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April 14, 2010 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
26:17
1640 Enthusiasm

A response to a listener facing the barbed walls of cynicism.

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Hey everybody, it's Steph, hope you're doing well.
It's April the 13th.
So a woman wrote on the board, I think it's a very interesting post, so I think it's worth talking about some really good universal principles in here.
So she writes, I just started listening to the podcast this last Wednesday.
My brother recommended a few of the episodes to help me grow, so to speak.
I'm not really sure how extensively he's been exposed to the site, but we've been calling each other nonstop, talking about it since then, and are trying to meet in person sometime later this week.
I cannot stop listening to the podcast and reading as much as I can in between.
It's a compulsion, and it's everything I've been looking for in conversations, relationships, and in my own mind for as long as I can remember it.
The truth and absolute reason behind everything that I've encountered is so perfect and so beautiful that I'm completely overwhelmed and emotional.
So people are concerned about the intensity of her enthusiasm for the philosophy that is in the show.
She says, I want to be able to share everything, and I have confidence that if they've listened to and seen everything that I have, they would be in the same state as I am.
However, for various reasons, work resistance to new things, inability to sit for long periods of time and just listen, they cannot take the same path that I have.
It's up to me to be able to explain myself and my choices in a way that benefits everyone involved.
Somehow, though, I have a history of not being able to express myself to people I care about in a way that will benefit everyone involved.
I get defensive or misunderstood, or, in my excitement, I accidentally leave key pieces of information out, so they get this skewed mess that barely resembles what I was trying to say.
What is the best way to explain my passion for this and my involvement in it, with the least resistance and the best possible outcome?
Has anyone else been through this?
Oh, my sister!
Why, yes, I think...
I think everyone...
Who is enthusiastic about virtue has been through this challenge, and you're not alone in this at all.
I go through it a lot.
Yesterday, I had 150 emails, most of which were very positive and enthusiastic, but there's always some crab vests.
That's inevitable.
So, the question is, how do you communicate your enthusiasm for philosophy?
And realize, I mean, that your enthusiasm is not for this website.
It's not for the podcast.
And fundamentally, it's, of course, it's no way to do with me.
But your enthusiasm is for the excitement of philosophy.
And people will say, well, but it's this website.
Well, obviously, I think this website is the best philosophical resource that has ever existed.
You know, maybe not counting the Library of Alexandria.
And I say that...
Because, well, obviously I think I'm a good philosopher, because if I thought there was a better philosopher out there, I would be cleaning the shoes of that philosopher and typing his letters, or her letters, and doing all of that.
Obviously I think that I have the best and most useful stuff to offer, and I'm not going to pretend that's not the case.
It would be kind of hypocritical.
So, I think that it's the best philosophical resource that's out there.
If there were a better philosophical resource, then I would be putting my energies behind promoting and publicizing that, because my goal is philosophy.
It's certainly not my website, and it's certainly not...
My endless voice casts and all that.
So, yeah, I think this is the best philosophical resource on the planet.
And, you know, again, to strike a note of humility, which is not false, it is the most, by best, I also mean the most accessible, right?
I mean, obviously, the library of all philosophical writings would be a better philosophical resource in many ways, but it's not really accessible.
And so the accessibility and the actionability of the philosophy that we talk about here makes it the best philosophical resource on the planet, and because of the technology, it is the best philosophical resource that has ever existed.
And now people can run around quoting me out of context and call me a megalomaniac, but I'm not going to pretend that I don't think that's the case.
That's what drives my passion, and that's what drives my level of devotion to quality in what it is that I'm doing.
And I am very, very conscious of the need to continue to provide quality and innovative arguments and perspectives to a seriously intelligent group of people.
So, your enthusiasm is for philosophy, and it is for reason and evidence, and is for the joy and the beauty and the happiness and the challenge and the fear and the anxiety that reason and evidence can bring to your life.
And perhaps it is also the joy.
I certainly think it's the case for me.
It's the joy of virtue.
It's the joy of wanting to live a life of virtue.
And that's having a cause, reason and evidence, and that is having courage.
And courage requires that you can act.
Right? I mean, it doesn't take courage to bitch about the Fed, because none of us can act to end the Federal Reserve, right?
It doesn't take courage to bitch about the war in Iraq, not much anyway, because we can't do anything to end the war in Iraq.
But where real courage is necessary, and where real courage shows up, my friends.
It's in those situations where virtue is achievable to us within our own lives.
So honesty in our personal relationships, integrity at work, courage when we see mistreatment of others.
This is where the real excitement and terror of philosophy lives, is in the virtues that we can achieve within our own lives.
So, I would imagine that there is a beast of desire for heroism within you, right?
And we know that this desire for heroism exists within all of us.
All of us have a massive yearning to burst into a DC universe with the Millennium Falcon under us, right?
I mean, we want to be heroes.
We are endlessly drawn to the heroic universe.
We watch all of this stuff as kids.
I mean, there's a lot of pretty drippy kids' books, but certainly when I was a kid, the majority of the books that I read were adventure stories about courage and heroism in the face of considerable odds and opposition.
And so that is something that we yearn for.
But where are we going to achieve it?
The world has been explored.
And there is precious little that we can do, most of us at least, in the realm of advancing human knowledge in sciences and we're not going to be prize-winning biologists who find 12 missing links and all that, right?
So the question is, how are we going to be heroic in our own lives?
How are we going to be the kinds of superheroes in tights that we loved, worshipped, respected, and dreamt of being when we were kids?
What happens to the glory of our possibility and our potential when we actually live in the world and grow up?
And of course, growing up is graying out for the most part.
Most people, when they grow up, you know, they...
Put away childish things and they become dull and boring and pedantic and soul-crushing and all that sort of stuff.
And they look with amusement at the dreams of heroism of the young.
And I think that's...
It's beyond wretched. It's beyond tragic.
We should retain our desire for, our drive for, our yearning-burning for heroism and for struggles and for courage in the face of hostility and immorality and slander and all this.
I mean, the world is at war, whether we like it or not.
and it is to the virtuous and to the consistent and to the rational that the spoils will eventually go.
And the heroism will eventually go, and there will be no heroism in the future, like there is heroism in the present, because the capacity has first come across the planet to live philosophically and survive.
You can't live philosophically in the Middle Ages and survive, but now we can live philosophically and we can survive.
And my friends, not only can we survive for one of the first times in history, we can even flourish by living truthfully and honestly with honor and courage and anger where necessary and love and compassion and all of these wonderful virtues.
We can live by them and we can flourish.
And that's an amazing, amazing thing.
So, that's the first thing.
Your enthusiasm is not for this website, and it's not for the podcast fundamentally, and it's not for me, of course.
But what it is for, is for the capacity, like an eagle landing on your chest made of fire and brimstone and diamonds and fear...
The eagle of heroism is landing on your chest.
We can be heroic.
We can be supermen.
We can be superwomen. We can be superheroes of virtue and build the future through our courage.
And until you have a reason and give a man a why, and he can bear almost any how.
We have the why, which is truth and virtue and reason and evidence and all that philosophy.
And so we can bear the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune to be heroic within our own lives and be heroic in our own environments.
And that is how the world will progress and no other way.
So your enthusiasm is...
It's the awakening of your hero.
Your hero. And heroine, I should say.
And I think that's a beautiful thing.
And it is, to be frank, an alarming thing for people around you, right?
We all dream of being heroes, don't we?
We all grow up on these stories and all...
Dream of being heroes and being heroic and fighting the good fight and passionately triumphing over malefactors and all that.
I mean, I've talked about this before.
I won't go into it again. We're constantly exposed to this stuff as kids, but then when we become adults, we're supposed to roll our eyes at that stuff.
Well, no, no, no. I've got some calls to make.
No heroism for me.
I have an iPad. So, that to me is very sad.
And to many people who attempt to continue the path of heroism, or the goal of heroism, into their adult lives...
Well, they kind of look at people who show up at sales conventions in tights, you know, in that cheesy Spider-Man costume that Tobey Maguire has at the beginning of the first Spider-Man movie before he gets, you know, the cool one.
It's just considered to be ridiculous.
And that, to me, is very sad.
And, of course, heroism is made purposefully cartoon-like and impossible, you know?
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.
No, no, no. In your living room.
Tomorrow, tonight, today, now!
That is where heroism can live.
But heroism is always put into spaceships and avatars and all that kind of stuff because it's supposed to be kept at a distance, right?
That's how our natural desire for heroism and power and virtue and goodness and triumph over vice...
It's put in these cartoony contexts so that we think of it as something akin to diapers, and we do not think of being heroic in our adult lives because it is portrayed as cartoony and ridiculous when we are children.
But it is not so.
It is not so. Heroism is not cartoony, and those who have had to be brave, or who have chosen to be brave, since bravery is fundamentally a choice, Those who have chosen to be brave in their life know that there is nothing cartoony about courage whatsoever.
Courage is a very, very challenging super Olympics, Paralympics of the soul.
So we're supposed to put away enthusiasm, right?
The foundation of heroism is enthusiasm, right?
Because if you're not enthusiastic about something, you can't be heroic.
You can't. Because you have nothing to be heroic for.
You have nothing to stand for.
Like if you don't love something, you cannot protect it.
If you don't love something, you cannot guard it.
If you don't love something, you cannot advance it.
You will not fight for it if you do not love it.
And so the love of virtue...
It's the source of the courage for goodness.
You can't get there any other way.
So, people...
I really believe this.
People can smell that on you, right?
People can smell the fresh cordite and battery taste of a newly minted, newly emerged potential hero.
And it's alarming, and it's unsettling for people.
Because if they've made that compromise wherein their own lives are going to be a daily drudge and, you know, that most men live lives of quiet desperation, well, that is very true.
And I think even more women live lives of quiet desperation.
And they have surrendered that aspect of themselves and they have surrendered their capacity for heroism and courage and victory and excitement and fear and living as it is colloquially called.
I'm not saying this about anyone you know.
I'm just talking about this in general terms.
I don't know anyone you know, so I'm just putting this out in general terms.
But people can smell.
They can smell the minty gunpowder of the freshly evolved or freshly emerged hero.
And how do they feel about that?
How do they feel about the capacity for the heroic, for the passionate, for the excited, for the plugged in, for the brave, for the motivated, for the enthusiastic, for the person who has found something to love?
Or, as is more truly the case with philosophy, at least in the current world, that love has found them, right?
Right? Philosophy does not...
We don't navigate to philosophy.
Philosophy erupts within us like one of those squealing little beasts in the alien movies.
It's like, hey, I didn't even know that I had anything in me.
I start reading some philosophy and bam!
Kapow! The Adam West of philosophy is clipping me over the face.
And... That's sort of how it comes out, you know, fully born and pulls us along in its fiery leash.
Sometimes that's how it feels.
More than a feeling, I think.
So, the question that I would have is not, oh, you know, what do people think about me listening to Free Domain Radio or what do people think about this website or whatever, right?
That's not the real issue.
A website is never the real issue.
People will try and make you think it is, but it's not, right?
Well, the question is, what is...
Not as what are people's relationship to your listening to this show or whatever.
The real issue, I think we all know this, right?
The real issue is, what are people's relationship to enthusiasm, right?
What are they enthusiastic about?
What are they dedicated to that's larger than just, you know, the detritus of the everyday, right?
The flotsam and jetsam of the everyday tide, right?
What... Are they just dealing with whatever the day washes in and washes out, like driftwood on the tide?
Or are they actually interested in something larger than themselves, something more generous, more deep, more rich, more powerful than just the accidents of the everyday?
Now, if you have a lot of people around you who are really into big things and enthusiastic about challenging things and have dedicated themselves to something a little larger than...
You know, their next meal or their next screw.
Well, those people I would, you know, if they caution you about your enthusiasm, I would listen.
I really would. That doesn't mean they're right.
But it means that they have the right to be taken seriously when it comes to...
So if you have people who are involved in big things and enthusiastic and wise, right, they have some knowledge, hopefully, of philosophy or at least of wisdom, even if it's only common wisdom.
But if they're generous and charitable and enthusiastic and switched on and excited in their own lives, By, you know, a big and powerful goal, then I would say, listen to those people, right?
But if they're not, well, how objective are they going to be, right?
If they have lives which are not being lived with real enthusiasm, as I would experience it, or see it, or describe it, Then can they be objective judges of the value of enthusiasm when they don't even have it in their own lives?
And we all understand that enthusiasm is a good thing to have, right?
It's a necessary but not sufficient condition for happiness, right?
You can be enthusiastic, I guess, about really bad things.
But I would look at the general happiness and enthusiasm levels of those around me, right?
And I would ask them, well, what are you enthusiastic about?
They say, well, your enthusiasm is bad or it's weird or whatever, right?
It's like, well, what big things are you enthusiastic about?
And it's like, well, I'm not enthusiastic about any big things.
I don't think any big things exist.
You won't get it that explicitly, right?
But you'll get lots of dodging and so on.
And if you get dodging, that's not a good sign, right?
People say, well, your enthusiasm is bad or weird or scary or whatever, right?
It's wrong. Well...
What are you enthusiastic about?
You can teach me how to be a better enthusiast, right?
But if they're not enthusiastic about anything, how objective can they be about enthusiasm?
You know, I try not to criticize people who speak Mandarin for what they're saying.
Why? Because I don't speak Mandarin, right?
So if people are going to criticize you about your enthusiasm, the first thing I would ask them is, do you even speak enthusiasm?
Do you? And what are you enthusiastic about?
What are you switched on? What are you turned on?
What are you passionate or powerfully motivated in your life?
And if it's like, well, nothing, or nothing that's real, then I would say, well, maybe your problem is with enthusiasm.
You know, and maybe you should stop criticizing my enthusiasms and go out and find some of your own.
That would be my thought.
And again, I don't know what the people are like around you.
I guess I have some sense, but it's important not to prejudge.
But I would go and I say, well, you seem to be a great expert.
You claim to be a great expert on enthusiasm and when it's right and when it's wrong and when it's appropriate and when it's not.
So you must have a lot of knowledge about enthusiasm.
And maybe they can tell you how their enthusiasm is managed and how they made sure that they had the right enthusiasms for the right things and not too much and not too little and how they navigated those treacherous pathways and how they dealt with the cynicism of those around them when they were enthusiastic about some big, powerful, and passionate idea and so on, right?
See? I told you we'd get to a couple of general principles.
Oh, I don't mean to shock you, but we are in fact getting there.
This is an important question, right?
Someone comes along and tells you how to live.
Hey, including me.
Not that I tell anyone how to live, but someone comes along and tells you how to be, how to live, what to do.
Well, I think it's a pretty important thing to say, how do you know?
How do you know? If you claim that my enthusiasms are inappropriate or off-base or anything like that, how do you know?
And not how do you know about me, but how do you know about the topic at hand, right?
Somebody comes in, you know, somebody stops me on the street and says, you know, Steph, you've got a couple of love handles there.
You should do this, you should do that, you should do the other.
And my first thing is to say, well, how do you know?
How do you know? Are you an expert?
How do you know? I think that's sort of important.
I don't mean somebody has to have a PhD.
Lord knows I don't. I have a master's, which is considered to be, I guess, a professional in most places.
But it doesn't mean that they have to have that kind of education, but it does mean that they have to have done a lot of reading, at least.
They have to have taken some courses, I would hope.
They have to have spent a lot of time studying it, so that when they tell me stuff, I can take them with some level of credibility.
I hope that it's coming slowly for me on Podcast 12 Million, but how do you know?
Oh, my enthusiasm is inappropriate.
Well, you must know a lot about enthusiasm.
Tell me about how you gained your expertise on enthusiasm so that you can tell me that my enthusiasm is inappropriate.
Now... I mean, this sounds all kinds of confrontational, and I suppose it is in a way, but it's really, it doesn't have to be in how it comes out, right?
So if someone comes up to me and says, you know, you're saying bad things, saying wrong things, saying bad things, right?
So, oh, well, you must be a great expert in saying right and wrong things.
This is the Socratic method, right?
People would run at Socrates and tell them, Tell him he was wrong.
And he'd say, well, that's great.
Instruct me, oh, wise one, because you must be a great expert in these matters.
So, someone comes up to me and says, Steph, you say things that are wrong, bad, damaging, dangerous, blah, blah, blah.
It's like, well, you must be a great expert in what is correct and what is incorrect.
So, tell me where it is that I have made my errors, my logical errors.
My empirical efforts.
And, you know, some people will say, hey, you know, you said this fact, and it's actually, I think I got a couple of years wrong in some recent thing about history, and it's like, hey, thanks, appreciate that.
I will let people know.
And that's great, but if they sort of say, Steph, you're doing bad, wrong things, I say, well, you must be an expert, so please tell me where the errors are, and how you have corrected them, and where your expertise comes from, and how you know, you know, establish some credibility with me, because I don't just take anyone, I don't take anything anyone says as gospel, of course, that would not be philosophical, that would be disrespectful to truth.
Um... Now, some people will say, it's rare, but it does happen, but people will say, you know what?
Now that you're asking me for evidence, I don't actually have any.
I just really feel strongly that you're saying bad things or wrong things.
I guess it's my own anxiety that I'm acting on.
It's like, I kiss you all over in a highly philosophical manner.
I mean, that's a beautiful thing to hear.
That is a courageous and honest expression of a truthful situation.
Because somebody's experiencing anxiety because of what you're doing, they don't know what's wrong, but they're just kind of telling you it's wrong, because they're trying to puncture that balloon.
If they say, you know, actually, I don't really know why it bothers me so much, then you can have a great conversation about what's going on for them that way.
And, you know, maybe once they've dealt with that, they'll come up with some better criticisms, but at least you can deal with what's really motivating them in that moment.
That's a wonderful thing. Sadly, all too sadly, of course, that is rare.
Most times, people will just change the topic.
They will attempt... I mean, what they're trying to do is they're just trying to unplug your enthusiasm...
They're just trying to unplug your enthusiasm.
It's got nothing to do with you.
Nothing to do with you. It's just their own stuff, right?
Someone did it to them, and now they're passing.
They're paying that destructiveness forward.
But I don't want to keep this too long, but I just sort of wanted to mention that, you know, don't...
Don't let people criticize you in generalities.
I think that's really, really important.
Really, really important.
Don't let people criticize you in generalities.
People will email me and say, you're arrogant.
What the hell does that mean?
I mean, it's not an argument.
So maybe I am, maybe I'm not.
I actually think I'm very humble, but obviously some people think that it's arrogant to be certain about anything.
And of course, I ask them, are you certain that I'm arrogant?
Of course, it's a very arrogant thing to say to someone, you're arrogant, without providing a lot of proof and evidence, right?
And most people will just fog and run away, but what they're trying to get you to do is to criticize yourself, because they can't come up with a good criticism of you, right?
UPB is absurd, right?
Or something like that. As if a proposition is true or false.
It's valid or it's invalid. I'm not sure what absurd really means, but it's just the argument from adjective.
People are just trying to get you to substitute self-criticism for their inability to criticize you rationally or empirically, i.e.
effectively. And I'll tell you this.
People have to earn their way into my credibility zone, Just as I have to earn my way into other people's credibility zone.
So, I would ask people questions and try and find out where this expertise and enthusiasm is coming from.
And, you know, be prepared.
You don't have to anticipate it necessarily, but be prepared for a bunch of...
The noise and distraction and emotional stress that is coming from your enthusiasm, I don't think that's a valid or fair thing to do, to just make people stop being enthusiastic because it makes you anxious.
And I would look for specific criticisms, you know?
The website is owned by one person.
It's not a criticism at all.
It's like me saying, well, the theory of relativity must be false because it was submitted by only one person.
Right? Well, that's not a perfect analogy, of course, because there's a peer review and so on.
But I think you sort of understand, right?
Those aren't rational arguments against what it is that is being put forward in the site.
If there's an error in logic, if there's an error in empirical evidence, fantastic.
You know, let's hear it and let's sort it out.
But, you know, just, oh, it's creepy.
I mean, that's really embarrassing to hear from a philosophical standpoint, because it's not an argument, it's just an appeal to insecurity.
And that, of course, I think is at the root of these kinds of criticisms.
So, be wary.
And, you know, don't give up your enthusiasm to mere negative statements without context.
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