G.W.F. Hegel (1770-1831) theorized that recognition is a human
basic need.
This rises the question of human
unwillingness or incapability of reocnizing let alone rewarding, the incredible number of lersons who gave immense. but unrecognized, contributions, to our progresses in all fiels, from historical events to scuence, art and health.
A surprisingly large perceentage of creating, inventing,organizing,producing, , helping, prevailing against evils and oppression has been achieved by people
who never came to the stage of history, regardless of gain, or any kind of reward.
Many of
them were not interested even in simple recognition.
Others kept their discooveries, inventions and and knowledge secret for long, of even until death, to avoid nefarious consequences or misinterpretation by
predatory tyrants and powerful parasites.
In more than just a few cases, very creative people were simply
killed or secretly chained into forced creativity and oblivion by those who had
the power to use and discard them.
Recognition
as such can leave
much unrresolved, because it can also attribute merits not only to others who lack them, but to persons who have the
opposite attributes.
Great virtues and superhuman qualities
have been bestowed to despicable persons, who remain on the altars of
history.
Some people we believed to be saints, geniuses and heroes were
despicable or insignificant persons.
Obviously, the trrue heroes and saints remain unknown...
Justice is a form of recognition.
Which brings us into a closed circle, because
our dependence on the capricious intelligence, integrity, knowledge and good
will of other humans remains precarious.
Since all of us are individualw before anything else, e ach of us is also the center of a universe that exists in our individual perception, and only as long as we live to perceive it.
Religion tells us we need not worry if we
have lived a virtuous life, for there is an after-life with infallible justice
and eternal reward.
All we must worry about is believing,
being good and virtuous.
That is one of the most soothing ideas man can have.
But we know that a whole set of comfortable beliefs
crumbles if we have another religion or faith.
Reality is the
same, regardless of our belifs or ignoance about superior beings, and eternal life .
Close circle?
Not if we realize
that the only inescapable reality is that each one of us is an indestructible
and probably eternal individual, alive or else, whether we perceive it or not.
Then, we become what we are and individually, regardless of recognition,
fame or oblivion.
We can learn that the merits of our achiemens are all that counts: regadless of recognition and/or abuses by otherrs.
Living and becoming
are fortunately
one and the same, and they depend on our will.
We can feel it, once we perceive our
reality.
In fact, I am sure that millions of forgotten humans have becomewhat we
could consider super-humans by just evolving without
recognition.
That obviously adds to their merits.
This may let down many readers who expected the ecstatic joy of esoteric pleasing revelation from a fashionable guru.
Some women generate children and remain obtuse to the marvelous meaning of it.
It is a
matter of choosing our individual posture in front of reality.
Are we then alone?
The question is then,
whether we like it or what we would prefer.
Since are individuals, being basically alone
is the obvious reality.
First, independence frees us from being on a stage where we are judged, rewarded, punished or ignored.
Life puts us in a competitive world.
That
may worry some who fear to lose in the competition.
We don’t lose because someone else is -or not- better than we.
If someone else or even all others
are better than we, that by itself doesn’t make us worse.
Comparison with the better ones
enables us to learn from them whatever we could absorb or surpass.
Thus, our simple good will can improve thus.
Our best competition is against ouselves, for it allows us to learn and progress.
No no matter how much we learn, what about the contest with others who oppress us beyond endurance?
Here comes the most underestimated
contribution of some postures, like Judeo-Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism,
rehashed in our own way by the great psychologist Victor Frankl (1905-1997), creator of the
"logotherapy", which treats psychological and emotional problems with “logos”, or
logic, rather than a mere psychoanalytical approach, that asserts: even if we are
hopelessly shackled in chains and under torture (as Dr. Frankl was, in several
Nazi Jewish-extermination camps), we still have the freedom to choose our
emotional and intellectual reactions.
Incredible but true.
It sounds hopeless, but we must realize
that over 99.99% of our reality comes back after death (with or without the entropic quantum loss... I know these are big words, but you can ignore then at very little cost. However, rhey are references you can check).
The ultimate
question/answer is like the difference between dying peacefully or with
suffering.
In suffering rests a supreme
opportunity for ultimate evolution.
That is what Euripides (484-406 b. c.) meant when he said
that humans need suffering.
That is not masochism, but reaching a pleasure-and-pain free equilibrium between being and not-being.
Tthat would be the ultimate liberation and final quiet beyond any adversity and the life/death cycle.
It goes beyond the “recognition” Hegel asserted to be a basic need of human beings.
Since few can be that "free" in the first life, the "enlightened" conclusion of some religions is that, if we don't detach ourselves from happiness and unhappines causing desires, we condemn ouselves to go through many lives and deaths again and again, even metempsychosis (through any forms of life...), to improve ourselves until we reach the readiness to blend with the universe, just like the drop that returns to the ocean.
Hinduism and Buddhism offered the best popularized versions to sthat approach over 2.5 millennia ago.
Success on earth required a society that would offer us its advantages by recognizing our merits.
That corroded the popularity of better
solutions, because it seemed to be less strenuous.
Besides, complaining that
others don’t recognize our merits is easier than the self-control required by
the steep learning curves of the solitary individual efforts and pains.
Gaining power over
others is also easier than the self-discipline of virtue and evolution.
Moses, Jesus, Buddah, Confucius preached love, self discipline, with or without worshipping a god (or whatever) who raises our focus to him (or her or it), but over 2000 years of orthodox and reformed efforts failed and are failing still worse.
Meanwhile, success was and remained the common ambition, beside the sublimation of erotic instincts into a lofty love that never seems to conquer the world but in aspiration, poetry, art and ideals that remain "unpractical".
Then came Niccolò Machiavelli
(1469-1527).
He was the first who succeeded in putting together a system of
practical instructions based on human nature as it is, rather than how it should
be, and is not and never was.
In other words, he was the first who used the scientific method on humans, based on
reality as we find it, rather than wishful thinking, religion, prejudices or
ideals.
The reason he had no other choice was
that there was no other way man could succeed (if that is the goal) without depending on the approval
of other men as they are.
Therefore Machiavelli's quip, “Men are not to do as they ought
to do, but they ought to do as they do do” is a deadly serious matter, still
used today by virtually most (if not all) politicians and leaders.
Today's psychologists who have (politically) surrendered to the anti-Freusian trend in favor of "Man cannot be changed unless he wants to" and try a promising approach: try a coctail of Machiavelli, Freud, and Frankl... concentrated on MOTIVATION...
Thinking of the ultimate goal of life,
however, the only real success is within the individual.
The path is well known but too arduous for nor exceptional people.
We can still go back to
the image offered by the ultimate result: face "God".
In that, the most powerful, the brightest and the richest without virtue have not even a minute fraction of the value of the most humble virtuous person.
It sounds like corny prattle, but the
truth must be told and repeated continuously, because most people
hope to reach success and happiness outside rather than within themselves.
The reason is that the
discipline required for improving ourselves is much more demanding -but also much
more liberating- than competing with others.
Descriptions of the ways offered by the original Hindu, Buddhist, and similar disciplines are available through many sources, but they were made into religions to satisfy the human preference for believing rather than learning and ascending.
Christian, Jewish, Muslim and other religions offered more popular and complicated versions based on the simple love principle, but they also have a hard time remaining uncorrupted by the basic “will to power” and by the demands of success “here and now, as we are, while we are alive”.
The “practical” solution could recognize that continuous self improvement in learning, self mastery, creating and growth through giving are the only way to progress and overcome the need for recognition simultaneously.
Impossible? Women do it by nurturing life
and living in total devotion to it.
Yet, ultra-feminists have become blind to it. Even more than
the men. Why?
Why do I write this? For recognition?
Recognition helps me only in the limited way I can understand.
If it helps anyone or anything else, it is called legacy, which has no limits.
Considering all of the above, it should be not too surprising to admit that the
greatest human who ever lived might have been so concentrated in progressing,
knowing, creating and whatever only he/she could comprehend, that he had neither
time, nor interest or need to seek our notice or appreciatiion
Modern psychologists had a great opportunity to use Freudian insights to find a practical shorcut that would develop practical steps from Machiavelli's perception, as a step to lauch a new era beyond {to overcomen.
Modernpsychologists
Much of it has been said before, but how many times more are necessary until it sinks in?
The most obvious of all the examples of selfless devotion beyond any recognition and description is MOTHERHOOD.
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