Alfred Nobel, . . . in 1888 read his own obituary in a French newspaper. One of his brothers had died, but a careless reporter had used a statement prepared for the wrong man.
Alfred, the principal inventor of dynamite, was disappointed with the published account. He was described as a “merchant of death” who had made a fortune from explosives and human exploitation. This haunting image caused him to reevaluate his life and revamp his will. Consequently, his money has made possible awards for individuals who excel in making the world a better place. We call these awards the Nobel Prize.
Alfred Nobel, apparently felt that his reputation, his value in the eyes of the world, mattered, and that he did not want to be know ONLY as the inventor of dynamite. Did Mr. Nobel create the Peace Prize as his way of trying to justify his existence, and enhance his worth in the eyes of the world? Did Mr. Nobel have to earn his worth, or did he have worth?
The autonomous individual who has to justify his existence by his own efforts is in eternal bondage to himself. ~Eric Hoffer
What you can say about most of my blog articles, you can say about this one: it appears to be written to others, and for others, but it is actually written to myself. I have admired Eric Hoffer since a teenager, and as I age my admiration only increases. Let’s look at the quote carefully.
THE AUTONOMOUS INDIVIDUAL – does the word autonomous mean individual, the singled-out, the self-governed? All of us are autonomous, aren’t we? Even the most dependent among us, is still just a being that exists within a specific sack of skin. We are all alone, even in a large family, and in a crowed city. A quote I have used before says:
No one will ever breathe one breath for us. No one will ever think one thought that is ours. No one will ever stand in our bodies, experience what happens to us, feel our fears, dream our dreams, or cry our tears. We are born, live, and leave this life entirely on our own. . . . No one else can ever live a single moment of our lives for us. That we must do for ourselves. That is responsibility. ~Helmstetter
So what Mr. Hoffer says in this quote applies to all of us.
JUSTIFY HIS EXISTENCE: Here we have the concept of earning our worth, or, at the very least, that you have to come up with a very good reason for being alive. If you feel your existence must be earned, or rationalized,
This thought reminds me of a debate I heard repeatedly as a kid raised by blackbelt fundamentalists. The topic was salvation. How does a person get into the position where God will save them. Do you get baptized the proper way (by immersion), and attend church regularly, and tithe to the church, and avoid sexual immorality, and spread the gospel, and so on, and so forth. OR are we saved because Jesus paid the price for our sins, and extends to us grace (which was defined by unearned salvation.)
In my church background the matter was DO YOU EARN salvation, or are you saved FREELY, AND WITHOUT HAVING TO DO ANYTHING.
In Mr. Hoffer’s quote he is bringing up a similar issue. about how one will justify his or her existence.
Does existence have to be earned? You exist. If you didn’t exist then there is no issue. If you exist, why would you have to justify what you already have? But having to justify existence doesn’t really matter, because although I don’t have to justify my existence, and you don’t have to justify your existence, my mind, and my emotions are crying out for justification.
Most of the time, I have within me this inner screaming match going on regarding my existence. When I do something that is less than perfect (in other words, everything I do) I feel worthless and in my mind I hear things like this:
=> that was a stupid thing to do, but what can you expect when you are so damn stupid.
=> God is wasting air on you.
=> everyone would be better off without you why can’t you do anything right, you screw up the simplest things
=> eventually everyone is going to find out just how dumb and inept you are, bozo, and you’ll have to go live under a bridge and die from exposure and neglect.
ETERNAL BONDAGE TO YOURSELF-- If I have to earn, or justify my own existence then I will be in eternal bondage to myself. I will be monitoring everything I do, and say, and every decision I make. This self-monitoring is not, in itself BAD, if I am just assessing progress and tweaking my skills, but that is not what is going on, not at all. What is going on is this: I am checking out every action, and thought, and I’m judging myself to be a failure, and being a failure I am wondering why I exist. Anyone living this way is indeed in BONDAGE TO ONE’S SELF.
It is odd that hardly anyone would question the worth of a new born baby. Every baby is born with a value that is beyond imagination. When a ship is sinking the first into the life-boats are children. Women come next I suppose because they are assumed to be the caregivers to the children. Every baby is priceless. The worth of the baby is not earned. The value of an infant does not have to be justified. If this is generally accepted as true, then when does this worth evaporate? When do we stop having unearned value? At what point does a person stop having unearned value, and start having to justify their right to exist?
It would seem logical to assume that IF you are born with worth, that you always have worth, but my mind doesn’t seem to compared that rationale.
Again, Dr. Frank Schultz has given advice that is worth repeating: Be curious about that.
I beg you . . . to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for answers which could not be give to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday, far into the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answers. ~Rilke
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