How to live after reading this

[Anonymous No.17830568]

[Anonymous No.17830572]

>>17830568
did you read it?

[Anonymous No.17830582]

>>17830568
Tell me about this book, OP. Is it just a modern rewrite of Aristotle or is it some bullshit “red pill on your black pill women are awful and the Jews made society” kinda bullshit

[Anonymous No.17830586]

>>17830568
Why not just read the original Rhetoric?
I fucking hate rehashed shit

[Anonymous No.17830590]

>>17830568
Did you actually read it? This book is radically pessimistic but ultimately a work of redemption.

[Anonymous No.17830606]

>>17830586
Because it have nothing to do with that. The title is misleading.

[Anonymous No.17830621]

>>17830590
>work of redemption
We've already talked about this and I disagree

[Anonymous No.17830626]

>>17830582
Neither of the two
Read the first chapter, which is only 5 pages long, and you'll know right away if you're interested

[Anonymous No.17830648]

>>17830582
It’s nothing like that. He literally goes back to the relation of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle in relation to the pre-Socratics and redevelops the concepts of persuasion and rhetoric, which he sees as contrasted to each other. The whole thing is also deeply personal and maintains something like poetry through the entire duration of the book. I can agree that this is a very dangerous book, but only if one doesn’t really understand or think about the implications of the picture that he paints in this book.

[Anonymous No.17830659]

>>17830621
Okay then disagree but I suggest you read the book again considering we’re blatantly offered a dichotomy. I seriously question if you’ve ever actually even read the book. Be honest. Have you?

[Anonymous No.17830663]

>>17830648
>I can agree that this is a very dangerous book, but only if one doesn’t really understand or think about the implications of the picture that he paints in this book.
This is basically a western exposition of the buddhist dukkha. And this is not hopeful

[Anonymous No.17830671]

>>17830586
There’s a chapter in the book where he walks through the process in Greek philosophy. He takes issue with Aristotle’s rhetoric.

>>17830606
What? It has everything to do with that. Why do you people do this?

[Anonymous No.17830676]

>>17830663
No. Stop. Don’t do this. Stop with the Buddhism, Dukkha nonsense. It’s not a Buddhist book. You have not read the book.

[Anonymous No.17830679]

>>17830568
Evola apparently thought this book was a masterpiece

[Anonymous No.17830681]

>>17830659
Yes. And I have already shown you, with quotations from the book, that according to Michelstaedter himself, the simple fact of taking the only possible way out required a superhuman strength of character, worthy of Jesus, Buddha, etc. Without that, there is no hope. I said:

Difficult, perhaps even impossible to take, is the way, I said, the only way to salvation, and it is certain that the majority of us will always prefer, to consolidate their meager assurances, to continue to sleep rather than to wake up: "But men are like the one who dreams of getting up and who, realizing that he is still lying down, does not get up but goes back to dreaming that he is getting up", while thus, Michelstaedter continues, "without getting up and without ceasing to dream, he continues to suffer from the vivid image that disturbs the peace of his sleep and from the immobility that renders vain the action of which he dreams" (p. 72).
And the author continues, not leaving in peace the one to whom he addresses, imagining well that the men, almost all the men, will not fail to oppose him a multitude of arguments which are so many cries betraying their fear, the fear of the death which pushes them to live without persuasion (cf. p. 77): "My legs are wobbly, and your path is impassable", and to these he answers: "There are the lame and the able-bodied - but man must strengthen his own hocks to walk - and go forward where there is no road. By the usual ways men walk in a circle that has no beginning and no end; they come and go, they compete, they hurry, busy as ants - perhaps they confuse each other, - but even if they walk, they are still where they were, for all places are the same, in the valley with no end. The man must make his way to reach the life and not to move among the others, to drag the others with him and not to claim the rewards that are not on the way of the men" (p. 73).
Carlo Michelstaedter knows well that to the impossible we are all held, and that what he calls the "right to live" (p. 78) is only snatched away from us. 78) can be torn off only at the price of a constant work, infinite in fact: "For just as the hyperbola approaches the asymptote infinitely, so the man who, in living, wants to be in possession of his life, approaches the straight line of justice infinitely; and just as the curve, however small the distance from a point of the hyperbola to the asymptote, must be infinitely prolonged to reach the contact, so the duty of a man towards justice, however modest what he asks as right for himself in his life, remains infinite" (pp. 77-8).

[Anonymous No.17830708]

>>17830681
Take your meds. I have no idea who you are or what you have “already told me”.

Just because you can cite some passages from the book, does not convince me that you have actually read the book. Be honest now. Have you read this book? We are very clearly offered up an antithesis to the problem of rhetoric. What exactly is it that you think that is?

[Anonymous No.17830717]

>>17830676
I have read the book, stop believing you are the official interpreter of Michelstaedter. It is the EXACT equivalent of the Buddhist dukkha, even Evola makes the connection. Michelstaedter exposes the suffering-satisfaction inherent to the phenomenal world, to the worldly life and its desires (his philopsychia).

[Anonymous No.17830730]

>>17830708
>Just because you can cite some passages from the book, does not convince me that you have actually read the book. Be honest now. Have you read this book?
Oh, shut up you pseud.

[Anonymous No.17830736]

>>17830681
what did the other guy say? radically pessimistic but ultimately hopeful. are you contradicting him?

[Anonymous No.17830741]

>>17830717
>is the EXACT equivalent of the Buddhist dukkha, even Evola makes the connection
No. It’s not. I don’t care what Evola said. Respond to this >>17830708 and tell me what YOU think, not what Julius Evola thinks. Your last sentence describes only 1/3rd of his philosophy.

[Anonymous No.17830750]

>>17830730
> no answer
Expose yourself harder. If you had actually read it, you would have no problem illustrating the antithesis that he offers up to rhetoric.

[Anonymous No.17830763]

>>17830736
>radically pessimistic but ultimately hopeful. are you contradicting him?
I don't find it very hopeful to know that there is a way out, but that to open it you will need infinite strength worthy of the few great men who have marked history, without which you are doomed to suffer.

>>17830741
>No. It’s not
Your arguments convinced me. Retard, you don't even know what dukkha is but you open your pseud mouth.

[Anonymous No.17830771]

>>17830763
> still won’t answer the question

[Anonymous No.17830791]

>>17830771
He has clearly read the book. You are cringe, stop thinking that only you have understood it.

Especially since he is right: Michelstaedter's analysis is very close to the Buddhist diagnosis. Michelstaedter says it himself by quoting the Buddha when he quotes people who said it before him (with the Ecclesiastes, etc.), Ebola is not the only one to have noticed it.

[Anonymous No.17830798]

>>17830771
I'm not going to waste any more time on you.

[Anonymous No.17830817]

>>17830791
Evola*, kek

[Anonymous No.17830829]

OP, I don’t feel like debating with these clowns or the people who want to say it’s some anti-natalist suicide fuel or actually dukkha or whatever. I don’t care about any of that so this will be my last post in this thread for you and anyone else who is interested.

This book actually DID stop me from committing suicide. I won’t pretend as if it’s given me the keys to living a happy life. But it did stay my hand and the basic reason is that if you actually read the book and follow Michaelsteadter’s throught on the dichotomy between rhetoric and persuasion, it’s true that he offers us a radically pessimistic view of the civilized world as chasing an insatiable satiation of privation, or rhetoric but he also offers us a counterbalance in persuasion. The antithesis of rhetoric, or the imperfect act, is not asceticism, deprivation, or denial (suicide) of act but rather the completion, or the perfection, of the imperfect act itself. He actually tells us to become persuaded through acceptance of privation and acts of privation - to turn work into play, not as an act of denial or destruction, but creation. This is not a disposition that’s restricted to a few great men and can only be said to be restricted to those who are capable of achieving that disposition to modern life.

[Anonymous No.17830830]

>>17830791

[Anonymous No.17830850]

>>17830791
He quotes several people. Is it as Christian as it is Buddhist. Just fucking stop. You clowns are just bad as the post-modern critical theorists who want to say to everything “Actually, this is Freudian/Lacanian/Deleuzian”. It’s is factually not a Buddhist text and it is factually not the same as Dukkha. At best what this man is describing is 1/3rd of Michaelstaedter’s philosophy. In fact, all of the quotes he posted can be easily copy and pasted from goodreads. I remain convinced that he hasn’t read the book, you haven’t read the book, and this thread is going to go nowhere as long as nimrods like you defend low IQ quotes who won’t actually answer questions for themselves, further illustrating they don’t know what they’re talking about.

[Anonymous No.17830858]

>>17830829
>but he also offers us a counterbalance in persuasion. The antithesis of rhetoric, or the imperfect act, is not asceticism, deprivation, or denial (suicide) of act but rather the completion, or the perfection, of the imperfect act itself. He actually tells us to become persuaded through acceptance of privation and acts of privation - to turn work into play, not as an act of denial or destruction, but creation.

What does that mean, concretely? Finding satisfaction in oneself, and not depending on anything?

"Persuasion does not live in the one who does not live only in himself: but is son and father, slave and master of what surrounds him, of what was before, of what must come after: thing among things" (p. 43, author's emphasis). The one who does not live in the persuasion lives in the dispossession, synonymous of the rhetoric, because "each one turns around his pivot, which is not his, and the bread that he does not have, he cannot give it to the others", being persuaded "the one who has in himself his life", "the soul naked in the islands of the Blessed", maybe (p. 44, the author underlines).

[Anonymous No.17830864]

>>17830850
>He quotes several people. Is it as Christian as it is Buddhist
No really? I said it.

>You clowns are just bad as the post-modern critical theorists ... Blah blah blah
Seethe more you pseud. 0 arguments but full of insults.

[Anonymous No.17830868]

>>17830850
I don't really see how the circle of privation Michelstaedter elucidates is really all that fundamentally different than dukkha

[Anonymous No.17830869]

>>17830850
>it is factually not the same as Dukkha
Bruh you don't even know what dukkha is hahahaha how can u say that
A Buddhist monk fucked your girl? Chill

[Anonymous No.17830878]

>>17830868
It is not. It's the exact same diagnosis of the world and of desires. The suffering-satisfaction that arises from the dependence on the conditioned and the desire of the impermanent.

[Anonymous No.17830894]

Bruh that's literally the same thing

[Anonymous No.17830919]

>>17830868
Because they have different views of the I possessing itself in this condition. Read the book if you want to understand. It’s an important distinction only in so far as it develops into the latter 2/3rds of his philosophy, which anon is ignoring.

[Anonymous No.17830928]

>>17830919
I have read it, but my memory's fuzzy. Elaborate.

[Anonymous No.17830932]

>>17830894
>Carlo's despair is stated as If it were to possess itself completely here and now and be in want of nothing—if it awaited nothing in the future—it would not continue: it would cease to be life. Carlo fell into the trap of defining delight and relishing as life. The Buddha's counterpart is:
>MN60:56.2: They live without wishes in the present life, extinguished, cooled, experiencing bliss, having become holy in themselves.”

[Anonymous No.17830936]

>>17830858
>"Persuasion does not live in the one who does not live only in himself: but is son and father, slave and master of what surrounds him, of what was before, of what must come after: thing among things" (p. 43
How is it not like buddhism? Or like every mystical tradition for that matter

[Anonymous No.17830941]

>>17830932
Based
We could make parallels for hours
A Buddhist reading this book could validate everything

[Anonymous No.17830944]

>>17830928
See this >>17830932 for a Buddhist’s view of how they differ. This distinction flows into Michaelstaedter’s implication of asceticism as an intermediate point between rhetoric and persuasion, which he develops in his book.

[Anonymous No.17830951]

>>17830941
The citation highlights the distinction between Michaelstaedter and Buddhist dukkha, bud. Parallels are obvious but there is a very important distinction. Please read again. Carefully this time. They’re not the same.

[Anonymous No.17830954]

>>17830944
They are not different at all. Both quotes say the same thing. Just because one says that life ends and the other doesn't, doesn't mean it's different. Of course the worldly life stops when one realizes himself, possesses himself.

[Anonymous No.17830959]

>>17830676
>>17830717
Michaelstedter himself was inspired by some if Buddha's words, he talks about this in his letters

[Anonymous No.17830966]

>>17830944
>Michaelstaedter’s implication of asceticism as an intermediate point between rhetoric and persuasion
That's literally the buddhism wtf

>In the Pāli Canon of Theravada Buddhism, the term "Middle Way" was used in the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta, which the Buddhist tradition regards to be the first teaching that the Buddha delivered after his awakening.[note 2] In this sutta, the Buddha describes the Noble Eightfold Path as the middle way of moderation, between the extremes of sensual indulgence and self-mortification:[2]

[Anonymous No.17830968]

>>17830951
I think the distinction is kind of superficial, you might get more track arguing Michelstaedter's anti-natalism is opposed to the Buddha's rejection of annihilationism

[Anonymous No.17830969]

>>17830954
>Both quotes say the same thing.
No, they don’t. I can’t even tell if you’re trolling or not anymore. I can’t continue to reply to this fucking thread. It’s said in plain text it’s offered as a counterpoint. The distinction offers, for Michaelstaedter, asceticism as an intermediate point. This is getting really annoying so I can’t continue with you.

[Anonymous No.17830973]

>>17830944
>implication of asceticism as an intermediate point between rhetoric and persuasion,
Ascestism is the path, ofc it's in the middle. Nibbana is the persuasion.

[Anonymous No.17830977]

>>17830959
And? He also talks about Jesus, Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Parmenides, and more.

>>17830966
Holy fuck. You are getting annoying. These are really the people becoming Buddhists on /lit/? The counterpoint is right there in plain text. Learn to read or don’t. I can’t respond to you idiots anymore.

[Anonymous No.17830980]

>>17830969
>as an intermediate point.
That's also intermediate in buddhism wtf
The path (ascetism-detachment) is not the goal (nirvana-persuasion)

[Anonymous No.17830987]

>>17830977
>And? He also talks about Jesus, Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Parmenides, and more.
Nobody said otherwise
We said it's analysis is close to the buddhist one
Chill

[Anonymous No.17831014]

>>17830980
>>as an intermediate point.
>That's also intermediate in buddhism wtf
>The path (ascetism-detachment) is not the goal (nirvana-persuasion)

"The dharma too is like a raft. It serves the purpose of crossing over, not the purpose of grasping."
https://tricycle.org/trikedaily/buddhist-parable-of-the-raft/

It's also intermediate in buddhism

[Anonymous No.17831024]

>>17830969
>Michaelstaedter, asceticism as an intermediate point.
For Buddha too. I quote:

"Monks, I will teach you the Dhamma compared to a raft, for the purpose of crossing over, not for the purpose of holding onto. Listen & pay close attention. I will speak."

"As you say, lord," the monks responded to the Blessed One.

The Blessed One said: "Suppose a man were traveling along a path. He would see a great expanse of water, with the near shore dubious & risky, the further shore secure & free from risk, but with neither a ferryboat nor a bridge going from this shore to the other. The thought would occur to him, 'Here is this great expanse of water, with the near shore dubious & risky, the further shore secure & free from risk, but with neither a ferryboat nor a bridge going from this shore to the other. What if I were to gather grass, twigs, branches, & leaves and, having bound them together to make a raft, were to cross over to safety on the other shore in dependence on the raft, making an effort with my hands & feet?' Then the man, having gathered grass, twigs, branches, & leaves, having bound them together to make a raft, would cross over to safety on the other shore in dependence on the raft, making an effort with his hands & feet. [7] Having crossed over to the further shore, he might think, 'How useful this raft has been to me! For it was in dependence on this raft that, making an effort with my hands & feet, I have crossed over to safety on the further shore. Why don't I, having hoisted it on my head or carrying it on my back, go wherever I like?' What do you think, monks: Would the man, in doing that, be doing what should be done with the raft?"

"No, lord."

"And what should the man do in order to be doing what should be done with the raft? There is the case where the man, having crossed over, would think, 'How useful this raft has been to me! For it was in dependence on this raft that, making an effort with my hands & feet, I have crossed over to safety on the further shore. Why don't I, having dragged it on dry land or sinking it in the water, go wherever I like?' In doing this, he would be doing what should be done with the raft. In the same way, monks, I have taught the Dhamma compared to a raft, for the purpose of crossing over, not for the purpose of holding onto. Understanding the Dhamma as taught compared to a raft, you should let go even of Dhammas, to say nothing of non-Dhammas."

[Anonymous No.17831082]

I think the anon here got angry because he thought he saw an attempt at Buddhist recovery-theft from Michelstaedter. There are of course differences between the two ways, but the diagnosis is the same, and the solution too. This similarity is of course not unique to the Buddha, as he said: >>17830977

And as Michelstaedter said. All great mystics have basically the same message. Stop the addiction, the wheel of desires of the worldly life, its conditioning, and find the fullness in you.

[Anonymous No.17831101]

>>17831082
And btw, this is not to denigrate Michelstaedter's genius, quite the contrary. He is not a parrot. He is in the big league.

[Anonymous No.17831131]

>>17830568
This book hit me hard
Never had the strength to finish it

[Anonymous No.17831343]

>>17830568
powerful stuff

[Anonymous No.17831359]

>>17830568
read kierkergaard

[Anonymous No.17831464]

Buddhism?

sounds gay

[Anonymous No.17831574]

>>17831464
Idiot, the points on which Michelstaedter agrees with Buddhism (dukkha) are also accepted in Hinduism.

Verse 4.4.14 of the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad:

While we are still here, we have come to know it [ātman].
If you've not known it, great is your destruction.
Those who have known it – they become immortal.
As for the rest – only suffering [duḥkham] awaits them.

And Michelstaedter also approaches Hinduism by not denying the self and by saying that the solution is the establishment in the fullness of the self.

[Anonymous No.17832289]

If you live in the third world and see shit after shit everyday this books mean nothing. Still pretty dope tho.

[Anonymous No.17832351]

>>17832289
>If you live in the third world and see shit after shit everyday this books mean nothing
On the contrary

[Anonymous No.17832463]

>>17830568
What's so special about this shitty book?

[Anonymous No.17832472]

>>17832463
blackpill smoothie with pure whitepill at the bottom

[Anonymous No.17832989]

>>17832463
everything

[Anonymous No.17833015]

>>17830568
The same way you did before just slightly worse.

[Anonymous No.17833029]

>>17830850
>it is factually not the same as Dukkha
Why do you keep thinking your opinion has any relevant when you don't even know what Dukkha is? Sure, you might have read Michelstaedter, at least superficially, but you're missing an entire side of the story. My guess is you're just going from wikipedia articles like a real pseud.

[Anonymous No.17833082]

>>17830829
Basically this. It's a ROUGH book, but at the end he does offer a way out.

[Anonymous No.17833426]

okay so he killed himself "within hours" of finishing this book. damn. this looks like a bumpy ride. order placed. wish me luck bros

[Anonymous No.17833553]

>>17832351
I mean, of course it makes the book even more important, but for the subject of killing yourself it's not going to make a great impact.

[Anonymous No.17833560]

>>17833029
Do you even know what a fact is? Also you’re a little late to the party genius.

[Anonymous No.17833589]

>>17830568
The author answered that with his actions

[Anonymous No.17833590]

>>17833589
Wrong.

[Anonymous No.17833601]

>>17833590
Why

[Anonymous No.17833636]

>>17830829
>This book actually DID stop me from committing suicide.
Didn't do that for the author: "Within hours of completing Persuasion and Rhetoric, his doctoral thesis, 23-year-old Michelstaedter shot himself to death. "

[Anonymous No.17833683]

>>17830868
>>17830878
will you say that part of what ecclesiastes shows is literally dukkha too?

[Anonymous No.17834065]

>>17833636
some niggas really wanna sell their books

[Anonymous No.17834074]

>>17833636
i'll try not to be too jealous

[Anonymous No.17834161]

>>17831082
>Stop the addiction
Desire to stop an addiction is an addition too.
>the wheel of desires of the worldly life, its conditioning
Why is this conditioning bad? How can one achieve anything without prebuilt conditions?
>find the fullness in you.
And who are you? What makes yourself worthy of living for oneself? How is it possible to find the fullness in oneself when the whole experience of life makes us want to find fullness outside of us?

I am probably a brainlet but I sincerely don't understand the existential problems this thread is talking about. For me it's clear that finding the purpose in life itself is impossible because as a thing in itself - life is devoid of meaning. It can only serve as a mean of achieving things outside of itself. The same with you as an individual. You can't find fullness in oneself because as an isolated entity you don't have any meaning whatsoever.

[Anonymous No.17834169]

>>17830568
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdvL-9GFSWw
Here. I saved your life.

[Anonymous No.17834227]

>>17830568
no worries, op. i got you...
https://youtu.be/cjVQ36NhbMk

[Anonymous No.17834245]

>>17834227
best post itt

[Anonymous No.17834246]

>>17834227
The Sunset Limited of pop-rock