JohnBFisher wrote:
Her journey will be fully underway when she embraces the reality that the ONLY thing we can control is how we act and react to the world around us. Yet, through that miracle of perspective, we can change the world by purposefully guiding the world around us through those actions and reactions.
I can agree with the reality that you describe, except that we only have partial control of ourselves.
However, your "miracle of perspective" allowing us to "change the world by purposefully guiding the world around us through those actions and reactions" is just wishful thinking. Of course, one is entitled to believe that if one wants to. It is probably as good a philosophy of living as anything else, even though it would be equally valid for both good actions and bad actions.
That is - if we could define "good" and "bad".
The word existentialist can have so many meanings, and so many differing belief systems, that it can only be used with understanding between those who have a common definition of the word.
To get back to "living is controlled dying" my perspective would rather be that living is uncontrolled dying for most people on this planet, and quite possibly for all of us.
But I think there is one truism about philosophy that we can all agree on - debate and disagreement is a necessary part of philosophical discussion, and no matter how vigorously we disagree, we can always remain respectful. In the final analysis what we believe is usually conditioned by our life experience, which can colour our philosophical musings.
By the way, I sometimes take things too seriously, and I not infrequently get things wrong.
Be Happy
Mars
