nephandi
Posts: 3930
Joined: 9/23/2005 From: Cold and magickal Norway in a town near Bergen! Status: offline
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Greetings quote:
I understand the conscious decision to want to live, but do the actions of a person adhere to wanting to live. For example, A thrill seeker constantly seeks dangerous stunts that can in fact cause his death. Yet he still does them. I think perhaps that it is not enough for the body to live, the mind must be alive to, and for a thrill seeker, what he or she do causes them to live, for while their bodies might live if they stayed in their homes safe, it is doing the things they love which make them alive. It is not a death wish, not from most I know who are thrill seekers, but more a wish to feel alive. quote:
The most basic of societal issues in our world that people do stuff daily that they know is harmful to them, yet they continue - eating unhealthy, not being or attempting to be in healthy shape, smoking, doing drugs, etc. Are they seeking to live or die? Did warriors in the series seek to live or die? Did assassins? The general free person? I am overweight. I know it is bad for me, but sometimes, the joy of eating a bag of chocolate is the only thing which get me through a depression. That is not a wish to die, it is a bad habit and finding a way to cope. I do not think a warrior go into combat wishing to die, but he is willing to die to honor his obligations or to fight for what he believe in. I do not think that any of the characters in the books, save I think there was one suicide or do I remember that wrong? wish to die. But many of them was willing to die for what they believed in or to safe keep their freedom. Being willing to die for some goal or cause or obligation is not the same as wishing to die. There is a story I was told of a Martial Artist, he tried to live up to the idea that a warrior had to live with death as his companion. So every night he suspended his katana over his sleeping mat by a thin tread, if the tread broke the sword would plummet down and kill the warrior. One day his teacher found out about this and he told the warrior that he was wrong, a warrior should not welcome death and play with it like he did, but be willing to accept it if it came. quote:
There is so much that while consciously you say i want to live for ever, yet the very actions you take in your life (you is general) as a Gorean may in fact be a way to die rather than live. Yes, but if I locked myself in my bedroom, eating nothing but the most healthy keeping myself away from every danger and every joy of life, perhaps my body would live longer, but I would already be dead. I wish to live forever, but as who I am and enjoying life, if that means taking a risk or an unhealthy choice here and there, so be it. I am alive so that I can live, not so that I can watch life. quote:
Nephandi you speak of instinct, yet that instinct is very low frequency unless in a situation where death is imminent rather than subjectory. That is not an every day concept people live with ignited. Actually I think it is. I do not know about other pepole but I feel the call of my instincts every day of my life. It is just that instinct is so basic that my self preservation instinct do not really kick in an warm me about the danger of a candy bar. But the instincts are always there under my intellect, under my manners and words. I wish you well
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Whatever you think you can do or believe you can do, begin it. Action has magic, grace and power in it.--Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Futon torpedoes, make love not war!--Aswad
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