Arthur Schopenhauer was one of the greatest philosophers of all time.
He lived from the end of the 18th to the beginning of the 19th century in Germany.
His most important work was “The World As Will and Representation”.
He was one of the most prominent figures of the philosophy of pessimism and the first
great Western philosopher who was interested in Buddhism.
The best way to understand his teachings is to analyze them through the eyes of the enlightened
pessimism prevalent in Buddhist philosophy.
Arthur Schopenhauer is known as the ultimate pessimist because he articulates a pessimistic
worldview that questions life’s meaning.
He believed that the universe was fundamentally irrational and human beings are driven by
a force called the Will, a basic force in the Universe, never satisfied, and we, the
human beings, don’t have much self-control to fight it.
Schopenhauer argues that the best way to be happy is by ceasing to look for happiness
and instead try to remove the unhappiness from our life.
This idea reflects philosophical pessimism, which is not a psychological disposition,
but rather a worldview.
Philosophical pessimism suggests that it is always better to expect the worst in order
to receive the best.
By using the principles of philosophical pessimism, we can eliminate the irrational hopes and
expectations we have in life and thus we can live more peacefully and happily.
So with that in mind here are 7 ideas you can follow in order to become a pessimist
according to the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer: 1.
Accept your limits Arthur Schopenhauer says: “Man can do what
he wills but he cannot will what he wills.”
In Arthur Schopenhauer’s view, we are free to act on our motives, but we cannot decide
what our motives should be.
Free will means autonomy, but not independence.
This is a compatibilist view.
The compatibilist theory says that free will can be absent from human actions or present
to some degree, depending on the circumstances and on the subject.
Western culture teaches us that nothing is impossible, but this is completely false according
to Schopenhauer.
Our life is confined by severe limits.
We are limited by the place where we were born, by the family who raised us, the availability
of job opportunities in our countries, by the way we look, or how we were educated,
or even our genetics, to name just a few.
The quote from Schopenhauer does not state the impossibility of a free will, but rather
its limits.
We cannot change who we are, and therefore we cannot change our fundamental personality,
the way we think and feel, the things we wish for ourselves in life, our wants.
We can learn to adapt to some situations, change the way we present ourselves, but we
cannot change the essence of who we are as a person.
The only thing we can do is to acknowledge our desires and try to adapt our lives accordingly.
It is still our decision to act according to our desires.
Sometimes, our desires push us towards a life full of suffering and stress, but we still
have the power to stop, reflect and exert more control over our desires.
It is important to be open-minded and skeptical about anything that you want; you need to
question your desires, your feelings and emotions, and assess whether they are constructive or
destructive to your life.
Thus, you can learn to have more control over them and live a more peaceful life.
For example, if you have the desire to be a rock star and you follow the top artists
with great interest, studied all their tracks and even thought of forming your own rock
band, you need to stop and reflect on questions like - do you really have the necessary skills
to reach success in this line of work?
Do you really know what it takes to become a rock star, how many hundreds of hours of
practice, how to negotiate decent contracts, how to to constantly be present and stand
out on social media, and how much you need to work on your persona and public image?
And, ultimately, do you feel capable of sustaining that kind of lifestyle?
The answers to these questions should point you in the right direction for you.
2.
Accept that everything changes and decays Schopenhauer tells us: “Life is a constant
process of dying.”
Every fulfilment a man achieves sows the seeds of a new desire so that each person’s desires
can never run out.
The Will is like the engine of the world, driving the actions of all its subjects, who
can never completely escape its power, they are trapped in chasing their desires, but
even when the desires are satisfied, it doesn't bring them happiness.
When people are fulfilled, having a desire satisfied, all they get is a state of painlessness,
with nothing left to them but boredom.
Even sensual pleasure is nothing more than a struggle and aspiration that ends when the
goal is achieved.
Instead of building metaphorical castles in the air, Schopenhauer advises us to recognize
the pointlessness of everything life can offer, to recognize that there is nothing eternal
here on Earth, to try to detach from chasing material things and clinging to relationships
which are all temporary, and to engage more in spiritual practices, meditating more on
the meaning of life and on death.
Death is inevitable and, according to Schopenhauer, after Death we will become whatever we were
before being born.
We have to come to peace with the idea of Death, that everything dies and decays.
The only thing we can do is to appreciate the momentary beauty of the things and people
we love, but never cling onto their presence.
The more we acknowledge their temporary existence, the more we can appreciate them.
We should remember every day that the people we love will die someday and this reminder
will make us love them even more and treat them that much better while they are still
alive.
Also, reminding ourselves that even this Earth on which we live will die someday will make
us appreciate the uniqueness of our forests, our oceans, of the animals who live here with
us.
Thinking about Death is a great opportunity to enjoy life even more.
3.
Learn to see suffering as the best teacher in life
In the words of Schopenhauer: “Mostly it is loss which teaches us about the worth of
things.”
In Schopenhauer’s view, the way we define happiness is usually wrong, happiness is mostly
the absence of pain and suffering.
Negative experiences are more prevalent in life according to Schopenhauer, especially
if we try to find happiness not within ourselves, but in other people or in material things.
What can redirect us to the right track and help us find real happiness is by having lived
a severe suffering such as the loss of a loved one or the loss of our career, our business
and so on.
Such tragic events can shake us and help us see how ephemeral and worthless all the things
we have been chasing in life truly are, and through this we can better understand what
really matters.
If we lost a loved one, we can meditate on how temporary this life is, how every second
counts, how to invest more time in the relationships that really matter, how to appreciate our
family and friends more.
If we lost a career or business, we can realize that although we put vast amounts of our time
and energy into that work, what really matters in the end is the person we become after that
journey, what lessons and skills we’ve learned.
In Schopenhauer’s view, loss is the best teacher, because it can direct us to find
the real value of all things in our life.
The bigger the tragedy, the more we can change ourselves, and the better we can understand
reality, that everything is just temporary.
For example, if we know our relationship with our loved ones is temporary, we are that much
less likely to take them for granted.
Also, in the case of our career or business, instead of concentrating all of our efforts
into getting extra money and in getting a better reputation and popularity, it is better
to focus on gaining new skills, on self development, on who we can become as a person by advancing
in that career or business.
4.
Don’t be blinded by love Schopenhauer teaches us that: “Every kind
of love, however ethereal it may seem to be, springs entirely from the instinct of sex.”
Schopenhauer believed that no one can claim their romantic love is stronger than their
sexual instincts.
Romantic love is rooted in sexual instinct, according to the theory of Sigmund Freud,
the founder of psychoanalysis.
Sexual attraction creates a powerful bond which connects two people for an initially
short, but potentially very long time.
The deeper the attraction, the higher the chances to build a life together and possibly
procreate.
According to Schopenhauer, love is the most powerful force in life, but, in his pessimistic
analysis, love is a servant of the will to live, it is a subconscious force pushing us
towards procreation.
The more chances there are to be compatible with someone in procreating, the stronger
the love you can feel towards that person.
That is why the way people look, the status they have in society, what kind of lifestyle
they lead, all play a crucial role in attraction.
We can compose beautiful poems about love, romantic novels and movies, chase high-profile
jobs, try to become popular in our personal and professional circles, invest fortunes
in our clothes and hairstyles, but, in the end, at the base of everything, it all comes
down to the base desire to procreate.
Therefore, instead of becoming infatuated and blinded by love, we should rather acknowledge
the basic instincts that are playing us, acknowledge their importance.
By recognizing them, we can control them better, and make better decisions.
This acknowledgment and choosing easier ways to impress the opposite sex can make our lives
that much easier.
Once we know what is at the root of many of our actions – our sexual instincts – we
can start controlling them and we can avoid being blinded by love.
For example, once you know who the person is that you want to be with, you need to start
seeing love for what it is, an expression of sexual desires.
According to Schopenhauer, the more easily you succumb to the power of love, the more
easily you are manipulated by the Will to live.
His philosophy was about trying to become aware of the Will that is driving your instincts.
However, to get out from the trap of one’s Will, using your mental faculties is not enough
as our Will is often manipulating us subconsciously.
Schopenhauer does not provide a manual to escape the power of Will, but he gives hope
that we can domesticate its power by refraining from following our initial impulse and by
trying to minimize our natural desires.
Therefore, before you follow your heart, you might be better off not following your initial
instinct at all, but instead to attempt to diminish your desire to be with that person.
For example, you might be in the situation when you have to decide if you should pursue
a life with a person you are attracted to but you know the person is incompatible with
you on many other levels.
In that situation, you may well be happier in the long run by ignoring your base desires
and spending your energy finding someone more broadly compatible with you.
5.
Sacrifice pleasure to avoid pain Schopenhauer posits that: “It is a clear
gain to sacrifice pleasure in order to avoid pain.”
According to Schopenhauer, we’re like lambs in a field, grazing under the watchful eye
of the butcher, who selects one after the other for his prey.
So it is that on our good days, we are all blissfully unaware of the horrors that fate
may have in store for us like illness, starvation, mutilation, blindness and so on.
In Schopenhauer’s pessimistic way of seeing life, every life’s happiness is measured,
not by its pleasures and joys, but by how free of pain it is.
For instance, imagine happiness after buying your first home.
At first, you might think you are happy because of the house itself, of how beautiful and
spacious it is, because you are now an owner, but what gives you happiness in reality is
the feeling of relief that you own a house now, you do not need to stress anymore about
paying rent and you feel secure that you always have a shelter from now on and all of these
are the consequences of removing the pain of not having a shelter.
However, Schopenhauer points out that this happiness is temporary and you will soon be
worried about issues like mortgages, maintenance, the security of your job with which you have
to pay the mortgage and so on.
And here is where Schopenhauer gives an important lesson: don’t spend every penny you can
earn or borrow on the most beautiful house you can find, it is better to buy a house
you can comfortably afford, which does not put additional stress on your finances long-term.
Doing so, you will avoid being a puppet that is completely manipulated by Will - not to
mention the bank - and instead, you make a reasonable decision which limits the pain
in your life, even if that means sacrificing the pleasure of owning the most beautiful
house out there.
6.
Limit your expectations In the words of Schopenhauer: “There is
no doubt that life is given us, not to be enjoyed, but to be overcome; to be got over.”
With astute psychological insights, Schopenhauer confirms his position on the negative essence
of happiness.
The Will can fool us into thinking that it is all about finding satisfaction and pleasure
in life, making us chase expensive cars, houses, high paid jobs, holidays in luxury resorts,
expensive clothes and the like, but in fact what we really want are the essential things
we need: a shelter, enough food, a partner, a secure community to live in.
Often, to get this minimum amount of things is a real struggle.
Therefore, life is not to be enjoyed, but to be overcome, which means we need to overcome
the Will that tricks us into wanting more than we need.
We should follow the Will only to an extent to satisfy our basic needs in life in order
to survive – like food, shelter, and family, but we should try to limit the power of Will
when it is pushing us to obtain things that we don't really need.
To make sure we really understand this teaching, we need to investigate our wants in life.
Instead of writing a big list of impossible dreams and plans for some exotic trip , we
might rather ponder on the troubles we have in life and find real solutions to overcome
them.
The to-do lists, according to this teaching of Schopenhauer, should not include to-do
items which push us toward achieving more than we need, but should include to-do items
that help us secure our basic needs and help us solve the life problems we already have.
For example, if you are an employee working many hours per week, neglecting your family
and trying just to pay the rent of your expensive apartment, try making a list of what you need
to do to remove the pain of working so many hours, of staying away from your family or
of putting all the money into your apartment while sacrificing other aspects of your life.
You could try to change your 12 hour-a-day job for one that requires a more reasonable
8 hours, perhaps move to a cheaper apartment, allowing you the opportunity to make more
time for your family or even just give yourself more personal space.
Therefore, you need to sacrifice the pleasure of living in a beautiful house by removing
the pain that comes with it: long hours at work, less time with your family and friends.
7.
Find Happiness within yourself In our final quote from Schopenhauer for this
video, he tells us that: “It is difficult to find happiness within oneself, but it is
impossible to find it anywhere else.”
Solitude was always one of the favorite subjects of great thinkers, including Schopenhauer.
By his pessimistic teaching, Schopenhauer points out how difficult it is to find happiness
in general and how impossible it is to derive happiness from relationships with other people,
through fame or through acquiring possessions.
Real happiness can only be found inside.
One of the most important pieces of advice Schopenhauer had for young people was for
them to start learning to find solitude as early as possible.
In Schopenhauer’s view, solitude is an inevitable reality and the sooner you acknowledge this
and the fact of being alone, the sooner you will free yourself from the fear of being
alone and this is the only way in which you can reach a lasting happiness and peace.
We all have a subconscious fear of being left alone, misunderstood and deprived of human
connections and this is the reason why we tend to cling to other people, demanding them
to make us happy.
Emotional dependency doesn’t provide happiness and Schopenhauer argues that only by being
free from dependencies, can you reach happiness.
To do so, you need to start building your inner world, to focus more on your hobbies,
on exploring your skills and talents, on meditating on life’s meaning, on what gives you peace
and real joy.
Make a list of everything you can do in solitude which brings you joy like a walk in the park,
reading a great book, listening to certain music, crafting, painting and so on and start
engaging in those activities more often.
Once you build your system of activities which bring you joy no matter the circumstances,
your emotional stability will never be shaken regardless of whatever happens in your relationships,
in your career, or in society in general.
So if you enjoyed this video, please do make sure to check out our full Philosophies for
Life playlist and for more videos to help you find success and happiness using ancient
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Thanks so much for watching.