Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Who is this Guy?

I feel like Meursault is the type of person who likes to keep his emotions bottled up where he does not let them show. He goes through the day uncaring and yet I feel that in his head many thoughts are going on but he does not dwell on them. After the funeral he is sitting and watching everyone go by and is merely observing their actions, sort of living through them. Yet he really only gives observations and I wonder what he is really thinking about. I wonder if he ever thought about joining them, actually going out and "living" instead of being passive and a spectator. I think while reading this book many people consider him to be a jerk because he is indifferent to his mother's death and goes through life detached. But I feel if everyone was to reflect on their lives there would be certain moments in which everyone was detached or indifferent to the world around them. I know I certainly do. If something is on my mind and I am trying to figure things out it can be seen as not really being involved in life but I am actually just trying to solve something. There are also the times where you feel like you just have to be alone. That another persons company is not wanted and that you just want to close your self to the outside world. This for me comes from being too stressed or that I feel very cramped with everyone always around me, even though one can argue that just because there may be many people in a room, you are still alone. So in a way I can relate to Meursault because no one really knows how one is going to act when a parent dies and I feel like because something happened in his life, he is unable to perhaps trust other people and himself because he can not be open.

I agree somewhat with what Vincent had brought up in class that the author was leaving Meursault so detached from the world so that the reader can be part of the story by bringing/ plugging in their own emotions. I can tell how someone can be reading and fill in their emotions to the lack of Meursaults. Although there are certain points in his life where I feel like I would go about it in the same way and even do it sometimes in my life. While he is talking to Salamano and Raymond about how their day had went or in gaining a friendship it felt to me that he was merely accommodating them, in both instances he felt nothing and said what he thought they wanted to hear, so that the conversation would not drag on any longer or that he would not have to add anything to the conversation. I often feel like at certain points I do that when I do not really like the person and so I am just trying to find a way out of it by merely saying what they want to hear. I also do that when I want to prevent any confrontation, I just put nothing forward like my thoughts and feelings so that nothing could be brought up that would cause a conflict. I guess in a way we are both being lazy and perhaps scared to actually show our true feelings because we do not know how they will be interpreted.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

different philosophies

I believe that there is no right answer to whether we live in a meaningful world because everyone has his or her own ideas on what living a meaningful life looks like. There are also some who believe that their lives are not meaningful and see no real point in life and then there are others who think everything is meaningful and wonderful. These are the two extremes and I feel like on most days of our lives we are a mixture of both, we do not lean to much on one side but instead are somewhere in the middle. I think our answers come from our experiences, if we go through something bad or sad in our lives we might result to having the opinion that life is not meaningful and then we can go through something that makes us happy or changes our life in a good significant way and we think, yea my live is meaningful.

“Everything is the same, even if it’s different” (Bernard and the blanket). I believe that this is true. I feel like there is more to our lives then how we are living them and we are not really seeing the big picture. Though often times I can see where people will be like, we’re not connected, nothing matters. Just like in Banach’s lecture where he says that we can only feel our own pain and no one else’s, we cannot really connect with anyone. Looking at the guy sitting across from you on the subway there is no clear picture that says we are the same, even if we are different. Nothing bounds them together then perhaps that they are both living. But I want to believe that everything is the same, and everything matters. It paints a much more beautiful picture of the world. I can see how we are the same and connected. One action I take will undoubtedly affect someone else and vise versa. Nothing we do in life only affects us. This is the beginning to thinking with a view on life that is meaningful.

“Once you realize the universe sucks, you got nothing left to lose” (Tommy). I also agree with this statement. If you convince your self that nothing matters and there’s no point to anything then why do anything? Or you can do anything because of the fact that it is unimportant. I think Tommy had fallen to the end of his journey and just stopped caring and figured that since so many bad things kept happening one after the other, there was not much point to anything, I can say truthfully there have been moments where I feel like I’ve been pushed down too much and do not see the point of getting back up anymore. But then something happens in which someone extends their hand and helps me back up. I feel like for Tommy that was Dawn when he meets her in the burning house.

Thus there is no one real truth to it. There will be a forever “overlapping, Fractured philosophies” of life and whether it’s meaningful or not. People just need to figure out their own truths and perhaps like Albert needs to experience both extremes first before figuring out where he stands in life.

Sunday, October 4, 2009

comments on part 3 and 4

Jia min,

I agree with you that Happiness is a relative term because it has no one true definition. Banach explains it as we are the only ones who can tell how we ourselves are feeling and we use our own experiences to define how other people are feeling. Thus based on our opinion some people think our own definitions are what is happiness and others take it as everyone has happiness in accordance to themselves and their feelings.

I kinda agree with you that we do not have freedom but I feel it is still in our presence of mind to choose to follow those set rules. Though I agree it might be harder for us today because of all that society wants of us. That and the different expectations everyone holds for themselves and what others hold for them.

I think its interesting what you said "I believe that there is real happiness when one feels it and I don't expect that we need to explain to anyone when we feel that real happiness." That it feels like if we start to explain then everything can come into the open and we may notice that their are flaws with in our thinking and that will break the spell. Or something like that.

I love your ideas and your post, it got me really thinking.

Marco,

I agree that no ones lives are meaningless because they die. People are always leaving behind something of themselves so that others can learn from them. I also love your definition of happiness. I feel like this is a more real definition and more relatable then Banachs.