Imagine a group of porcupines in winter.
The porcupines are freezing.
They close ranks to warm eachother, but porcupines
have spikes.
When they come together they sting eachother,
so they must move apart again, but then they
freeze, so they get back together.
That goes on and on.
They come together and sting eachother, they
move apart and freeze.
They leave eachother and freeze, they close
ranks again and sting eachother just like
an accordion.
Porcupines are like us.
Our need for compassion, affection, fun, for
human proximity let's us close ranks, ... but
the ideas of others, their quirks, their political
stance, even their smell forces us to move
away.
We constantly fluctuate back and forth between
desire and rejection.
We're as Schopenhauer said yanked in and out
of solitude and vulgarity.
"[...] the world offers no choice beyond solitude
on one side and vulgarity on the other."
- Arthur Schopenhauer
How can we overcome this so we mustn't live
as an accordion?
Schopenhauer has a clear answer - through
politeness.
Politeness, distance full of compassion or
if you will "proximity with the needed distance."
