Reflection VI
Introduction
The study of any early civilization immediately means the study of their temples and places of worship. Looking at certain old places of worship in the history of civilization, such as Göbekli Tepe in southern Türkiye (known as the oldest place of worship in the history of civilization) or millennia later in Egypt around 2000 B.C., we can clearly see how humans have built their society and daily life very closely around an understanding of supernatural ways of giving meaning to their existence. To make sense of the world around us, of any inconvenience, of any event that looks like a chance or luck, or to understand the only certainties of existence, that are birth and death, we have always created our own mystical meaning for these meaningless occurrences and covered it and attributed it to gods, stars, animals as spiritual beings and later, after almost undergoing a conscious evolution, to a single God. When the success of existing societies today results mostly from a once-existing early civilization around a supernatural approach to life, how do we, as humans, place ourselves in the middle of a non-localizable space without attributing its purpose to something spiritual? How manageable is it for a human to become a pragmatic and down-to-earth thinker when one of the first things to which we have attached ourselves during our journey after becoming humans, was our determination to avoid anything down-to-earth?
In this post, I would like to make a distinction between believing in something because of its rational and common sense properties and believing in something because that is what we have always done as humans. I would like to discuss how natural it is for humans to want to believe in something more, and in something invisible, by also stating and defending my own worldview, which is active nihilism. I will furthermore explain the difference between active and passive nihilism.
It is clarified in the introduction of this blog that I refer to superstitious approaches (religion or spirituality) as non-logical and non-rational ways of thinking because they do not have a place in my worldview and my way of giving meaning to events. My choice of words when discussing superstitious beliefs does not have belittlement or arrogance as a reason. I believe in respecting each other's beliefs by also being able to express one's thoughts.
Avoiding the existential crisis
Throughout our journey of evolution, after satisfying our basic and primal survival needs in the world, the next need we had to satisfy was one that was existential and about our place in the world. We became conscious beings and we had to make sense of the two certainties there are in life: birth and death. Between these two events that don't take place without each other, we have filled the empty gap of existence with one of the many things that create distinctions between humans and other species, which is our remarkable and creative ability to fantasize and tell stories. This ability we have has also been a helping hand throughout history to answer certain existential questions for which we avoided bittersweet pragmatic responses or logical, down-to-earth explanations.
The basis of all of our efforts to create religions, to turn the night sky with stars into a story of a God who looks like He is embracing the Earth, or to turn earthly material and water into a touchable statue and material, thus idealizing the untouchable images in our unconsciousness and subconsciousness, boils down to our avoidance of the empty existential reality as it is. Instead of allowing every individual to find and create their purpose in this vast space and spectrum of many possibilities, we have systematized certain primal and specific cultural codes that stabilize a society by turning it into a structure of obeisance and authority. In this matter, our ability to create a language and its immediate political purpose for creating order plays an important role in understanding religion. Anywhere with more than one human is a space where language must fulfil its political purpose for that +1 amount of people to be able to live compatibly. It is one of the most distinguishable things we have done as humans to make everyday existence in a society tolerable and habitable. For performances, done by the head of a society, that needed an acceptable reason to justify their feasibility, we as humans have attributed the purpose of it to a God or a superstitious belief to legalize what our ratio today wouldn't accept in most cases around the world, such as killing, restricting freedoms or accepting discrimination, all of them under 'the law'. With this, I would like to clarify the importance we have put into creating a society through the operation of politics and storytelling since the day we started to use language to express a limited part of what we can express, all of it to systemize order and teach its codes for the sake of stability. All religions that came into existence are intertwined with the games of language, its political purpose and its motivation to realize some sort of stability that is seeked by the person who claims to be the head of that specific religion.
It is natural for humans to believe in God
Letting go of the idea of our instinct to believe in a God might be scary because we might be associating it unconsciously with the idea of letting go some sort of order in the disordered emptiness of existence, free of any sort of plan and purpose. In doing so, we might feel like we are losing the control of having mental and existential stability. It is not because as humans we have done something for so long, that the reason behind it must be the proof of the practice's purpose, thus the existence of God or a spiritual destination. The only thing that this need for practising a belief in a supernatural being or a spiritual way of existing proves, is our basic need for filling the empty gaps and avoiding the existential reality of nothingness. Being able to grasp the little freedom of creating your personal purpose in life is something that needs deep independence from any imposed meaning in life, profound attention to what makes you want to wake up in the morning to experience life and that gives you mental peace and satisfaction for the long run. To be able to find your way in this stretched space of so many possibilities of meaning and purpose is for someone who gives themselves the time to grow and be in touch with the beauty of the freedom nothingness of existing possesses.
It is when we openly correspond and embrace the absence of a universal purpose and plan that we can have a chance to feel the most human possible in its most naked and natural way. That is exactly how the universe behaves, but most importantly, it is also how the stars behave: chaotically and disorganized, just like every particle of dust and atom in it does. Humanity is the result of a supernova (the explosion of a star) and we are made up of dust that was found inside a dying star. It wouldn't be wrong to say, As Brian Cox meant it, that we are literally the children of stars, as he cited in the 'Wonders of the Universe', "Every carbon atom in every living thing on the planet was produced in the heart of a dying star." If we can synchronize our mental existential state with the way the universe and the stars in it behave, which is free from meaning and divine plan, that is when we might awaken a profound, yet very light and delicate touch with existence to open up our curiosity to find ourselves and our own purpose in life. We might start to love every meaningless occurrence around us, and instead of looking at the meaningless reality as something negative, which is the connotation that the word itself holds, we might see it as part of life and the processes that nature undergoes every single second: existing, surviving and passing it onto the next generation for the sake of existing, surviving and passing it onto the next generation without purpose, meaning and plan.
We are just like the turtles who pop out of their eggs in the sand and immediately try to make it into the ocean without being eaten by the birds that are in a rush above them to try to catch their snack of the day. And then, when these turtles make it into the ocean and live long enough, they repeatedly come back to the shore to lay eggs and go back into the water, for the sake of surviving and passing on their genes until they can't do it because they died at the end of their incredible journey. That is all and there is nothing in between the lines to see or to grasp: first, as humans, we are born, and then we constantly process and give out information, and if we are lucky, we might have created our own purpose if we can break free from any imposed meaning in life, and finally, we die. Thanks to our imagination, we have been able to satisfy the empty gaps in our existence without being aware of our efforts to idealize reality.
Through the eyes of a religious person: not having a God sounds scary
Growing up with a dominant presence of God makes it almost impossible to be able to disconnect mentally even for a day from Him, but in doing so, one can realize that nothing much changes in their lives. The good that comes to someone in their daily life does so because of the circumstances that follow each other and the result happens to be advantageous to the affected person. The bad and unfortunate that take place, do so because it is also the result of so many occurrences that end up affecting you negatively with disadvantageous properties. Matter of fact, in this space and time, we are always somewhere, and as long as we are alive, things will occur actively and passively out of which some will be neutral and some will affect us positively or negatively. The good or bad that we experience is not in the hands of a God. His presence or absence does not change anything and there is a logical reason for that. Since, as humans, we have been using more of our brains for asking questions and are aware of our existence in the middle of nowhere, believing that we are all swinging meaninglessly between the possible range of experiences is not a worldview that sounds fascinating for most of us. Still, all reality starts from that point and the most factual worldview is the neutral nothingness. Any other 'universal' worldview that has been created is a reflection of either a specific culture with its traditions, personal preferences, rules, laws or politics, but mostly, of our devoted avoidance to accept that our existence is meaningless.
Active nihilism vs. passive nihilism
As you might have understood from the thoughts that I expressed above, I quite believe that life does not have an inherent meaning that can be accepted as universal. For those who are not familiar with what nihilism really is, they might think of my worldview as one that is pessimistic, groomy and gray. In fact, I do think that there are gray fractions in nihilism in which someone can be destructive with their thoughts to themselves and to the people around him/her. I believe every individual should be open to tap into their deep thoughts and reflections to find what their purpose is in their life. Some of us might even have many purposes, changing over the course of their life. To me, active nihilism might be a freeing condition that can also push us to destroy old values and ways of thinking that are difficult to synchronize with the new ways of life in every generation. In this case, I embrace absurdity and am devoted to live according to my own values, without diverting too much from the law, but allowing myself to divert as much as I want from imposed meanings of life and certain forced rules of traditions that mean nothing.
Social media and other channels have mostly portrayed nihilism with passive nihilism. People who tend to be passive nihilists are the ones who become overly passive, as the name says it, and they resign themselves to kind of give up finding their meaning and purpose in life, thus also overlooking moments that can be cherishable and enjoyable. They are the ones who do not listen to their will or desires and the reason for that is to minimise the suffering they face from the meaninglessness of the world, and to me, this is what can turn someone into a very lame and boring person. Once someone lets themselves turn into a passive existing thing, without using the capacities they have, the mind starts to destroy itself and it might lead to a deep sense of pessimism. I believe this crucial difference between active and passive nihilism is very important to understand to still be able to distinguish what it means and feels to be human versus letting all your thoughts down and almost waiting passively for death. This worldview where someone takes away all meaning from things because they will die anyway, might be experiencing death before dying. We should twist our perspective and believe that, because we will die anyway, we should cherish the nice moments and not turn daily life passive because of death. Accepting and not being in conflict with the emptiness, nothingness and absurdity of life can still make someone enjoy their life. As Epicurus said, "If I am, then death is not. If death is, then I am not. Why should I fear that which can only exist when I do not?"
Conclusion
Even if there is meaninglessness in the core of our existence, this does not imply that we should reflect it on all of the aspects of our lives. If we do not listen to our fears, suffering and pain and also cover them by the fact that suffering is meaningless, we will only harm the functioning of our bodies because at that point we are affecting our mental health. To me, my active nihilism is my worldview, but it is not something that controls my whole life. It affects the way I stand in front of challenges and beautiful moments, but it has no power and authority over the other sides of my life. It is not because I have an active nihilist approach to life that I will not care about the people in my life, or about my motivation and inspiration to fulfill my desires and follow my dreams. This blog is one example to showcase how I do not let passivity become a dominant trait in my personality and daily life. Most of us will never admit it, but existence was already and has always been meaningless with or without God. So, in the midst of all of this chaos, the only thing we can always do, is not to shut ourselves down because all of it doesn't matter, but on the contrary, we can enjoy things because all of it doesn't matter.
Thank you
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