How to escape anomie and find stability.

Things in nature work in cycles. The reason something exists is simply to maintain existence till death. In the process of existence things manage to reproduce offspring that are better adapted to the environment in the following life. The process of the individual species is secluded to being, but process of passing itself on for the maintenance of the species is to become a stronger and better adapted species. Things of nature are fleeting in themselves, because the only purpose of them is to exist for the sake of existing, then to die and come back on the form of offspring just for the sake of survival. When looking at the bigger picture the survival of one seems pointless in itself, but what it does for others of its kind in the bigger picture is it makes them better. If we live for the things of nature simply for themselves we live in cycles, but if we can live for something greater with our lives we find something linear, which makes something greater. The reason it’s greater is because we don’t do it for the sake of itself, but to benefit others. It must benefit us in some way first though. If we can’t find satisfaction in becoming a greater person by denying nature more frequently, then we won’t much time in skills we can share. In nature the existence of things are methods of becoming something more because they are there to maintain a greater community. The food, protection, sleeping conditions, and sexual activity exist for sustenance in order to make the lives of everyone better. The vampire bat will share blood with other bats. The chimpanzee will share food with other chimps. The purpose is to maintain a community, and as social creatures this community allows us to become more than we are in ourselves.

When we move from natural control to cultural control it’s because we value something more than a cyclical process. In a civilization we are no longer codependent, but interdependent and the market can take care of our needs and wants. When this happens we no longer see our connection to others as directly. When we gather food from the market it’s to feed ourselves. When we find a home for protection by the law, we sleep for ourselves. When we have sex in modern society we don’t always seek it in those who are part of our community, and now that we have abundant drugs and alcohol we puts these in our bodies only to satisfy ourselves. We can share these things on a greater level, but not till we share cultural control will they become less fleeting in themselves. To share things from nature in themselves with others doesn’t always lead to greater things, because in many cases it doesn’t create a community. Going back to Aristotle the utility friendship is one where we have material things in common at a time. These can be living situations, but they can also be material culture in the form of instruments, art, sculptures, and literature, as well as things that exist in a home. The pleasure friendship in my eyes in purely a communicative friendship, because we wouldn’t share the things of nature with people we couldn’t talk well with. The character friendship is supposed to be where two people want to better each other for the sake of it, but I’d argue that nobody would want to do such a thing for the sake of it. They’d only it if there were pleasure and utility involved first. I’ll call the combination of all these, the complete friendship. Some friendships start with utility and we learn we can communicate well. Other friendships start with good communication and then we decide to share utility. One can always make the other, but it’s not till we have both we want start bettering the person for the sake of it, and they’ll do the same because we’re now codependent on some level.

Notice of all the friendships that none of them are based on nature. Nature in itself is fleeting and the evolutionary argument in some ways is that we have these things, because they helped us survive at one point in time, but they no longer serve a function. The irony of many evolutionists is the bias of some things still having a perfectly useful purpose today while others have no use at all. It’s supposed to be a deductive logic where things fit in the evolutionary model, but they tend to subjectively choose things that are allowed to fit as they desire. One example is that religion may have served a purpose at one time, but just like (too much) food it’s killing us today. After this they’ll turn around say sex is completely natural so we should have lots of it to be healthy as if doing so without being cautious in the way we should eat food shouldn’t also be followed. The things we acquired in nature are still needed. They just aren’t needed as much, and since they aren’t needed as much, it’s the over use of them that makes us stagnant and unproductive, which makes us just humans being. It’s not till we value cultural control over natural control that we can become something better than we are. The thing with nature is it’s cyclical, so to eat now is to be hungry later, to sleep now is to be tired later, to have sex now is to want more sex later, and the drink now is the need to get drunk again later, and the problem with these things in themselves is we must always return back where we started each time. These things don’t makes us better people in themselves. Once we learn to self-bureaucratize and create rituals give us something to do with our days we don’t become bored and cave into our natures. The things with finding cultural control is we always come back where we left off instead of starting over again. When you eat a sandwich you will come back to being just as hungry, but when you try to dance you will be a little better each time. When you sleep you will eventually be as tired again and start back over again, but when you learn to paint or play and instrument you will come back to the skill level where you left off. When we drink it actually causes our bodies distress, but to run a mile is eustress. Both will cause the body stress, but one will make you live worse and the other longer and better. One will cause more problems and the other more enjoyment in the long run. The reason we cave into natural control is depression. When we have no cultural control to invest in we turn to the things we know do have control over because we were given control of these things by nature. If I have no self-bureaucratized hobbies I’ll feel a lack of control in my life and when I can eat something that makes me feel good temporarily I’ll have a feeling of control in my life. If I can’t go about the right way to finding a good relationship with someone I’ll seek to just find sexual gratification in them, because I’m really depressed I can’t find a relationship. Civilization is the cause of loneliness and worry and it’s not till we become resentful enough to self bureaucratize our lives into a sense of cultural control and constant activity that maintains a life that keeps growing that we can have utilities to trade with others for happiness. If we don’t gain knowledge and the ability to communicate well we won’t have people who know can be worth their time, even after our looks fade ,and the truth is looks won’t matter after some time even if we’re beautiful, because we eventually only see someone personality instead of their aesthetics when we’re around them long enough. This is why we developed skills and communication abilities for the long run, and if we find we can share these first, then we can start sharing some of those things from nature later. People who can talk well and share a life together will continue to bond over food, sex, and sleeping amongst one another, but to pursue them in themselves is fleeting.

What civilization creates is the ability to transcend speech through messages rather than verbally and this takes away from an emotional experience. In nature conversation, company, attention, and affection all take place simultaneously. When we invent messages and messengers we can tell people stories without telling them to their face. Some messages take place in the form of laws and others have been in the form of religion. Since we live in larger communities where expressing the norms and laws can’t be said verbally and reinforced automatically, we have laws written so people know as they grow up. Once we move from codependent to interdependent we send people messages about how we feel, but we don’t see their emotional expression. This separates conversation/attention into one category, and company/affection into another. Now we can display attention through conversation in letters, but don’t always get the company and affection we desire in return. This is one of the things that can lead to insanity when one desires more than another, and it’s a way for another to use us for what they want as well. Since nobody really cares about us till we’ve developed a complete friendship the messages become a game for those who choose to play. When civilization makes us insecure we seek to project messages that we think others might approve of to win them over. Since we’re all insecure on some level we’re always trying to escape depression, and when we’re rejected we feel anger. Going back to love and hate being the opposite of apathy, the reason we project love and hate is to get an emotional reaction. We wouldn’t say anything if we didn’t want a reaction or we’d say nothing. We can always expect a reaction among those we’ve developed some kind of friendship, and this kind of attention isn’t cyclical, because we’ve found security in each other, so these conversations always work at making us better. If we are insecure of broken however, we will keep tossing emotions out at random to get a reaction. We will throw out love at those we desire it from and when there’s apathy on the other end we throw hate at them, and this sometimes gets a reaction, but it’s a negative reaction. Regardless we feel temporarily satisfied, but just like nature we throw out love again when, because this person we desire still isn’t what we’d like in our lives. We become depressed when ignored and angry for attention again. Broken people are only good for other broken people, because they want to constantly cycle their emotions at each other in a manner that never makes them better people. The way we get used by this even more is through messages. Now we can write messages showing attention and conversation from one end, and the person on the other end doesn’t need to give us conversation or company in return while feeling validation by our words. It’s not till we become emotionally intelligent that we learn to not chase people who don’t respond in person, and not just respond in person, but respond as frequent as we’d like the way we like. Messages are only good for people we’ve already developed stability with, the same way they are written in laws to maintain a stable community and the community respects the laws because the community is stable. The mistake we make most is we tend to tell ourselves a different story than the one we originally walked through life with when it comes in conflict with another story. For example if my personal story is to meet someone who wants to spend every day with me, and I meet someone else who seems to communicate well with me that says they only want a couple days a week with me, I’ll tend to change my story to fit theirs, which gives them more power in the situation, because it’s the person who cares the least in a situation we embrace that always has the most power, because they have the most apathy. Once we bend our track to fit another track so the stories can make sense we become unstable in ourselves. This eventually will lead to what Emile Durkheim would call a state of anomie (state of normlessness). When we change what the norm is for our most emotional comfort to suit someone else that hasn’t established empathy through reciprocity first, it will eventually lead to a tremor. Once we receive a tremor in a relation with someone we haven’t already established good communication and utility between or that is fading, the tremor is a sign that an earthquake is inevitable. In other words, once someone shows they can’t be the original story we wanted it’s already over and it’s only a matter of time till the earthquake hits. In many cases we prolong the earthquake and our suffering, because we aren’t emotionally intelligent enough to just put ourselves where it feels good once things feel bad and we try to rationalize how to keep this person in our lives that makes us unhappy in this state of anomie. The only way to do this is to be blunt and demand they see you as often as you like as much as you like or there is no reason to continue speaking. If they choose not to then we’re automatically in a better place even if it doesn’t feel like it right away, because the tremor wouldn’t have eventually caught up to us. Unlike Buddhism that says to give up desire. I believe desire is healthy and not just desire but desire for things that can keep getting better each time we return. A person who comes in our life that isn’t better each time we come back isn’t someone that helps us become better people. These people are broken and if anything is to work out it wouldn’t be for several years when they have possibly changed in the future. Our anger used to express emotion and our rejection that creates depression is only for broken people to subsist on with each other, while those of us who put our feet down where we know it feels good will keep finding personal progress. This is why we should care about our home and the people who live there the most, and the people who we interact with through the home. Those who prove they can share the conversation or utility and desire the other as well are the only people who will give us the emotional comfort we desire. Those who show us apathy when we are distressed should be ignored back and left to be broken with the other broken people that don’t aid our progression.

The Epicurean ethic applied to the emotional school of thought.

The Epicurean ethic applied to the emotional school of thought.

Epicurus (341–c. 270 BC) had the belief that the best life was a life of happiness, and the way to achieve this was to pursue pleasure that would cause the least pain. Epicureanism gets confused with hedonism sometimes in that seeks pleasure in life as an intrinsic value in itself. The highest pleasure is tranquility and the freedom from fear. The way to obtain this is through knowledge, friendship, and a temperate life. It started off as an opposing school to Platonism but eventually became the main opponent of Stoicism. Epicurus bought a house with a garden and it became known as the philosophy of "The Garden". Some of greatest differences in ethical approaches between Epicureanism and Stoicism are pleasure versus ridding oneself of desire. Pleasure versus self-preservation. Pleasure as self-preservation being inseparable versus self-preservation leading to valuing of reason, which leads to excellence. Epicureans don't see it necessary to eliminate emotions because only a few are needed in moderation for a good life. Stoics sought to control emotions through self-restraint because they'd hinder reason and excellence.

Today we will be Epicureans due to the fact that my philosophy on morality is one based on emotions. The point of Epicureanism is to reach Atraxia or disambiguation, and the way this is done is by living life through observation of the senses, and not being clouded by thoughts of things non-evident we'd like to inquire about. Its focus is on pleasures in moderation and those pleasures are those of the mind rather than those of the body. It's more important who we eat with rather than what is eaten. It's not about suppressing pleasure as much as artificial pleasures created by culture and politics, so it's very focused on a simple private life away from public traditions like marriage. Epicurus was celibate his whole life, but didn't impose it on those who followed his philosophy. Reciprocity is another important feature because it's beneficial. Epicureanism later influenced utilitarian thought based on pleasure and pain by Jeremy Bentham, which is good when being applied to obeying the law or a market system, but what should be kept in mind is that utilitarianism and market systems are about immediate gratification and punishment, or supply and demand. The problem with this is it doesn't allow for long-term rewards and punishments and only focuses on cognitive dissonance of things built on through our own experiences. If we have a bad experience like touching a hot stove it's a well lesson learned, but someone hurts our feelings this isn't the same as that from nature because nature to an extent can run on scientific laws that repeat like gravity, but people are not all the same, and we may take a bad experience from the past and associate it with the present taking away from a possible long term reward available. Market systems are amoral so they give us what we want, but not always what we need. For example we can get material goods we desire based on supply and demand but we may not be supplied well with health care and education by the market, because only those who can afford it will get it. When the news shows us stories we want to see because they're exciting we might not always see important information we need to see. If we place this on a micro level to the individual we have to keep in mind things that feel good are always what is best for us in the long run.

This is where I create what I call the emotional school of thought. A popular belief in democratic societies is that rationality is good and emotions are bad. The reason emotions are seen as bad is because we tend to only think of them in one context in contrast to rationality, which outburst or anger, so a person who can't keep their calm and be rational must be acting crazy, but if we had no emotion or passion we would be robots with nothing driving us to love or hate enough to drive us to opinion. The same is seen when it comes to emotions as a weakness, but I believe emotions are our greatest strength, and the only reason people become crippled by emotions is because they aren't emotionally intelligent. They're busy trying to rationalize their way through problems instead of following their gut to where it feels good. If we followed our true emotional desires and rationalized around them we'll find true happiness. An example of this is a man I know who is trying to figure out why this woman keeps calling, but won't come to hang out. He's trying to come up with numerous theories as to why, and the one he believes is she wants to control him and make him want her, so the solution is to figure out a way to control her back in order to get her in his life. This over rationalizing will only drive a person crazy. First of all even if he could trick her into his life he'd find she isn't what he really wants, because he had to trick her there. The second problem is that he thinks she cares enough to want to control him. The truth is we live in a world where nobody cares about us. They only care about what we can do for them, and since we're emotional creatures, I see this woman flipping through a Rolodex in her head whenever she wants emotional attention. If nobody is in front of her at the time she scrolls to the first name available and calls. It's not about him for who he is as much as it's about he's available and nobody else is right now. As soon as someone else is around he won't exist again till she's alone.

Civilization has made all of us insecure, because we live in a world where we're amongst strangers, and we all want emotional attention. This is in our nature beneath all rationality. If there were two amoebas swinging their cells around it isn't to find a special amoeba, but to connect with whatever touches it first. Once it connects it finds emotional validation. This is all we really want in life from a world of insecurity. Although I may not completely agree with Epicurus, there are some important lessons to be learned. In a world of insecurity we need to use reciprocity to test people to see if they're worthy of our time. The mistake of my friend is he's trying to control a situation where he has no control, because there is apathy on the other end toward him. It's not till someone can love enough of the things we can do for them that they'll begin to love us for who we are personally. Once we've reached this phase we no longer see selfishness and a desire to get what these people can do for us. We are now a machine that functions as one. Now two is more powerful than one and others who would like to be selfish and see this will either join or flee, because they can't compete. This is how a moral society forms and only the deviants remain as criminals. These morals form around our emotions for stability and happiness. When enough people find this is possible the same way it because the rule opposed to those who won't cooperate with it. People who can't find emotional intelligence will pull their hair out over and issue they can't change in their favor instead of just doing what they know they really want. A step up from this is realizing what we want and trying to trick people into it like call me later till they finally call saying I'm coming to see you, but these people never exist as we'd like them to. A step up from this is to know what we'd like emotionally and put our foot down right there demanding what we want and others can't meet it they should leave. Finally, to reject people who can't meet our emotional needs in a kind way that causes them to still think highly of us on their departure will go into the world wanting to be more like us and create world more like the one we'd like to live in.

The secret to finding what we want in people isn't seeking it out in others as much as to stay on our track where we know things work well. Nature gave us many important attributes, and if we look at early societies and how they functioned perhaps we'll have a formula for what can make us happy. Instead of trying to control a situation where we'd like more and can't get it, we should focus on what we can get, and when we're doing this just like the amoebas we'll find there are some people who happen to connect with us on a regular basis the way we like and makes us emotionally comfortable and stable the way we were before, but on a higher level. The first tenant of Epicureanism is friendship. If anything hurts us the most in life its chasing after love and being hurt. Friendship is far more valuable in the long term. Love is what we want and not always what we need. If we look back at the hunter-gatherer we find tribes, and just like Epicurus lived in a house with his friends the tribe lived together. As social creatures this is an important things crated by civilization that has been taken from us, especially in a place like America where independence and individualism are more important than teamwork. That means the first step is to establish a tribe. Friends are what Aristotle would see as the pleasure friendship. The next step would be to add the utility friendship, or find friends we enjoy the company of and share some basic material things with them like food, shelter, and protection. Sharing these basic needs will make a home where we can be happy together and better take care of ourselves because we take care of each other. This emotionally comfortable and stable home will always give us a place of refuge. Another tenant should be physical contact. Now we go back to the speech about sodomy that will lead to other topics, but lets keep in mind what Plato said about loving people for their virtues. Men more than women have been taught that it's wrong to touch each other, but it doesn't have to be in what we know as a sexual manner. The greatest sources of stimulation are the brain and the skin. Having the ability to hold or be held reinforces morale.

If there were ever a problem with the modern relationship, it's that we've been taught that it should revolv around sex, and love, and that sex is love and love is sex, so a good sexual relationship is a healthy relationship, and one without good sex isn't healthy. If happiness is more about friendship and we look at the hunter gatherer we find that men and women were economically codependent, shared a home, shared children, and we more than just sexual partners. They were part of a greater community of friends that took care of each other. The modern relationship is dyadic, and we're taught to move away from the public life and deep involvement with others causing a far more intense relationship leading to stress. The great feature of the tribe is that we have others we can spend time with and talk to who also share similar lives with us. We seem to keep the same friends for several years without this stress, but not lovers. This is where I'll have to create a term to sum up what it really takes to find a stable and healthy relationship today. I'll call it "Epano Love" with the Ancient Greek word for "more than" placed in front of love. A relationship needs Epano Love, because love and sex in themselves are not enough to keep two people close. Why does a friendship work so well for so long? It's about having shared goals and a shared identity. Finding people who are willing to cooperate in the long term as well as share material resources is a start, but there is something that needs to come before this. Since morality had to form before religion and religion was needed to give us a story to know how to live, so we didn't have to repeat the process of reciprocity in law, we need to find people who share our story of how to live. In religion there is always a sacred and a profane. The sacred is the ritual that binds a community together, and the profane is the everyday life they live around this. A church is a great place to meet people who share a story with us. If we don't have a church perhaps we have a political party where we meet others in activities that we care about. Above all we something I call Self-Bureaucratization. Stability is gained by doing things on a regular basis that make us better people. It's true that nature gave us a function for food, sleep, and sex, and we even crave alcohol or drugs, but these things are the things we want, and don't always need. These things in minimal amounts leaving room for a focus on greater things will give us room to be greater people. All the things from nature in civilization are fleeting, and should only be done with friends. That means we need to self-bureaucratize by finding talents, competence, and skills. A human being is human going nowhere, but a human doing is a human becoming something greater that they were prior. The things of nature only bring temporary happiness with a desire for more of the same thing, but the things of ritual will make us specialists in things we can share. The food we put in our mouths, and the sleep we crave only benefit our bodies, and the sex we enjoy with those we haven't developed empathy for ends the night it begins. To self-bureaucratize is to become good at things like music, art, physical abilities, dancing, career skills, and in today's society we live in a reflection of the past in many ways where women are no longer chained by physical chains, but their souls are chained, because they're still taught o be cute and pretty, and they learn to rely on this till they're middle aged and another young girl takes their place, but a woman who can become competent and skilled has things to share beyond sex and love. She has the tings to share that true friends share and those are hobbies that make us better people. This means those we learn to share our goals and hobbies with will make the best lovers, because we have epano love and only seek to better each other beyond things that can happen in a bedroom. We should seek these epano friendships in everyone we meet, and when we meet people we're attracted to, we should invite them to spend time with our tribe of friends so they can see us in our natural element, and if they don't show up it doesn't seem awkward, because it doesn't seem like a date. It seems like we want friends who can share greater things with our community, and us and perhaps if they want to become part of the community love may come later, and if they leave and we feel hurt our community will reinforce our morale till another comes along. We shouldn't kiss those we aren't sure will be close enough to share our lives first in greater fashions beforehand, and this will avoid drama and pain. The same as hunter-gatherers sent a wife to a tribe for goods, and the wife became part of the new community, we should be focused on bringing other into our communities. This is what we need and not just what we want and it will bring the greatest happiness. Next I will go back into religion and messages