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What is Philosophy For?
Chris Kirk
March 01, 2024
If Philosophy isn’t a framework for life…Then whats the point? 🤔
So here’s a concept to think about - How do you live your life? And what do you measure it by?
It’s my experience its largely pointless to consider the how or why “we are here”, the thing that actually matters is what to do with the time that is given to us.
One thing is absolutely certain - we all die. Again its irrelevant if you have a god/gods or believe you’ll be going under general anaesthetic for a long time..
The principle still applies - one minute you’re here and the next you’re not.
I had a coffee a few weeks ago with a chap in work, sadly less than a week ago, we received an email that he had passed away. These small moments always bring work and life back into focus.
It begs the question - what do we do with the time that is given to us?
Where philosophy fits in… 📚
In some sense we all need a framework to make sense of the chaos of the world. Some simple heuristics to get by - especially in the information overload days we live in.
Having a life philosophy is a super cool way to do that.
Take Stoicism - which is one of my favourites. It’s not perfect. But what is it they say - don’t let perfect, get in the way of good enough… something like that.
Either way - there are solid principles that don’t require much thought and they save you a metric Sh@! tonne of cognitive space.
Basic Principles 101. ✏️
To thine own duties first - let everyone else deal with everyone else. “Call me if you need me, otherwise I’m working on my own tasks”.
Bear with people as much as we can, but demand the best from ourselves. Imagine if everyone adopted this principle…
Have some values/principles that you run decisions through like water through a filtration system - it might take a minute but the result is worth it.
Gratitude is fleeting and hard to practice - imagine a room full of bags of everyones anxieties, problems, concerns and woes. I reckon after a few looks in other peoples you’d be sprinting to find your own…
Stuff will go wrong - might as well be ready for it, because its coming…
Asking for help is underrated - we are made to work together.
If I can’t change something, does it deserve my energy?
Failure is part of the game - the sooner we see it as opportunity the quicker we’ll complete the game…
The secret to having true wealth - is rooted in the concept of being comfortable with less. How much do we really need?
If you want to improve you have to be comfortable with being the court jester… the fool is the precursor to the wise…