“he rejects pleasures to secure other, greater, pleasures”
alyska posted this post, which I am copying verbatim, because I think it points to a central tenet that one should be required to learn in order to truly be an adult. I think we should have one formal rite of passage from childhood to adulthood, and it should be centrally focused on this very idea. When one groks this concept in fullness, they have reached adulthood.
You would think that simply experiencing life would be enough for people to learn the concept, but it seems to me that people smack this wall over, and over, and over again; some people never, ever understand, and so they continue to take actions for their immediate benefit, and suffer much pain in the process.
Please comment with your thoughts:
“Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit…”
“There is no one who loves pain itself, who seeks after it and wants to have it, simply because it is pain…”
The standard Lorem Ipsum passage, used since the 1500s
“Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.”
1914 translation by H. Rackham
“On the other hand, we denounce with righteous indignation and dislike men who are so beguiled and demoralized by the charms of pleasure of the moment, so blinded by desire, that they cannot foresee the pain and trouble that are bound to ensue; and equal blame belongs to those who fail in their duty through weakness of will, which is the same as saying through shrinking from toil and pain. These cases are perfectly simple and easy to distinguish.
“In a free hour, when our power of choice is untrammelled and when nothing prevents our being able to do what we like best, every pleasure is to be welcomed and every pain avoided. But in certain circumstances and owing to the claims of duty or the obligations of business it will frequently occur that pleasures have to be repudiated and annoyances accepted. The wise man therefore always holds in these matters to this principle of selection: he rejects pleasures to secure other greater pleasures, or else he endures pains to avoid worse pains.”
When one groks this concept in fullness, they have reached adulthood.
Let’s team this up with my belief that there needs to be a certification process before people are allowed to bear children (yes, I know it’s impossible to enforce, that’s not the biggest roadblock, though. Who the hell do we trust enough to do the certification evaluations?)
And let’s add a clause that makes people over 70 take a yearly road test just to make sure that they aren’t becoming a hazard from so many years of taking this right for granted. (Did I ever tell you that in high school I wrote a research paper on this topic and got the Gray Panthers pissed off at me?)
The problem, as I see it, is that so many people are raised by controlling parents and the simple act of breaking away from real or supposed control makes people want a period of “I’m doing this because I WANT TO. The problem is, that while this is a normal response, many people don’t get that this should only be a temporary phase.
Who teaches this concept? It’s not a subject in school. Should it be? Same problems as the parenting certification, who would dictate what gets taught and how? That puts it back into the realm of “those who raised me” ought to imbed this concept in my head.
I know. Let’s blame it on video games. Instant gratification. Or TV! There’s a devil if I ever saw one.
Do I think that the ability to evaluate when a choice will result in immediate pleasure that will eventually cause pain and then choose not to take that course is a sign of adulthood? I would like it to be, but I know too many people around retirement age that still ignore this tenent. So many people value their personal gratification over the greater good. We all do it at some point. Those of us that grok, do it with knowledge that we will have to take responsibility for our actions.
Of course, this is all coming from the mind of someone who claims that growing up means growing old. The whole adulthood thing baffles me. I’m still waiting for my ritual that gets me ready to be an adult. I feel cheated growing up a concrete princess of middle class America.
I am of the opinion that mandating any “qualification” for adulthood across the board is an act of futility and foolishness. While this concept has merit, in our society, it may be completely irrelevant in another place or another time.