The Desert of the I

 You like to think you owe your brother nothing. Your "neighbor", after all, is as distant from you as your most distant ancestor. What do you owe to these people who existed in places, times and circumstances so different from yours, to the point that, if by a completely implausible miracle you were to meet them, you would feel like you were dealing with aliens? In fact, these "others" who came before you, whose fatuities led them to engender, little by little, the acts that would result in your existence, had little or nothing to do with you, neither in language, nor in manners, nor in ideals. If you have a surname in common with them, that's all of it. And if from this multitude of anonymous people, your "flesh", your "blood", did not inherit any trace of gratitude, what can we say about being grateful to these strangers who swarm around you, with other names, other faces, other languages, other bodies, demanding your sacrifice, demanding ...

  "(...) he was the one among the philosophers who brought real suffering into the sphere of philosophy. Until then, until Hegel, philosophers were mere creators of systems.  Systems which were impenetrable,  logical, but also completely dead, because they lacked any element of real vitality. The philosopher got used to explaining everything, but at the same time explaining nothing, and life got used to go ahead just fine without him. Because he was content with pure concept, with pure theory, being, notoriously, always unfit for life. With the exception of those ancients, such as Epicurus, who tried to make philosophy a study for practical reality. These few, however, were labeled as non-philosophers, for trying to move, however timidly, from mere theoretical formulation to everyday wisdom. With Schopenhauer, a whole new period of Western thought was inaugurated, now open to the influence of ancient Eastern wisdom. And so, contrary to the eternal placidity of Hegels and...

  Some events in my life, in recent times, have led me to question the very foundation of the ideas I defend, the validity of my self-proclaimed egoism, of my individualism-at-all-costs. So I think it is worth to digress a little here, to try and demonstrate how life, concrete life, everyday life with its surprises and vicissitudes, calls into question the value of ideas, of all ideas, those abstractions that we are so proud of, but at the same time understand so little, those exercises of the mind that sometimes seem so fundamental and sometimes turn into trifles. Because when we question the value of ideas, when we leave the world of ideas and turn to life itself, we are left struggling with the most essential, the most basic things, and we have to take some direction, even if in the end it leads to nothing. When you turn to the most basic, the most essential things, you leave aside many issues that have no real importance. The essential thing is the struggle for existence, pur...

Some situations in this life are leveling. You like to think that you are privileged to be able to walk past so much misery and boast about not having even a fraction of the problems that afflict the majority of people around you. It is invigorating to feel you are above suffering. But then, life calls you, “summons” you to your moment. Your moment to face your misery, your weakest side, your nothingness. The moment when you realize that you are a man capable of suffering is the moment when life reveals itself. The curtain of illusion falls and the ghost of the inevitable appears. How can we deal with something so insignificant and, at the same time, so particularly important, visceral, vital? Aren’t we, after all, nothing but “cosmic dust”? Our pain is insignificant in the general scheme of things. Yes, but for us, it is almost everything. It surrounds us and practically encompasses all of life.  It keeps us alert, aware, yes, but also eager for the quickest possible end. Pain i...