The Tangled Branch Discussion Forums

What do I gain, what reward
precious knowledge
or advantage?
Borderline nihilist
or eager existentialist
trapped by love, boredom
pain, death, God
or thoughts of Superman
I've tried it,
searched for meaning
and truth.
It didn't increase my happiness
like a cold beer
after a hard days work,
or all the delayed satisfactions
naturally instructed
that educated,
undepressing as they went.
I will die unsurprised,
what happens after
is (now) none of my concern.
I'll leave the big thinks
for other happy people
like Nietzsche.

Hey Colm This has all the hallmarks and themes of your poems but without the imagery. The message could be reduced IMo to 
I have searched meaning
and truth
but it was like a cold beer
after a hard day's work

and references to Nietsche a bit too obvious. Besides, Nietsche true nihilism was to write what almost nowhere ever read or really understood.

I thought and were a natural couple

Thanks guys
The Nietzsche at the end wasn't meant to be a deep dive, just a hint that deep thinking can be detrimental

Colm, I hear you saying that the criterion was happiness. I wonder if during (presumably) all those years of thinking you, or N, kept that in mind. Later you say that what comes after is no longer your concern. Did that replace happiness as the criterion? 

In what way, exactly, has deep thinking failed you, or N?

I'm struggling to understand this passage:  
or all the delayed satisfactions 
naturally instructed 
that educated, 
undepressing as they went.

Life's big questions! You're brave to tackle them all in a poem.

Jackie

AlienFlower wrote: ↑

Thu Dec 16, 2021 5:20 am

Colm, I hear you saying that the criterion was happiness. I wonder if during (presumably) all those years of thinking you, or N, kept that in mind. Later you say that what comes after is no longer your concern. Did that replace happiness as the criterion? 
In what way, exactly, has deep thinking failed you, or N?
I'm struggling to understand this passage:  
or all the delayed satisfactions 
naturally instructed 
that educated, 
undepressing as they went.
Life's big questions! You're brave to tackle them all in a poem.
Jackie

Hi Jackie,
I suppose it's in our nature to search for 'truths', and from what I can see many deep thinkers were not the happiest people you'd ever meet. I've come to a few conclusions about the meaning of life and ways to be happy. The amount of control I have over my life is one of the crucial factors, when I feel that I am in (some sort of) control, I am happy; it's not an obvious sense of joy...more like a sense of calm, probably created by the absence (or reduced amount) of stress. The big questions that can't be answered satisfactorily, like the meaning of life, don't concern me anymore. That passage alluded to something we all do by choice (eating the vegetables on a plate we're not fond of first, and save the really delicious elements till the end) or other 'naturally instructed' delayed satisfactions like pregnancy. The human 'condition', one of them being boredom, or pain and death, has/have distracted so many people. Who hasn't asked why a loving God would 'allow' a child to die.
Science will continue to answer some questions, but will never the philosophers' big ones, the existential questions.
We are all responsible for the human condition, we could eliminate hunger etc. With genetic manipulation we can create the great utopia. If the planet doesn't overheat we will eventually become transhuman, and given enough time, cast off our stupid meat bodies completely. Quantum data pockets capable of feeling anything, and travelling to anywhere in the Universe, becoming the entire Universe, or even creating our own Universes.
I think I'd be happy with all that control over my (eternal) life As long as I'd still be able to bitch a bit about the neighbour's new upgrade