Breaking Down the Basics (or what makes up the philosophy for a little better.net)
November 9, 2009
This Post by Justin Dixon Follow me on Twitter Photo Courtesy of h.koppdelaney
One of my favorite authors, Ayn Rand, used to greet every person that she met by asking each person to state their premise. She would demand that they break down the basics of their life philosophy, so that she could examine it, and give them some of her own philosophy to chew on. On top of this lately a friend of mine, Jeffery Tang, has been writing a great series of his 12 great commandments for life. Between these two awesome people it has become clear to me that I should lay out some of the basics for my own philosophy.
Now this is a constantly growing thing. I welcome any and all questions about any of the points I make. If your question is good enough you may inspire a post. I also welcome challenges to any of the points I make here. If you prove me wrong than I get to grow some more. Here are the basics for A little Better.net
People are not your enemy. Our only great enemy in this life is falsehood. Do not take this to mean that all people will do right, or that they will be kind. We all know better than that. What this does mean though is that we must remember that when people are consistently doing wrong it is because they are acting on a false idea, and not because they are inherently bad as a human being.
We are all intelligent in some way. The lead psychologist for Harvard University, Howard Gardner, has consistently challenged the way that we look at intelligence. His premise is that the narrow definition that we have used to define intelligence in the past is not only skewed towards a limited kind of intelligence, but is harmful to society. We leave brilliant people with the false impression that they are not. Instead how Howard Gardner has proposed we redefine intelligence as any area of talent that others find valuable and can be used in a form of trade. To find out your areas of intelligence you can click here.
We must not separate ourselves from others. This does not mean that we as individuals do not matter. We matter a good deal. This means that because we are individuals going through the same reality as others that we are neither higher nor lower than other human beings. We have within each of us all the greatest good that you see in Mahatma Ghandi, and the greatest evil that you see in Adolf Hitler. To make an exception to this is to judge others by an unequal standard. If we are to have anything remotely close to the golden rule, than we must not do this.
The greatest sin, is to disobey your own conscience. We each have our own sense of what is right and wrong, but its very easy to forget to listen to this. There are so many people who will tell us what is acceptable and what is not for us to do in society. We are told that something is fine by a group, or other people do it, and we allow the crowd to become our own check and balance. This is dangerous. This is why historically the worst acts have been committed by crowds rather than individuals. I would challenge rather that you learn to listen to your own sense of right and wrong, and that you would do only what you genuinely believe to be right. This is a challenge that we must accept if we are to see good succeed in this world. Before you obey any religion or law you must learn to listen to and obey your conscience.
We must examine our lives. We must examine our beliefs and have more reason for believing them than because we were told to. We must examine our actions in order to know what it is we really believe. We must examine our attitudes and thoughts in order to know what directions we are going. Socrates said it first, and it still hold true today.
“The unexamined life is not worth living.”
We must remind others of good things. Its not that we don’t know what to do. Its not that we don’t have answers ourselves. Its that we get tired. When you are pushing forward all of the time, you don’t see all of the ground behind you that you have covered. You only see the next challenge that you have to take on. With this being the case we must remember to remind others of the ground that has been covered, to remind others of the good, because we need others to do the same for us sometimes.
We must be patient with ourselves. All of the best things take time. Yes you can bake a cake in the microwave but its not nearly as good as if you had made the same cake from scratch and baked it in the oven. This goes back to those obstacles that we are constantly faced with. It is easy to get discouraged when you are trying to do something. When this happens, find someone encouraging to be around, take a break, accept slow growth, and move forward.
We must become examples. Or rather we must all become examples of what we wish this world to become. We are examples already, the question is of what. This does not mean, get into a huff whenever you find a moral code that you can not abide by. We should not promote any form of morality which we can not make practical in our own lives.
These are the premises with which I make my judgment calls. These are the ideas with which I write. They may or may not be perfect but they are definitely sincere. I may or may not always succeed in remembering these myself, but I always try. Now my question to you are what are your premises? What are the points that you use to make judgments? What is your moral standard?
Entry Filed under: life. .
20 Comments Add your own
Leave a Comment
Some HTML allowed:
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <pre> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>
1.
Tristan Lee | November 9, 2009 at 2:39 pm
Hi Justin. Thank you for these words of wisdom. Although I don’t always find it easiest to do, one of my common moral standards is to not judge a person from what they look like, but judge a person based on their actions. This usually helps me judge them in a more fair, non-biased way.
2.
Justin- AlittleBetter | November 9, 2009 at 7:11 pm
That is definitely a tough one. I decided instead to try to see what they were trying to say with their presentation. I still think we should care about our presentation, though I see what you are doing as admirable.
3.
Jeffrey Tang | November 9, 2009 at 3:02 pm
Hey, I got mentioned in the same breath as Ayn Rand :) Awesome!
In all seriousness, though – I really like your emphasis on examining life. I think too often we just go through the motions without thinking about what we’re doing, where we’re going, or what kind of impact we’re making. That leads us down all kinds of dangerous roads.
In fact, all your points here are great. I’d respond to all of them right now, but I’m only on my lunch break at work…
Awesome post, Justin – and a great followup to your article about lessons from libertarians.
4.
Justin- AlittleBetter | November 9, 2009 at 5:41 pm
As you get the chance to go back and reference all the points you are welcome to do that :D The original blog title that I wanted was Examined Life, however not only was it taken, but when I examined my own message, and I examined my own successes I found that A little Better really was the way to go.
5.
leapsecond | November 9, 2009 at 6:26 pm
Fantastic, fantastic post. I’m reading the Fountainhead (for the second time) now and it’s really eye opening how much more I understand now that I’m firmly in the self-development niche.
6.
Justin- AlittleBetter | November 9, 2009 at 6:31 pm
I definitely enjoyed that book, though what I’m pushing more for here, is I want your ideas, and your premises. Do you have anything to add?
7.
leapsecond | November 9, 2009 at 8:17 pm
Why not? Two of my guiding principles are:
1) Everything is a means unto itself. In a nutshell, we should be doing things because they are fulfilling in and of themselves, rather than a stepping stone to further things. One example is doing chores: we dread them because they’re just a means to an end. However, if we’re mindful and do them with complete, almost meditative attention and presence, we’ll find we can actually enjoy these tasks. This applies across the board to anything, from commenting here to playing sports to writing posts.
2) Express yourself. This means that everything you do communicates who you are at your core, rather than trying to “impress” with your actions. That is, instead of doing what other people will like or what you think other people will like, you communicate what YOU want. This is like the application of your call to obey your conscience. This is like following your conscience with every action that you take; you can express with much more than words or body language. You don’t even need an audience to express.
If you didn’t fully understand either concept, never fear. I’ll be making massive posts on both those concepts in the future.
8.
Justin- AlittleBetter | November 10, 2009 at 9:03 am
Great points. Let me know when you have the posts up.
9.
Jonathan Frei | ordinary time | November 10, 2009 at 4:57 pm
“We are all intelligent in some way.” This works both ways though. You could also say, “Everyone is stupid in some way.” But the point holds. Each of us have our unique strenghts and weaknesses that we must deal with and work with in our journey.
10.
Justin- AlittleBetter | November 10, 2009 at 8:41 pm
Our greatest weaknesses are often only a part of our greatest strengths.
11.
Oscar - freestyle mind | November 11, 2009 at 5:34 am
Loved this list and examples. Especially that we must remember others of good things. Unfortunately we tend to point out only bad things. Stumbled!
12.
Justin- AlittleBetter | November 11, 2009 at 8:18 am
I figured if we are to adhere to anything even remotely like the golden rule, that this would be a good standard to go by.
13.
Arvind Devalia | November 12, 2009 at 7:01 pm
Great post Justin and insights into your philosophy.
I am working on my own life principles and polishing up ones I blogged about a while ago.
People are people wherever they are in the world and everyone has so much to offer and immense goodness and brilliance if we give them a chance to show it.
And we must become examples – i.e. be the change we wish to see in the world.
Keep up hte great work you are doing.
14.
Justin- AlittleBetter | November 12, 2009 at 8:06 pm
I really like this point of if we give them the chance to show it, though they also need to let it shine themselves. Our best way to help others do this is to start doing it ourselves.
15.
Muscle Might | November 16, 2009 at 3:31 am
Hi thanks for these gems of wisdom. I liked your blog. It is worth a read.
16.
Justin- AlittleBetter | November 16, 2009 at 8:35 am
Glad you like it. I think we all have gems of wisdom screaming to get out, its just sometimes we have them buried so deep or we have so much other noise that it gets hard to hear.
17.
Björn | November 25, 2009 at 1:54 pm
Great words.
Can’t help but to comment a little:
People are not your enemy. < Except psychopaths and highly strung up addicts etc. (Walking down a street at night in a shady area, you have no excuse to not be aware and watchful.)
The greatest sin, is to disobey your own conscience. < Except if you do it temporarily in order to truly improve your positionand means to get where you want to. (You can make your point or action with timing or not. You can keep your day job while you launch your new thing.)
18.
Justin- AlittleBetter | November 26, 2009 at 7:22 am
Even in those cases it is not the person that is your enemy. It is the dark ideas that cause them to behave dangerously. In those cases you are dealing with a slave to a dark ideal, and may have to defend yourself. The human being is not your enemy, the dark ideas that they are enslaved to, and that may force you to appropriately defend yourself are. My point here is not to say that you will never be attacked, I honestly believe ever person should learn self-defense, and I highly recommend the Systema defense system for its practicality. The point is to not judge them even as you are forced to fight them. To not bare hatred towards them, even while you have to stop them.
Secondly, any job that makes you do something that you find to be morally wrong is not worth doing. No exceptions. I stand by my point. If you can not obey your own sense of right and wrong, than you will be easily made a slave to immorality. We must do what we believe is right to do. The end does not justify the means, not even temporarily. If your morals are only situation based they are not values, they are not morals, they are hobbies. In terms of business an immoral leverage is only temporarily, integrity on the other hand will be recognized at least by the people who most matter. Leadership of any kind requires integrity.
19.
Björn | November 26, 2009 at 10:08 am
Thanks for you comments.
I am sure you appreciate that my point is not in any way to dismiss your great words.
The world is indeed as you prefer to regard it.
When my younger brother was in the late teens, he used to bring some kind of simple “protection” with him (like ninja-sticks), when he went into the nearby town in a weekend night. He and his friends “saw” the downtown area as dangerrous because he had heard about gangs and violence. I couldn’t really relate to that at all, since I never had seen the town in that way. It was weird.
What I do like is to think about wise words and “test” them a bit against everyday life situations.
You introduced moral, not mentioned in the original text. But it is completely relevant.
And, again, I agree, when the matter at hand is “big” enough to be a moral issue, yes, one must be true to ones ideals and principles.
But, in the more “grey areas” of everyday business life, one could for example have a “conviction” or idea that one thinks would be really good for the company. If your boss says no, is that a reason to immediately feel neglected and threaten to quit because “you didn’t get acceptance of how it should be done your way ASAP”?
Or, should one stick around, learn, discuss and polish the idea and go about to plant it in stages so as to get gradual recognition etc.
I guess the answer is again just to ask yourself if you really have thought things through properly.
To my mind also comes the many people that attempt to “change the (bad) system from within”. Should they always reject and leave the system instead because it is bad?
Who will then create change? Can it only be created from the outside?
20.
Justin- AlittleBetter | November 26, 2009 at 10:20 am
I quite enjoy the feedback, and I enjoyed writing the response, so no offense taken, and I hope none was given.
I don’t consider a conviction and conscience to be the same things. To me conscience is about right and wrong. What your talking about is something that I would think of as more of a preference, even if you know its a better way for things to be run, you have to earn respect and clout to be able to affect those changes.
In terms of affecting a bad system, this is something I’ve given a lot of thought to as an independent. If you operate in the system the same way as others than what change will you affect? And if you are surrounded by something of a negative nature without some form of positive reinforcement it is more likely to change you. I do not think that modern politics can change modern politics, instead I call on people to look beyond the systems and see what solutions they can find not only for themselves but in working with one another. If change can be affected than by all means affect it. If you have a way to do it, than do it. For me that means writing things that will cause people to have the confidence to trust there own conscience and decisions.