Men clamor over a place in line to proclaim and demand a thing like ‘vitality’ if it comes from their master above. But never do they offer so much as a second’s meditation on right action to attain such a thing. One wonders why—but then one sees that they cannot offer what they do not possess the ability to generate themselves. Indeed such a thing as a ‘vitality’ in a person or a people cannot arise through some force external. It must only arise from force internal. Force cultivated through the aeons, force like some refracted ray through that jewel which is the singular Force, the Agon that resides at the center of all that is alive.
See the man’s hair blonde from Californian sun, see his skin bronzed by selfsame nuclear mouth atop the sky, watch him surf-dance along the waves in his watery domain. There is no schoolmarm who compels him to master the techne of this form, there is only his Nature and the Nature of every being that has ever lived which yielded at last a forcing of the unity of his dance.
Write in plain language. Hold yourself to this standard: “as simple as possible, but no simpler”.
This doesn’t mean you have to be lifeless or clinical. You are clearly channeling BAP, a master of simple, direct, yet powerful and passionate prose.
Trying too hard to sound smart, deep or poetic communicates insecurity. Instead of BAP you become the “unmatched percipacity” guy, a fate worse than death.
>>3532 >>3543 I also disagree with lepo. Prettypoasting is good. It’s a fundamental art form of Western Civilization (under different names and guises), and this was a nice change from the typical variety of autism.
Even worse than merely disagreeing, lepo outs himself as a low-taste retard. OP is clearly going Cormac mode, and there’s some Nietzschean aphorism style, but calling that “clearly channeling BAP” is a hilarious self-own. I think it’s too over-the-top Cormac if anything. Don’t be discouraged OP, there is the spark of something good here.
The more serious problem here is that i dont know how to engage with OP. Yes vitality come from within, not prescribed from without. What else can even be said itt?
>>3545 That doesn't really strike me as a problem. Do you have to engage via reply to everything you see? It's definitely possible to read it, judge it depending on what you thought, and move on. And as a matter of fact, there's plenty of content to disagree with in OP, but it seems like it rings true for people.
The real question is should sofiechan culturally accept ornamental posting? Is it okay for someone to write something we enjoy and find true without needing much discussion? I think probably not in the big tags, but I could pretty easily see this style carving out a niche and occupying a smaller tag.
>>3549 Whatever works man. I'm sure we'll fight it out and our preferred formats will emerge. Aphoristic microblogging works on twitter, why not here? May I suggest though that OP could have been improved with some actual imagery and maybe a better title. Not everything has to be 4000 characters, but this one turned into a referendum on format because that was easier to discuss than the content, which is cryptic and out of context.
Nice post. What's both painful and hilarious about cerebral types is our Discovery of Truths through rhetorical means, when truth is both invisible and exercised without misstep by the surfer, big wall climber, backcountry skier, etc.
Ah, so vitality and will are the defining inputs in a system? This insight requires no reading and no thinking, you simply have to watch a group of surfers sit patiently for the set to roll in and organize themselves accordingly as the waves break. A piece of music performed well has the same effect.
And that experience, of *witnessing* the thing happen and from there on out *understanding it* is exactly what makes the essence of will and vitality impossible to capture in writing. It's disrespectful to even try to compress it down to words, especially plain explainoor language. At a minimum do some prettyposting as OP did, or even better roll it into some fictional story that can maybe capture some sliver of the invisible essence possessed by some and gawked at by most. Film, plays, ballet, are all better mediums. BAP is smart enough not to even try so he rolls everything into comedy.
The surfer who has priority on the set waves would never think to write about that experience. The writing by the spectator on the beach is filtered through a lens so distorted that the writing and the scene share no true ancestor, they are distinct entirely.
>>3544 The adjective use is McCarthy-esque, but it needs more rhythm in the sentence structure and maybe a smattering of fragmentary asides to really hit.
>>3532 >>3532 Vitality is great, and I for one enjoy swimming, backpacking, ultramarathons, cycling, sailing, frolicking in the California sun, being blonde, tanning, and all that good stuff. All that said, one wonders if narrow vitalism is sufficient for a philosophy of life. In the opening to Aristotle's Politics, Aristotle notes that the man who can live outside of society and the political order is either a beast or a god. I think there's a way in which the archetypal vitalist young man blends a bit of both. There is something godlike, but also something blunted and subhuman about the withdrawal from the linguistic order and from public life.
The job of politics is to direct the energies of the energetic. Being Political means having a Plan for what to do with Resources, one of which is energetic young people.
At an individual level, being as energetic as possible is probably directionally correct.
>>3578 > All that said, one wonders if narrow vitalism is sufficient for a philosophy of life.
Vitality is marker of health, not its cause nor its goal. The causes and goals of health, or more broadly flourishing, must be considered and pursued on their own. That's exactly what Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics and Politics are about.
