seek yourself in everything you do. It’s possible to be rather than to be as something
The world will never know the greatest feats. I mean, think about it. You could even make the argument that the greatest feats necessitate secrecy/not for public consumption.
Now, I am hyper competitive, and that is not to say I am not going to try. I guess I just phrase the quest somewhat differently. I’m not trying to imprint anything on the world, so much as perfect myself.
This was your first mistake, and the one from which most of your problems probably stemmed. Ayn Rand is a chicken hawk propagandist who preys on immature minds. You should probably start reading different shit altogether. Having a mentality that’s predominantly informed by information regarding social stratification is a really big waste of a life. Learn to enjoy yourself. It sounds like you don’t know how.
Why is that, Fixed Cross?
I may be wrong here but perhaps when you are able to bear and to “see” the weak ones, and feel comfortable within your own skin with them, your whole philosophy will change. Does one not need to know one’s self, to acknowledge if not all, at least, many of one’s own human aspects, in order to see value and truth when it appears?
What do you think of Jesus? Do you think he was weak because he walked among those who were weak, he felt comfortable with them and identified with them? Does the ‘truly’ powerful person need to be surrounded by the strong at heart in order to feel and to know his own power? Or is the truly powerful person comfortable with and able to bear with all kinds of people? Sometimes we have a tendency to lean towards people and those things which make up for what we lack, even unconsciously, instead of developing within ourselves a balance.
It’s true that birds of a feather flock together but we aren’t often aware of just how those feathers came to be - what it was that they ‘grew out of’ and are continuing to grow out of. And sometimes those feathers get in the way of seeing the roots from which we developed. When we can see those roots and shape and apply them realistically, our ambition is not then unbearable but becomes a true raison de etre which flows out of a sense of love and solidarity.
Both cowardice and complacency become frustrating to people with ambition.
Once burned by such people, the mind decides for all time that such people are “bad”/“unworthy”/“a hindrance”.
Of course, the issue is one of getting frustrated - attempting to accomplish, disregarding the situation. Then making a decision “for all time”, continuing to disregard future actual situations.
The “cure” is to instill within yourself the notion that if you are trying something and not getting anywhere, it is You who is disregarding reality.
I do that but that is not all there is to life. I can enjoy days of just walking along the surf or preparing a nice dinner. But a deeper drive lives in me as well. We’re not all built to be completely complacent and satisfied with taking things as they are, and I accept that.
That’s cool.
I wish you’d post more on that, instead of on how bad the outer world is.
You’re an idiot for thinking that someone who quotes a writer is predominantly informed by similar writers. But thanks for the advice. I enjoy seeing people who spend their life running around drunk and stoned without any desire to reflect. I’ll try to be more like you for the remainder of the day.
In fact I’ve always been very gentle and accepting of weak people, but I noticed that the weak are not “innocent” but the opposite. Weak beings are almost necessarily parasites, even without intending to.
Jesus was obviously more tolerant than I am in accepting the influences that forced themselves on him.
But the problem with being surrounded with weak people is not that it prevents me from feeling my power, but that there is a great dissonance between what I am and what I can express. Weak people do have the tendency to gang up and want to crucify the one who is not following weakling-urges.
When in Rome…
Actually I first was so confident of the value of everyone around me, that I believed their judgments (this can’t be done, you’re crazy, blah blah, don’t do it I feel scared, etc) to be relevant to my own. This thread was started around the time I rid myself if the idea that I can perceive anything accutrately (and therefore accept it as real) that does not enter directly into my own perspective. I was able to throw off the judgments of the weak.
I just had to make one decision - to begin to anchor my own perspective. I then rediscovered that this was an immensely powerful ground to build on, and to think from. I started to enjoy the objections of weaker minds, as natural phenomena occurring wherever there is a strong self-achnoring. I kind of played around with that - I am still very tolerant of “real life” weak people. But I am wary of giving them any moral authority or weight just because they are weak.
Of course. But in order to try to attian something, one must know what one wants to attain, in concrete terms. The ambition that is the subject of this thread has not, precisely like my ethics, been crystallized into concrete terms. It is still a drive, a sense of ascent, underlying the world of separate object(ives).
I’ll ask again;
What if after very careful study and consideration, you find that your ambitious goal isn’t in line with your ethics?
What if your ethics actually indicates that you should NOT be trying to influence the world in such a way or become so wealthy?
The point is never to become wealthy, or influential for the sake of wealth or influence. If that was the objective I would just have followed the path set out for me by my youth and society.
The unbearability of the ambition is in part due to the fact that most paths to wealth and influene involve compromising almost everything else, especially clarity. That is part of this threads “spirit” - the frustration with the constraints put on the nature of accomplishment by the structure of success. What counts as the greatest success in this world, as I wrote earlier, is quite meager. Precisely because it involves separation, fear, exclusion - it all directed toward the opposite of what I’d consider successful.
In any case I never formulated a specific ambitious goal. The OP describes the feeling of necessity, of potential.
I loved MA’s Meditations - I thought they were beautiful. So much wisdom within them to reflect on. That is a man I would have loved to know. Could have sat for hours and hours and hours and hours exchanging with him. 
I received more and more the sense of Nietzsche’s “amor fati” from it than anything else…as in love of fate…or one’s own fate…
I want to learn more and more to see as beautiful what is necessary in things; then I shall be one of those who make things beautiful. Amor fati: let that be my love henceforth! I do not want to wage war against what is ugly. I do not want to accuse; I do not even want to accuse those who accuse. Looking away shall be my only negation. And all in all and on the whole: some day I wish to be only a Yes-sayer.
Freddie’s - The Gay Science
My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it—all idealism is mendaciousness in the face of what is necessary—but love it.
Ecce Homo - (Why I Am so Clever)
But there were some moments when reading it, that I thought that Marcus Aurelius was just a bit too tough on himself…perhaps because he was a Roman Emperor and…duty first. There were times when he would have liked to simply chuck it all and disappear but alas …duty first. He was a truly noble man in my book…and not solely because he was a Roman Emperor.
…
Were you to live three thousand years, or even thirty thousand, remember that the sole life which a man can lose is that which he is living at the moment; and furthermore, that he can have no other life except the one he loses…
I seek the truth…it is only persistence in self-delusion and ignorance that does harm.
It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.
Wisdom
Not so wise.
Note that he chooses to love whatever is necessary but then declares, disregarding what might be necessary, to forever want for nothing to be different.
Loving the necessary is ensuring one’s awareness of what is in need of being different and wanting/loving only the changing of it… starting with oneself.
Fixed Cross…
I thought of Icarus in reading some of what you wrote in here, FC. You know, we all have our own personal BUT sometimes unconscious myths which live within our psyches which drive, pull and motivate us. As far as I’m concerned, I think that sometimes that can be a good thing…depending on the myth and how we relate to it. I think the myth of Daedalus and Icarus is yours. Is it possible that you have become too overpowered by it? For me, our myths are meant to serve us by teaching and guiding intuitively - once we’ve discovered our own - showing us the ways in which to go but we have to be careful because at times they might harm or destroy us or others if we begin to live them too literally, if we get too caught up, (universally speaking) for instance, in our own self-aggrandizement, delusions and illusory ambition. Icarus in his own ambition flew too close, far too close to the sun and fell to Earth. Perhaps you’ve read the story - perhaps not. But probably. If not, perhaps it would be good for you to read and ponder it. I don’t mean to say that in an arrogant way, FC -we can’t always see ourselves if we are standing too much in our own light or trying to fly so high that the sun blinds the truth of us. I think that Lucifer (I’m not calling you a devil- don’t believe in them) is a counterpart to Icarus. Both got in their own way of seeing the truth and pride always goes before the Fall. I think it is a very good thing to begin to peel back that onion (our perception of what is true - ‘real’), despite how strong and negative its aroma may become, to come to the realization, if it be so, of why we seek to be so far beyond or ‘unbearably’ ambitious and in what way it might perchance serve us MORE or truly serves humanity. If we’re afraid to even begin to do that - then there’s a good chance that we instinctively and intuitively know the metaphorical onion is rotten to the core. And by the way, ‘real’ humility is not weakness but rather a strong, clear and integral knowlege of who we are. It brings us in harmony with who we are - it does not separate or diminish us.
Actually, AD - the Icarus myth is ingrained so deeply in the northern European protestant mindset, it is so natural to think that one must not put ones head above the cornfield, that I dont think anyone around these parts is unfamiliar with the threat of flying too close to the sun. In fact, it took me extreme amounts of energy and courage to liberate myself from this disempowering idea. Because the idea is disempowering, and meant to keep people down (and governments up). It is related to “Render unto Caesar what is his” - a message saying: don’t even try to be what you can be.
I foresee a very different future for man. The coming two thousand years will be, I expect, a steady preparation in which man learns that there is no God above who will punish him for aspiring to greatness, but only a dormant “divine” (fundamental) will that, on the contrary, wants the individual to “approach the sun”, to shed the fear of rising above the mud of fear and superstition, to shed the authority of those who insist that individual must remain small, and to become conscious of being. In such a state no man or society will let itself be fooled into submission and servitude.
I\ve been “accused” both of being Icarus and Daedalus, by different people - I see this as a result of doing something people are afraid even to observe without judging it, let alone to do it - claiming my being for myself.
I hope and trust that more people will adopt my attitude in the coming millenia.
Sound to me like you need to do what I need to do with my ambitions and thats glen some perspective on the matter and realise we will never reach an end point that we think we desire not until the day we die, but its the chasing that we REALLY like. Its easy to lose sight of this though as we get so attached to the idea of fulling our ambitions. So yeah man i think the world needs more people with said ambitions but people with said ambitions may also have to deal with said ambitions 