The Sovereign Artist—Episode #4
Normalize Silence & The Virtue of Self-employment & Outside-the-box Living & Why Philosophy is Dead & more
Hello friends,
Welcome to Episode #4 of the The Sovereign Artist series.
A few weeks ago I came across a controversial aphorism—a declaration of independence—by Emil Cioran, a famous philosopher born in Transylvania:
“I lived exactly the life that I wanted—free, without the constraints of a profession, without petty worries. A dream life, a life brimming with leisure, something unheard of in our times. I read a lot; I read voraciously, but only what I liked, and when I attempted to write a few books, my work got rewarded because I never ignored my genuine interests and tastes. The greatest success of my whole life was the fact that I managed to stay entirely unemployed. I designed my life quite well. I pretended that it was a failure; but it wasn’t.”
[The text was translated & edited to foster clarity & precision]
I somehow tend to read a lot more than I usually do these days; but I don’t write that much—except for the sloppy notes that I share on paper.
But that’s not writing. Writing is—should be—structured. Coherent. Explosive.
I believe it has to do with the change of seasons. During winter, I’m drawn toward deep but slow work. No deadlines. No metrics. No strategy. And thus no pressure.
The lack of sunlight makes me surprisingly calm—but this should be my lack of energy masquerading as a virtue.
I’m currently reading the likes of Montaigne, Taleb, Umberto Eco, Roger Scruton, and Julius Evola—they all have the golden status of barely being prescribed by the school curriculum.
Have you ever tried to convince yourself to normalize silence?
Sit down in a room alone with your thoughts and feelings. Keep a notebook. Travel with it. Sleep with it. Work out without music. Aim to walk (slowly, very slowly) without any predetermined goal or destination. Look down at your feet. Notice how effortlessly they move. Feel the ground pushing back against you.
Naval Ravikant came up with a powerful phrase: “To measure the quality of your life, simply do nothing, and see how it feels.”
An Algerian Garden, 1860-1900 (Artist unknown)
In an age of endless distractions, the greatest accomplishment of a human, a busy primate, is to be able to spend hours and hours without doing anything.
You’re in control of your life only if you can enjoy inaction without feeling any boredom or remorse.
3 Aphorisms
I.
Q: What does your ideal day look like?
Most people love to set “big” goals for the future...
But they fail to seize the present moment.
Instead of thinking at the macro level, begin by designing your perfect day.
Once you’re able to live 200+ such days per year, you’re rich—even though you aren’t rich.
II.
Look at the people further along the path in your field.
Are they who you want to be?
If the answer is NO,
You need to reconsider your career choices.
“I got out of the rat race,” Daniel Vassallo wrote, “when I looked around me and realized that even the winners were miserable.”
III.
Note to Self:
Create a few stories worth telling your kids & grandkids someday.
Train for some wild event. Get your hands dirty on a crazy project. Spend time in nature for a few days. Eat like a caveman. Swim naked with the dolphins.
Travel only by bike. Go to a new country. Find an old, traditional, non-touristic village and live there for a few weeks. Talk to the locals. Help them out with their chores. Drink as they do. Party as they do.
Find out what scares & inspires you at the same time.
Outside-the-box thinking requires outside-the-box living.
H/T Sahil Bloom
I Think, Therefore I Laugh
“When I was a child I wanted to become a standup comedian. But then I studied philosophy. So I became the joke.” — Mahmoud Rasmi
Philosophy is dead, and universities have killed it. Academics managed to turn philosophy into the most boring subject on Earth.
The Austrian philosopher, Ludwig Wittgenstein, brilliantly remarked that “a serious philosophical work could be written consisting entirely of jokes.”
What he meant by that is not that we should turn philosophy into comedy, but that any genuine philosophical work must be a manifestation of play. Any philosophical toolkit, while practical and useful, may nevertheless have to entertain the mind. Paradoxically, philosophers should sprinkle some joy or humor over their intellectual exercises if they wish to be taken seriously.
Wittgenstein also remarked that he looked forward to the day when philosophy was no longer a subject in its own right but rather infused all other subjects. Philosophy is (or should be), in this view, an adverb: one does linguistics philosophically, one studies science philosophically, one investigates political issues philosophically.
Humor has something of the same character. The announcement “We will now tell jokes and be humorous” sounds distinctly totalitarian. Humor too is adverbial and qualifies one’s approach to other activities: one answers questions humorously, analyzes a situation humorously, writes or speaks humorously.
Both humor and philosophy require a free intelligence in a relatively open society, and both reveal a keen concern for language and its (mis)interpretation.
Reference: John Allen Paulos
Timeless Insights by Nassim Taleb
i. Worrying about showing signs of weakness is a sign of weakness.
ii. The only valid political system is the one that can handle an imbecile in power without suffering from it.
iii. What counts is not what people say, but how much energy they spend saying it.
iv. Used skillfully, a compliment can be much more offensive than any form of criticism.
v. A great book can’t be summarized. A great idea doesn’t need context to be understood.
vi. Just as eating steak doesn’t turn you into a cow, studying philosophy doesn’t make you a philosopher.
vii. The world is split between those who don’t know how to start making money and those who don’t know when to stop.
Wrapping up...
Hope you liked this episode 🥂
Any feedback, suggestion, or criticism is welcome: feel free to reply (if you got this in your inbox) or send an email to viziandrei@outlook.com
Thank you for your time,
Vizi Andrei