Admiration seems to be a good evaluation via the report of others but the perception of others has its limitations too. Plato's seemingly just person could gain inauthentic admiration so its not an objective standard. The excessive desire for admiration or dependency on it for ones self esteem is problematic.
I sense that there is a place for it, in being so good, that you become a role model for others. People learn best when they can observe and model their behavior after others. Admiration is useful to teach others ethics.
Sometimes I have slipped in the last few years and after reflection, a moment to think of how others perceive me in a situation, would have given me important information to regulate my behavior. Healthy admiration can be an opportunity to learn empathy. If one loses the admiration of others, it's not necessarily due to disagreement but most likely an issue of one's style or tact.
Sometimes I don't know what to do or how to approach telling the truth or taking some action so that it produces good.
I have learned to understand my feelings and I'm not sure if it's hindsight bias or something of the like that gives me confidence in where my emotions lead me. For example, my anger was telling me this relationship lacked boundaries and was unhealthy but i let it go until i had an outburst instead of making a decision earlier on.
The question is; how to live?
Others say be good. I don't like feeling bad. But what is good beyond the way I feel? If what is good is out of touch, how would I know it?
It must be something I can sense by reason or feeling for those are my access points to what is.
Even if it means stepping in your shoes to see myself as an actor, the good must be somehow perceivable by me to follow and know it.
Is this good a priori? Can I walk into a situation that has a variety of variables, mixed in such a way that my path of or to the good seems ambiguous?
What am I to do, in the now, as others move in this dynamic circumstance?
My reflections and thoughts flow through time. I cannot pause what is, as fast as my mind may be. Decisions and action are inevitable in a time-passing existence with other agents we cooperate with. Those decisions and actions are from our being and are micro cosmologically our existential responsibility. We may claim responsibility for our presence, decisions and actions or not. Is this what it means to be good?
We are faced with the blizzard of the perceptual moment and from there we produce a degree of unknown consequences. It is our existence and stand for our own life and meaning which situates us in this predicament. We are caught at a crossroads of developing our own freedom, leaving behind the imprint of those present moments in the interwovenness of what is, now what was, in the past.
So what is it, then?
It is something, for the idea of the good, being good, and feeling good guides decisions and actions. It is in the now, i make decisions for now, later and before. Now and later I see what happens but maybe before is just as important.
Here is where philosophy comes in. Reflection allows me to identify general properties in my experience and test alternative modes of action and behaviour when sufficiently similar situations recur.
What is it then? Beyond just a value but maybe something more?
What wisdom was lost before words? Is there such a thing?
Could it be, that the good, is the cosmological unfolding of our existence as cooperative animals who feel towards an ideal goal?
The cosmos is the kind of thing that produces beings as us, from what we understand as 'nothing.' We come from nothing. A universe such as this, grows beings as us. Together, us and this cosmos, exist. The good is found here, between us and what is, the cosmos. We use words, the cosmos is. They are not necessary for what is to exist.
The capacity for one thing to exist, means there is a general category of that particular thing. There are instances of the good, feeling good and being good in our universe so the general category of the good exists. The often undetectable intersection of human, other and reality creating 'good' whether the human perceives it or not. If you are fishing and you catch one fish, there are many more you cannot see. Just because we don't always see the good, doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
Is there some path that only allows one way so that any beings who grow as we do, must 'be good' to be in harmony with themselves, each other and reality?
It is ethical, to follow one's responsibility, through unknown consequences, with principles and virtues to guide them.
The puzzling thing for me is what do the others have to teach me from their instincts and what can my feelings contribute?
Maybe the real wisdom was never written. Maybe the real wisdom is the long line of success our ancestors shared before our time, now spoken mostly through body language. Our species actually depends on this for mate selection and is rooted in how we feel. Our feelings have been guiding our species in a process of artificial self-selection, weaning out ways of being that are not conducive to our relationship with each other and the cosmos.
I don't know what to do.
Exist.
Well that doesn't seem correct. There is a lot to 'exist' and how I do it matters.
Exist for X.
What does this mean, 'for x'?
Is this good?
21.11.21
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