Nietzsche, the great mustachioed one, said
that if we want to be great individual, revolutionary
thinkers, we each must take an individual
stand between the twin dangers of morality
and nihilism.
Morality, the dogmatism, laws, traditions,
and rules of the cultures that surround us,
can prevent us from thinking critically and
improving ourselves and our culture.
However, if we question everything, this can
lead to excessive skepticism and doubt, nihilism,
such that we believe in nothing and do not
have the courage and passion to take an individual
stand and create new meaning and truth.
In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche uses
the symbol of the tightrope walker to stand
for the individual who balances between opposite
sides.
We must have the courage to learn from the
morals, rules and dogmas, as well as question
them freely and critically, taking from them
what we each individually choose for ourselves.
We can each use dogmatism and skepticism as
we want to to create new truth and meaning,
transforming the old.
This became central to Existentialism, and
then later Poststructuralism and Postmodernism.
All new thinking is dangerous and risky, but
if we are afraid to think for ourselves, we
do not take the risk that could pay off and
be revolutionary.
The history of religion, law, philosophy and
science is made by great individuals who take
the leaps that inspire everyone else.
Those who think outside the box are the ones
who get to change the box.
Nietzsche inspired other great thinkers to
question reality.
Heidegger said we can be boxed up by our use
of time and technology.
Sartre said we can be boxed up by social roles
and social class.
Fanon said that we can be boxed up by racism,
institutional and internalized.
Foucault said we can be boxed up by institutions
that divide the normal from the abnormal,
the criminal from the legal, and the sane
from the insane.
By learning from these skeptical thinkers,
we do not get a recipe or rulebook as to how
we should be great individuals or what we
should choose to do.
Instead, we see how we are boxed up, so that
we can think outside the box and about the
box, to choose how to think and how to live.
