Kierkegaard: A Responsible Philosopher?

Søren Kierkegaard (1813 – 1855) is without a doubt the greatest Danish philosopher. The father of existentialism. In a very simple way, he lived his philosophy. After all, to exist means not only to be alive and breathing but also to “stand out.” 

I always visualized existentialism as a vibe board, where a particular life stands out in an ocean of other lives. The image is romantic but it fits with Kierkegaard. He stood out. 

To the world he is known for setting the tone for such themes as fear, guilt, and anxiety, but also for choosing the choice, freedom, and love. In Denmark, his name is spoken with a certain amount of reverence because it can be difficult not to be seduced by his vision of life and poetic style, but also because he was radical. For example, Kierkegaard was openly critical of democracy when he elevated the individual above the crowd. In fact, he would not see imprisonment in isolation as one of the worst forms of punishment, because the truth emerges, undisturbed, between the individual and God. 

For Kierkegaard, I suggest, it all comes down to four important concepts: the self, truth, freedom, and one’s relationship to God.

Read the rest of the essay in Erraticus

Haste Makes Waste

“Of all the ridiculous things,” the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard writes, “the most ridiculous seems to me, to be busy—to be a man who is brisk about his food and his work…What, I wonder, do these busy folks get done?”

Busyness, unlike what some might believe, does not signal importance, but rather is proof that the busy person does not know where he or she is headed here in life. Being busy is like a robot running around looking for an input. Haste makes waste. It is ridiculous.  

Haste is closely tied to general inattention (e.g. how we relate with care and awareness to what is happening). Do we learn from our previous experiences or disregard them? For example, hangovers or moral scruples can get many people to drink a little less the next time. If not after the first time, then the second. 

Haste becomes waste is intimately tied to the fact that many people have forgotten to inhabit their body. To acknowledge is not a passive activity like digesting a sandwich, but something active. An inhabitation of the body is involved. It moves in the direction of sound, of smell, of touch. The body can help us connect with life by qualifying the extent to which there is a reason to hurry. For example, upon hearing a child scream, I can turn to see whether the child is doing so because her father is swinging her about in affectionate play. 

One of the first Western psychotherapists, Wilhelm Reich, was interested in how the body’s energies influence the mind. Reich believed that the unconscious was not located in the brain but rather flowed through the body’s soft tissue. Although it is possible to feel bodily sensations such as pain, tension, and tenderness, most of us are rarely conscious of our body—until it hurts. In the day-to-day, most of us are unconscious about our bodily sensations: we live primarily from the neck up.  

This can be reminiscent of Mr. James Duffy from James Joyce’s short story, “A Painful Case” (1914): “He lived at a little distance from his body, regarding his own acts with doubtful side-glances.” Mr. Duffy lives without contact to his body, which he views askance as if his body did not belong to him. Whose ass is it he sees in the mirror? 

Perhaps, the rushing people Kierkegaard refers to as ridiculous are only chasing their minds. They might not even notice their own busyness. The morale is that all of the bodily sensations that are not felt or registered can be considered unconscious. Thus, the unconscious is not something deeply concealed, but just something as yet unknown. Haste becomes waste because we have no time to explore or examine life—in the here and now. As Plato’s hero Socrates states, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” Why not adopt this statement for all aspects of life and suggest: the unexamined friendship, relationship, profession is not worth being in or doing?

To examine requires the opposite of haste such as paying attention potentially. 

Although it is customary to blame the Internet and social media for most wrongdoing, I do not think the concept haste makes waste can be explained by increased speed and technology alone. It is more likely tied to a fundamental lack of attention to and ignorance about what is important. Life today is filled with people suffering from sensory amputation. They rush around without getting anywhere. This may sound arrogant, but next time you meet a busy person, who is always in a rush, ask where he or she is heading. The simple question might shock them to slow down and actually think. 

Like the rest of us, they too come from nowhere getting elsewhere. The point is to slow down once in a while, and do nothing. I do nothing every day. Perhaps—at least, it happens for me—then we realize if it is worth going anywhere—and going there fast. In the end, we are all heading toward our death. 

The question is whether we take the opportunity to live while we can.  

This thing called vacation is a welcome opportunity to slow down, pay attention and examine whether your life is worth living. Most people rush for a reason. Seldom this reason is what makes their life worth living. 

First published in Erraticus, August 7, 2019

Kig væk

Jo flere informationer, desto sværere bliver det at tage fornuftige beslutninger.

I Weekendavisens sektion Ideer (»Kultur i acceleration«, #27, 5. juli) refereres der til interessante studier foretaget af blandt andet DTU, der handler om, hvordan vi i dagens forjagede kultur har sværere ved at fastholde vores opmærksomhed. Vores nærværende tilstedeværelse bliver mere flygtig og zappende. Hele tiden er vi på jagt efter fristelser og belønninger.

En fælles præmis for studierne, der omtales, er, at opmærksomhed betragtes som en ressource. Dette stemmer glimrende overens med tankerne bag begrebet opmærksomhedsøkonomi, idet økonomi handler om allokeringen af knappe ressourcer. I dag er den knappe ressource vores opmærksomhed. Opmærksomhed er dog ikke kun en ressource, men også en erfaringsskabende kapacitet. Det kan sammenlignes lidt med det at skrive eller at male, som på den ene side er teknikker og en ressource, som kan læres, men som på den anden side også er kapacitet, der kan trænes. Nogle mennesker kan skrive i hånden i meget lang tid, fordi de øver sig dagligt, mens det for andre er en begrænset ressource.

Sagt anderledes: Opmærksomhed er en muskel, der kan trænes. Spørgsmålet er, hvorfor det er værd at træne den?

Den amerikanske filosof William James talte om vigtigheden af opmærksomhed som evnen til frivilligt at bringe et flakkende sind tilbage, hvilket han så som fundamentet for udviklingen af ens dømmekraft, karakter og vilje. Han skrev et sted, »at den uddannelse, som kan forbedre denne kapacitet, ville være en uddannelse par excellence«. En anden amerikaner, Jon Kabat-Zinn der forsker i mindfulness, som netop er en måde at træne opmærksomheden på, har beskrevet opmærksomheden som tosidig eller dobbeltrettet. Den rækker både ud og ind. Det vil sige, at jeg både er opmærksom på det, som sker, samtidig med at jeg også er opmærksom på kvaliteten af min egen opmærksomhed.

Det er især kvaliteten af ens opmærksomhed, der forbindes med erfaringen, mens den udadrettede opmærksomhed ofte ses som en ressource. Tænk blot på folkeskolelæreren, der fortæller sine studerende, at de skal være opmærksomme. På hvad og hvordan? Sådanne spørgsmål forvandler opmærksomhed til et moralsk anliggende.

Den engelske filosof Iris Murdoch forbandt opmærksomhed med kærlighed og mente af samme grund, at opmærksomhed var essentiel for at udvikle vores moralske dømmekraft. I en af hendes bøger talte hun – meget rammende i kontrast til i dag – om »unselfing«, og ikke selfies. Hendes idé var, at for at kunne deltage opmærksomt i livet må vi skubbe vores eget ego til side. Kun på den måde kan vi for alvor erfare det, som sker, og derved tage bedre del i de moralske beslutninger – til glæde for alle.

Murdoch var i høj grad inspireret af en anden filosof, nemlig den franske Simone Weil, der beskrev opmærksomhed som en neutral og direkte kontakt med virkeligheden. Det vil sige, at opmærksomheden som erfaring er uden filter. Den dømmer ikke på forhånd.

Normalt, når vi erfarer livet, sker det gennem et mere eller mindre instrumentelt eller moralsk filter, hvor vi er opmærksomme på noget bestemt, enten for at bekræfte vores antagelser eller fordi vi tror, at det lige netop er dét, som vi mangler. Vi er ifølge Murdoch egoistiske.

Det, som Weil og Murdoch opfordrede os til, var at overkomme denne instrumentelle tankegang for derved at mærke og blive mærket af livet. Det, som studierne fra DTU viser, er – lader det til – at vi i sjældnere grad mærkes af livet, men i stedet mærker os selv, idet vi hele tiden lader vores opmærksomhed flakke derhen, hvor den bekræfter eller underholder os bedst muligt.

Spørgsmålet er derfor, om en forjaget kultur derved, gradvist, gør vores verden mindre og mindre. Og, om vi derved bliver dårligere til at udvikle vores dømmekraft og vilje.

Bragt i Weekendavisen, #29, 19. juli 2019.

Mind Games

For some, sports is a field with very little on the mind. For others, it’s completely different.

Annie Vernon, a former Olympic rower and now a sports journalist, has written a book about what takes place between the ears of elite athletes. Called Mind Games, it has a clear premise: “Everyone has the physical tools—it’s the mental tools that separate the good from the great.” 

The book is not a practical guide on how to train or toughen your mind, nor is it an academic contribution to the field of sport psychology. Instead, it is like being inside a locker room, full of anecdotes from professional athletes, coaches, and sports psychologists. The book’s methods resemble William S. Burroughs’s cut-up technique, in which the author cut up stories and interviews. But unlike Burroughs, Vernon arranges them in order. 

Readers get access to experiences and reflections from triathletes, rowers, boxers, football players, etc., whose comments are often put into perspective by sports psychologists. 

Mind Games is a book aimed at other athletes, or perhaps people who are new to the field of sport psychology. The book’s writing style is both personal and jovial. For instance, the author is funny and self-ironic, especially in her self-referential footnotes. This can be appealing or the opposite, depending on the reader. Personally, I felt that it took out some of the intensity from the ideas’ presentation; I was in the locker room with all of these amazing athletes but without the sweat and nerves. 

 The book can also be read as a collage of locker room idioms such as “You’re either that person who wants to be best or you’re not. You’re either a chicken or a pig”—“In sport there is no hidden places”—“Being prepared is the best psychological weapon you can have.” 

Vernon succeeds in showing the relevance of these expressions while also stressing, several times, that there is no one way to play the mind game. It depends on your personality. 

Still, since “our mind dominates our body,” what matters is how you move from being involved in your sport to being committed. The thread throughout Vernon’s organization of these personal stories goes something like this: Many athletes have a clear experience of when “the penny’s got the drop,” and they just know when this is it. That is, this is where they move from being involved to being committed. Like a love affair. 

Another common characteristic for athletes—the thing that probably helps the penny to drop—is their competitiveness. Some are competitive in all aspects of life, while some only when it comes to performing in their desired discipline. However, most are competitive in all aspects, even when playing Trivial Pursuit. This drive to win is also what sets the less committed apart from those who are (see also my essay Lance Armstrong as Teacher on will, strength, performance enhancing drugs and ethics).

The really committed also know how to say no to other activities. They know how to stay focused. They know this because they are both intrinsically and extrinsically motivated. That is, they compete with themselves and against others. A lovely quote from the book says: “Of course it’s amazing to be the favorite. Because it means you’re better than anyone else to date.” 

Vernon suggests that elite athletes are a little odd. They have to live like monks: accepting many boring routines, keeping their minds inclined toward positivity even when there are setbacks, and being mindful and self-aware. “Becoming good at learning how to do the process comes from years of reflection and self-awareness,” she writes.

 Lastly, one of the great mental challenges is how to gain confidence. Training is one way: practice, practice, practice. As Vernon writes: “The kind of people who become elite athletes will have a world-class work ethic.” Another element is a positive mind that is capable of boosting yourself up, almost to the level of self-deception, and always seeing problems as fixable challenges. 

All of these steps lead to a greater likelihood of performance excellence, when one has to perform. 

If you’re new to the field of coaching or sport psychology, the book can be read as a light buffet of ideas. And if you’re an ambitious athlete, you will probably find it inspiring.  

Finn Janning, PhD, philosopher and writer. The review was first published in Metapsychology, Volume 23, Issue 29.

Roberto Bolaño og kunsten

Det er ikke muligt at penetrere livets eller kunstens inderste hemmelighed. Men den kan erfares gennem de produkter, som et livs kreative handlinger efterlader. Sådan skal man læse den chilenske forfatter Roberto Bolaño, for sådanne efterladenskaber udgør eksistensens fundament. Og med et sådant kan der måske gives et svar på, hvordan lever man i en verden fuld af vold, pengegriskhed og had?

Læs essayet “Hver eneste forbandet ting er vigtig” i anledning af, at Bolaño døde på en solrig dag, som i dag, tilbage i 2003.

Og jeg stopper først

”Og jeg stopper først, når mænd stopper med at begå overgreb,” skriver Sille Kirketerp Berthelsen i en kronik i Information. 

Offerrollen er blevet så populær, at alle tilsyneladende drømmer om at påtage sig den. Kvinder og mænd, de fremmede, de syge, de arbejdsløse, de smukke, de tynde, de kloge og mindre kloge. Alle er de til tider ofre. For offeret er det altid den anden eller de andres skyld. 

I Berthelsens kronik er det mændenes skyld. De begår overgreb. Og det gør de. Jeg tvivler ikke på statistikkerne eller hendes oprigtighed. Men, modsat hendes spådom, er jeg ikke træt af #MeToo. Tværtimod. 

I Spanien, hvor jeg bor, dør der cirka to kvinder om ugen på grund af hustru- eller parvold. I alt for lang tid har holdningen været – helt forrykt – at lidt fysisk vold er okay. Heldigvis har #MeToo og andre vigtige kampagner igangsat en mentalitetsændring i Spanien (se også When Stupidty Rules).

Men kvinder begår også overgreb af den ikkedødelige karakter, som kronikøren nævner. Mange mænd har fået slynget en barm i ansigtet eller presset nogle hårde bryster mod sin ryg. Mange mænd er også blevet reduceret til objekter af kvinder. Mange mænd har oplevet at blive kysset mod deres vilje. Eller haft en hånd i skridtet efterfulgt af en enten såkaldt smigrende eller fornedrende kommentar om, at der er noget henholdsvis ikke noget at komme efter. Jeg har prøvet det hele. Jeg har også mødt en kvindelig blotter. 

Adfærd er altså ikke partout kønsbestemt, men snarere tegn på at en person er mere eller mindre velfungerende (se også All Women Are Not Angels).

Mine egne erfaringer til trods ser jeg ikke mig selv som offer. Jeg er snarere et menneske, der har erfaret livet på godt og ondt. 

Enkelte vil nok mene, at det skyldes, at jeg er en mand. Og sagen forholder sig unægtelig anderledes for mænd, idet manden ofte er fysisk stærkere og derfor kan virke mere truende (og manden fylder unægteligt væsentligt mere i statistikkerne). Alligevel gjorde den kvindelige blotter mig bange, da jeg mødte hende som niårig.

Jeg tror, at inderst inde i os alle befinder alle de andre sig. Vi former og formes af hinanden.

Stereotyper og generaliseringer er der nok af. De vokser som bekendt, hvor ignorancen trives.

Pointen er, at der findes smukke, respektfulde og tillidsvækkende mænd og kvinder, ligesom der findes mandlige svin og kvindelige orner. 

Af samme grund, så vil jeg gerne være en killjoy – noget typisk filosofisk og ikke partout feministisk – og ønske mig, at kronikøren først ville stoppe, når alle mennesker stopper med at begå overgreb. 

Dette vil kræve, at vi bevæger os udover denne dualistiske dans mellem offer og krænker, hvor positionerne hele tiden skifter, som i en tenniskamp. Når offeret føler trang til at hævne sig, som i kronikken, så kan jeg godt forstå det, ligesom jeg ofte finder vreden produktiv, men problemet er dog, at taktikken nemt kan ende med at bekæmpe had med had.

Det for småligt til at gøre verden mere rummelig. 

En mere frugtbar tilgang ville udspringe af kærlighed. Det vil sige, at i stedet for at gøre et regnskab op, som jo aldrig kan gøres op, når det er så attraktivt at være offer, kunne kræfterne bruges på at skabe et fundament, hvor fremtidens mennesker kan leve frit og kærligt sammen. Som den afroamerikanske feminist bell hooks har påpeget, er kærlighed ikke en naturlig menneskelige evne, men derimod noget vi må lære. Kærlighed forudsætter, at vi mødes med kærlighed, venlighed og medfølelse, hvorved vi også erfarer lighed mellem mennesker – dvs. mellem køn, racer, aldre og seksuelle præferencer. Kærligheden kræver tillid og respekt, hvilket er noget som kultiveres gennem tillidsvækkende og respektfulde handlinger.

At vedkende sig eksistensen af krænkelser og overgreb er første vigtige skridt. Næste skridt må være, at eliminere eller reducere muligheden for fremtidige krænkelser.

Dette projekt kræver, som nævnt, kærlighed, venlighed og respekt, ikke had.     

Denne kommentar blev bragt i en redigeret og forkortet version i Information

Nietzsche and Psychotherapy

It looks like the 21st century will become one of philosophical therapy.

Philosophy has moved out of the ivory tower and back into the public sphere from where it began. At times, this trend enhances the public debate and, at others, only populates philosophy to make it more marketable. The latter is often disguised self-help literature.

Another, more important reason for the awakening of philosophy is that many of today’s illness cannot be graphed using psychology. Stress, burnout, borderline, and depression can no longer be regarded as individual diagnoses. Rather, they are symptoms of a sick society. Among the philosophers who are often used in philosophical therapy, is the late Wittgenstein and his mantra “meaning is use,” or existentialist, especially when they are dealing with a pallet of powerful concepts, such as false belief, anxiety, authenticity, responsibility, freedom, and perhaps most popular, stoicism, which some used to overcome their vulnerabilities and attain peace of mind. For example, the stoic tries to eliminate the passions that cause a person to suffer. Stoicism is closely related to religious or spiritual thinkers in that they operate based on a kind of salvation, a stage in which they no longer suffer from pain or loss.

Then, there is Nietzsche.

Psychotherapist Manu Bazzano has written Nietzsche and Psychotherapy. Unlike the stoic, Nietzsche saw suffering and loss as a part of what makes a life worth living. A full and flourishing life has something at stake. For example, my love for my wife and our children makes me vulnerable because I could lose them.

Nietzsche and Psychotherapy can be read as a Nietzschean experiment that brings some of the German thinker’s concept, including joy, becoming, will to power, etc., into psychotherapy.

Bazzano shows how radical and powerful a thinker Nietzsche is, as well as how psychotherapists can learn or be inspired by his thoughts.

 For example, he tries to compare the life-affirming and life-denying approach by taking what works from psychotherapy and adding a dose of Nietzsche where these practices do not work. “In person-centered therapy it is assumed—rightly, I think—that the person receiving therapy is in a states of incongruence… It is also generally assumed—wrongly, I think—that ‘successful’ therapy means the coming together of organism and self-concept” (p. 31).

The first is right, according to the author, because those who suffer from a crisis indirectly are inviting creative experimentation into their lives. However, they do not do so to find themselves but to overcome. The self is not found; rather, it is achieved or created.

According to Nietzsche, philosophy starts in fear. For example, fear in today’s performance or achievement society has reduced education and therapy into punishment. Here, Bazzano tries to liberate psychotherapy so it becomes more creative and less judgmental. “Therapeia means, after all, healing…The nihilistic, life-denying influence of our culture has made sure that psychotherapy replicates these principles, thus functioning as a mouthpiece for a pervasive ideology of resentment” (p. 134). Instead of a passive nihilistic approach to life, Bazzano suggests the adoption of an “active nihilism” that turns therapy into a kind of entertainment, a term that originally means  “holding together” (p. 150).

Holding what together, we might ask. A myriad of interpretations of what it is that actually is holding life together (or potentially might hold it together), and how intense it is doing so, etc. The approach related to Nietzsche goes against a mechanical, teleological or strictly normative approach; instead it opens for a more intuitive, poetic and liberating relationship to and with life. “Where you can guess, there you hate to deduce,” Nietzsche is quoted for saying. Bazzano call it “therapy without prejudice” (p. 82).

In a psychotherapeutic setting it “means that the criteria of true and false no longer have primacy and are superseded by new criteria of high and low, noble and mean. What begins to matter more is the sense and value of what one thinks, feels and says” (p. 165). In his book on Nietzsche, the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze said something like that we have the thoughts and feeling we have due to our form of life.

Reading Nietzsche and Psychotherapy, you instantly notice that Bazzano is a man with an agenda. He exemplifies Nietzsche, where the German said: “Every talent must unfold itself in fighting” (p. 50).

The book is not a critical inquiry into Nietzsche, but one using Nietzsche to conduct a critical inquiry into psychotherapy, yet always trying to do so in an affirmative way. I would not recommend the book to readers with no knowledge of either Nietzsche or psychotherapy. However, if the reader has some experience in these areas, the book is inspiring. Furthermore, the book is full of illuminating quotes by Nietzsche and Deleuze, which actually make it archaeological.

The writer ends, “We go on digging. The conversation is infinite.”

Review published in Metapsychology, Volume 23, Issue 24

Michel Serres

I first crossed paths with Michel Serres in the late 90s. I was studying philosophy at that time in Copenhagen when I overheard someone speaking about a French writer and philosopher who had a “poetic style.” Shortly afterward, I found a book written by Serres called Genèse published in 1982. The volume marks a shift in his oeuvre from a more traditional academic style to a more poetical tone. For example, from Genèse onwards Serres rarely used footnotes. It was the beginning of the kind of love affair that philosophy is full of—illustrating that philosophical thinking begins with a vital force like loving friendship.

Michel Serres was born in Agen, France in 1930 and died Saturday, June 1st, 2019.

He was the son of a sailor—a path he too followed by entering the École Navale in 1949. In 1952, he began studying at Ècole Normale Supériere. Significant for a multidisciplinary thinker like Serres, he was a licentiate in three disciplines: mathematics, philosophy, and classical philology. After graduation, he returned to sea, working as a naval officer until 1958. Following this period he began teaching, and his philosophical opus began with his doctoral thesis on Leibniz in 1968. Still, the sea never left him. For example, on several occasions, he described philosophy as a journey through an archipelago, where the philosopher connects what is being separated. For a time, Serres was a professor at Stanford in the US, and in 1990, he became a member of the French Academy.

Read the rest of the essay in Erracticus.

We play to survive

We play to survive.

Play refers to our engagement in an activity, either as participants or active observers. It is normally regarded as a fun endeavor that often results in anger and frustration when interrupted. However, I argue that playing is a matter of life and death. Unlike games, which have a competitive element, play is a joyous activity—and when we get bored, we stop or invent new aspects or dimensions of play. Games, of course, can also be joyful, but they differ from playing in the sense that they stimulate an extrinsic motivation, whereas playing is much more intrinsic. We play because we like to play.

Unfortunately, we tend to play less as we age, perhaps because we lose some of the imagination that makes the play worth playing, and we forget the implicit existential lesson within it. 

Play is a metaphysical activity.

Read the rest of the “Play Is the Metaphysics of Becoming” in Erraticus

Mona Lisa Smiled

In 1996, I saw the Mona Lisaat the Louvre in Paris. Standing there in front of the painting, I heard – like many before and after me have heard – an American woman say, “It’s so small.”

The woman was disappointed. She came from a culture where something was being evaluated based on its size. Hearing her, I felt disgusted. As I turned around, I saw—with joy and satisfaction—that she was fat and wearing clothing of no particular style, along with a yellow cap with a guide logo on it. She was part of group wearing identical caps. She didn’t want to get lost. 

Read the rest of my essay in Critical Read

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