everyday philosophy
on falling down and feeling incompetent
Hi friends,
We hope you are masked-up and doing well 🤗
This week, as told through favorite quotes we came across:
J:
(re: this meme)
N:
(I’m sorry if this makes me sound like an ASMR mouse, for some reason I sound like I’m asleep????)
It’s ironic that we’ve chosen to write about philosophy this week, given that we were asleep 70% of the time during our freshmen Philosophy lectures. Clearly, all of this is to say that we are not experts: rather, inspired by some of the philosophers we do remember, we wanted to write about the way these principles guide our everyday lives.
A thoughtful sky (haha)
N:
The Philosophy of Falling (alt title: Fall-osophy)
I started off this week thinking I was going to write about the Philosophy of Walking. I read that many great philosophers walked as a form of thinking. Nietzsche used to walk quickly, up to 8 hours a day when he was composing his thoughts into volumes. In contrast, Kant used to walk slowly and delicately – afraid of getting sunburn. I was going to write about how walking is a meditative portal into the mind. That when I walk, every muscle feels extended like rubber bands being stretched to a point of breaking but at the same time, something within me slackens and relaxes. I wanted to write about beauty, calmness, groundedness. The ‘love affair that is the walk home’.
“When there is really nothing left to do or believe, except to remember, walking helps retrieve the absolute simplicity of presence, beyond all hope, before any expectation.” – Frédéric Gros
I was thinking about all these things before I got literally run into and over by a man near my home yesterday, scraping both my knees and my shoulder. One moment I was walking and the next, I was on the gravel. It was such a strange experience if only because it was so easily avoidable. It was jarring that my safety could be compromised in such a strange manner – at the same time, I recognized that in so many ways it could be a lot worse. It was just a scrape. I was lucky not to have fallen into the ditch that I stared into as I lay there, shocked.
Still, later on, I felt somewhat sorry and embarrassed for myself. I was mostly mad that the fall wasn’t even for some glorious bike ride down a steep mountain, wind flowing through my hair. Nor was it from an exhilarating, risk-filled, day of romping around and exploring. It had just occurred on some random weekday on a random gravel filled road. It was the unpredictability of it and the lack of choice, suddenly, that got to me. I had never thought of myself as vulnerable in that way. I guess life has a strange way of alerting us to our frailty.
Anyways, instead of the Philosophy of Walking, it’s probably more relevant to think about the Philosophy of Falling. Sometimes things happen for no reason, things beyond your control. This applies to events both good and bad. Randomness has it that in our lifetimes we will fall, stumble, maybe collapse. Sometimes your fall will be self-inflicted. Sometimes it will be because someone pushed you. And we have to accept that we all are flawed, malicious, ignorant in our own ways. When there are small things that don’t go our way, we need to recognize their smallness. I like to think of this as changing the temperature, volume, and channel of our thoughts. This doesn’t mean we should ignore our feelings or disregard pain and suffering in the world (that which is existential and very real: grief, poverty, etc). But when we are faced with small injuries, small obstacles, instead of dwelling on the bad we can and should delegate parts of our energy directed at anger, self-pity, and annoyance towards relishing the immensity of good.
Like sailors in an ocean, instead of focusing on the directionless movement, the unexpected, we can lean into being surrounded by the vast and mysterious sea. Knowing the waves and chaos makes its calmness all the more beautiful.
J:
A Beginner’s Guide to Philosophy
2020 feels like a blip in the space-time continuum. My mom was filling out documents the other day and asked my brother and I for the date. June 27. For a moment, it feels like I’m experiencing whiplash. In my head it is still May, and I’m complaining about how slowly time inches forward. All of a sudden, we are on the heels of July.
With this realization also comes the reminder that Nicole and I have been working on this newsletter for over three months now. A small milestone, but significant nonetheless. Before this era of online learning and infinite hours at home, I had always craved for the time to pursue a passion project. The edges of my planner are often lined with overly-ambitious ideas (eg. code a website from scratch) that are quickly buried by the arrival of problem set deadlines. Kopi Club represents one of the few projects seen to fruition.
At the start, we came up with a schedule that has remained unchanged for the most part: we call early on in the week to discuss ideas, spend the next few days word-vomiting all over a Google doc, and reconvene on the weekends to edit, mildly panic, and publish. 12 weeks to streamline the writing process - and yet, this week’s issue isn’t any easier to write than our very first introduction. “I’m stuck” is how I often begin most editing calls. Writing sprints are less so “sprints” than they are a series of uncomfortable starts and stops; the thrill of a new idea met with the itching inability to put it into words. It is strange to even really think of myself as a writer, when I seem to spend more time doing anything but write. 12 weeks later, and I still feel like a novice on my keyboard.
In Zen Buddhism, the word shoshin describes “the beginner’s mind”. The beginner’s mind: in a success-obsessed culture, this almost sounds like an insult. For most, it connotes a lack of skill, inexperience. Shoshin, however, means something entirely different. It is a state of openness and wonder: the willingness to learn and continue doing so, even if one is already an expert. I love this idea - that growth is not about the progression away from a beginner's mindset, but the adoption of it.
I am constantly reminded about the many ways I am a beginner: as an amateur writer struggling to form coherent sentences, and more generally as a human being scared about entering my early 20’s. Strange, because I didn’t expect to greet the arrival of adulthood still feeling wholly unprepared. In September, I’ll begin my final year of college, and the term ‘senior’ still feels very much like a misnomer. Even sooner, I’ll turn 21. Growing up, this number used to bear so much more significance. I remember watching Princess Diaries 2 and seeing a 21-year-old Mia Thermopolis assume the crown for Genovia. At 20, I struggle to govern my own emotions.
On a more comforting note, I recently received some advice from a friend about the realities of adulting: she admitted that it was all just a front. The notion that someone in their early twenties would have their act completely together is a lie. In reality, no one this age actually knows what the hell they’re doing. Shoshin then becomes an equally important reminder that the beginner’s mindset is not about a daunting lack of knowledge, but liberation. The ability to move forward without any assumptions about what the correct path looks like. As I blow out the candles on my 21st birthday cake, this will be the thing I wish for.
“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few.” - Shunryu Suzuki
PS: Kopi Club will now be released every Monday evening!
Hugs,
J & N