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Personally, I see nihilism as part of strategic deployment like any other philosophical position. If nothing has inherent meaning then you are the one who has

Personally, I see nihilism as part of strategic deployment like any other philosophical position. If nothing has inherent meaning then you are the one who has power to give meaning to things. You can avoid giving meaning to mishaps, mistakes, past, nasty comments and anxiety while cherishing and making other things more meaningful (to yourself). Nihilism opens door to countering positions such as above. By using it, one can either accept life without meaning and move on or they can counter it with different position that doesn't bind them from construction of their own structure. off topic > It helped me a lot, given that I'm bipolar I am curious how do you trust yourself dealing with that. In a similar position, I find it a bit complicated to retain trust in myself (messy part is I have trauma related to trusting others as well). The feeling of being able to do anything devolving into sleeping like a rotten piece of meat within a few months. When I noticed the pattern, I had to stop thinking anything ambitious long term. Currently, I have a few yes/no questions that highly depend on ny emotional and psychological state. I ask myself when I am unsure whether it's a good phase or bad phase. When am I myself? Is it when I can be high or low? Or somewhere between combining both. Obviously, I can ignore the emotions and look at things objectively but then, I would start disagreeing with lot of people including doctors and become more 'robot' like. I start thinking about incentives, motive, biases, biological coding and what not to rationalize 'something' but that 'something' ultimately depends on my emotional underlying. The argument proposed are hard to deny unless someone has an irrational absolute stance originating from a position of faith or bias they are unaware of.(I am not saying things directly, I know) Aa for drugs (they don't really work that much for me), do you not see yourself as intoxicated though? If someone was under the effect of alcohol, would you say that someone has control or actually thinking by their own? Comparing medical drugs to alcohol might be a bit stretched but some of what I took in the past was relatively similar in effects after a bit of research. What if you had to take drugs forever to retain that person? Who is judging what is ultimately good for you?

brazzy 7y ago
>If nothing has inherent meaning then you are the one who has power to give meaning to things. You can avoid giving meaning to mishaps, mistakes, past, nasty comments and anxiety while cherishing and making other things more meaningful (to yourself). That's one outlook on nihilism As I understand it, that is, in fact, existentialism, not nihilism.
- thrwaway69 7y ago
  That's correct. I wasn't saying it was nihilism but proposing that by discovering nihilism (meaninglessness), you can employ existentialism or solipsism to your advantage as a response.
- mirimir 7y ago
  Agreed. But nihilism is the gateway.
  - ahartmetz 7y ago
    AFAICT existentialism is nihilism plus a bunch of pretentious gibberish, so if I was going that route, I'd rather stop at nihilism.
    - mirimir 7y ago
      You do have a point. Basically it's making up stuff to believe in, rather than believing in "nothingness" (which is not just "nothing"). As Landmark says, "We are meaning making machines." So it's very hard to stay centered on nothingness. And that's what TFA alludes: > as nihilism is all about hiding from despair So with existentialism, you're just manipulating yourself. But that's arguably better than being manipulated by others, your culture, authoritarian structures, and so on. Another perspective is that it's all games. But that we're prone to forgetting that, and thinking that it means something else.
mirimir 7y ago
> If nothing has inherent meaning then you are the one who has power to give meaning to things. You can avoid giving meaning to mishaps, mistakes, past, nasty comments and anxiety while cherishing and making other things more meaningful (to yourself). Yes, that's exactly it. It's amazing how just noticing that I'm making myself miserable can bring a smile to my face. Or at least, a grin. > The feeling of being able to do anything devolving into sleeping like a rotten piece of meat within a few months. Yeah, been there. > Obviously, I can ignore the emotions and look at things objectively but then, I would start disagreeing with lot of people including doctors and become more 'robot' like. Some doctors are competent, and some just push whatever's trendy, or heavily detailed. Generally I recommend ignoring them all, except for some psychiatrists. Based on my experience, SSRIs are dangerous for people with bipolar disorder. They made me seriously hypomanic, but emotionally numb. Also, I used to think that emotions determine how I think. But eventually I got that patterns of thinking determine what I feel. It's just that stuff reminds us of a morass of similar past experiences. And there are associated feelings, which have been reinforced through repetition since we were very young. The three canonical ones: there's something wrong / I'm wrong (1-2 years) I don't belong (early school years) I'm on my own (teens) But you can train yourself to realize that you're being triggered. And then decide freely how to deal. But it's never fixed. You just get better at catching it.
- thrwaway69 7y ago
  > They made me seriously hypomanic, but emotionally numb. The worst part about that is my avoidant behavior of self care in the pursuit of work that feels good. There are other issues that made it that way. It's akin to being addicted to hard drugs (not meant to be insensitive. Can't find any other analogy atm). Mind and body want different things while also being on their own in the reception/outcome. Priorities shuffle in a matter of minutes if you are not concentrating and controlling yourself. Having so much self control is exhausting when others don't have to do this and makes me wonder whether am I alive at all sometimes. Letting out anything becomes difficult and I really believe my future is gonna be full of substance abuse. > It's just that stuff reminds us of a morass of similar past experiences. And there are associated feelings, which have been reinforced through repetition since we were very young. I know but things went wrong my entire childhood and they still are. While I try to avoid things that reinforces negative emotions, some of them are just unavoidable. Eg - washroom...painful memories there. I wish I had means to reward myself but I don't. Things that may have worked as a reward is an addictive dependency now and I truly don't care about most things including what I get to eat or whether even I get food at all. That last part alone makes people doubt and fill in holes with their broken explanation which then I need to reassert how eating food in some situation is objectively better hence I do it but I wouldn't in lack of friction to avoid eating it therefore I don't desire the food for it's merit but external factors force me into it. Do people enjoy things on their own merits or external factors coerces them to enjoy something? I can't figure out the answer because I do most things for avoidance.

brazzy 7y ago

thrwaway69 7y ago
That's correct. I wasn't saying it was nihilism but proposing that by discovering nihilism (meaninglessness), you can employ existentialism or solipsism to your advantage as a response.
mirimir 7y ago
Agreed. But nihilism is the gateway.
- ahartmetz 7y ago
  AFAICT existentialism is nihilism plus a bunch of pretentious gibberish, so if I was going that route, I'd rather stop at nihilism.
  - mirimir 7y ago
    You do have a point. Basically it's making up stuff to believe in, rather than believing in "nothingness" (which is not just "nothing"). As Landmark says, "We are meaning making machines." So it's very hard to stay centered on nothingness. And that's what TFA alludes: > as nihilism is all about hiding from despair So with existentialism, you're just manipulating yourself. But that's arguably better than being manipulated by others, your culture, authoritarian structures, and so on. Another perspective is that it's all games. But that we're prone to forgetting that, and thinking that it means something else.

mirimir 7y ago

> If nothing has inherent meaning then you are the one who has power to give meaning to things. You can avoid giving meaning to mishaps, mistakes, past, nasty comments and anxiety while cherishing and making other things more meaningful (to yourself). Yes, that's exactly it. It's amazing how just noticing that I'm making myself miserable can bring a smile to my face. Or at least, a grin. > The feeling of being able to do anything devolving into sleeping like a rotten piece of meat within a few months. Yeah, been there. > Obviously, I can ignore the emotions and look at things objectively but then, I would start disagreeing with lot of people including doctors and become more 'robot' like. Some doctors are competent, and some just push whatever's trendy, or heavily detailed. Generally I recommend ignoring them all, except for some psychiatrists. Based on my experience, SSRIs are dangerous for people with bipolar disorder. They made me seriously hypomanic, but emotionally numb. Also, I used to think that emotions determine how I think. But eventually I got that patterns of thinking determine what I feel. It's just that stuff reminds us of a morass of similar past experiences. And there are associated feelings, which have been reinforced through repetition since we were very young. The three canonical ones: there's something wrong / I'm wrong (1-2 years) I don't belong (early school years) I'm on my own (teens) But you can train yourself to realize that you're being triggered. And then decide freely how to deal. But it's never fixed. You just get better at catching it.

thrwaway69 7y ago
> They made me seriously hypomanic, but emotionally numb. The worst part about that is my avoidant behavior of self care in the pursuit of work that feels good. There are other issues that made it that way. It's akin to being addicted to hard drugs (not meant to be insensitive. Can't find any other analogy atm). Mind and body want different things while also being on their own in the reception/outcome. Priorities shuffle in a matter of minutes if you are not concentrating and controlling yourself. Having so much self control is exhausting when others don't have to do this and makes me wonder whether am I alive at all sometimes. Letting out anything becomes difficult and I really believe my future is gonna be full of substance abuse. > It's just that stuff reminds us of a morass of similar past experiences. And there are associated feelings, which have been reinforced through repetition since we were very young. I know but things went wrong my entire childhood and they still are. While I try to avoid things that reinforces negative emotions, some of them are just unavoidable. Eg - washroom...painful memories there. I wish I had means to reward myself but I don't. Things that may have worked as a reward is an addictive dependency now and I truly don't care about most things including what I get to eat or whether even I get food at all. That last part alone makes people doubt and fill in holes with their broken explanation which then I need to reassert how eating food in some situation is objectively better hence I do it but I wouldn't in lack of friction to avoid eating it therefore I don't desire the food for it's merit but external factors force me into it. Do people enjoy things on their own merits or external factors coerces them to enjoy something? I can't figure out the answer because I do most things for avoidance.