Happy Friday!

Today we’re going to wrap up this existential week with our favorite, Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Burning that off, we’re going to do a Reality Check. Wrapping up, we’ll take a look at one of his shortest but most insightful quotes.

Have a seat. Relax. It’s Friday’s Thought Breakfast!

Existentialism is not just an abstract philosophy. At its core, we’re asking things like “Who are we becoming?” or “How are we living?” You know, human beings are not fixed things. We’re constantly shaping ourselves through choice, action, habit, and even, as we talked about on Tuesday, avoidance.

It’s easy to move through life passively. Without much questioning, people inherit their values, routines, goals, and identities. Of course, they get become slightly personalized over time, but ultimately everything we know, do, and hold was inherited from someone else. Without examining whether those things genuinely belong to them, days begin to blend together quietly. A passive life doesn’t do much else besides distancing people from themselves.

Dostoyevsky constantly forces his characters to confront themselves in the most uncomfortable ways possible. Real, genuine selfhood requires that brutal honesty, conscience, self-examination, and most importantly, responsibility.

Anything you read by Dostoyevsky will show you that no matter what, there will never be any perfect answers. Life will always remain uncertain, complicated, and unfinished. I think that if Dostoyevsky were to assign a goal in this arena, he would say that rather than achieving certainty about meaning, the goal would be to learn how to participate in reality honestly and intentionally. A meaningful life should be actively lived.

Ask yourself:

“Above all, don’t lie to yourself.”
— Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov

Fyodor Dostoyevsky cuts straight through all the layers with this line. People can lie to others for years, but the most dangerous lies are usually the ones we tell ourselves. We convince ourselves that we’re trapped when we’re drifting, authentic when we’re performing, or fulfilled when we’re simply comfortable. Existentialism ultimately asks us to stop hiding behind those illusions and face life more honestly. Becoming someone real begins when we stop avoiding the truth about who we are, how we live, and what we actually want from our time here.

Munch on that for today. Have a great weekend, you newly ordained existential pragmatists. Don’t forget to come back next week for some more delicious Thought Breakfast.

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Remember to stay mindful, smell the flowers, and take it easy.

Chef Ricky - Thought Breakfast