Despair
"Bad faith is possible only because sincerity is conscious of missing its goal inevitably, due to its very nature. I can try to apprehend myself as "not being cowardly," when I am so, only on condition that the "being cowardly" is itself "in question" at the very moment when it exists, on condition that it is itself one question, that at the very moment when I wish to apprehend it, it escapes me on all sides and annihilates itself."
Self-determination bears holes on its sides. To assert oneself as something is to doubt it so gravely the assertion takes form, and comes into conscious being, and to express this is to find a strength so overwhelming it imposes itself beyond one's self, beyond one's own. To effect change, perhaps? To overcome the very doubt which gives the expression its vigour? It is folly.
"The condition under which I can attempt an effort in bad faith is that in one sense, I am not this coward which I do not wish to be. But if I were not cowardly in the simple mode of not-being-what-one-is-not, I would be "in good faith" by declaring that I am not cowardly. Thus this inapprehensible coward is evanescent; in order for me not to be cowardly, I must in some way also be cowardly. That does not mean that I must be "a little" cowardly, in the sense that "a little" signifies "to a certain degree cowardly - and not cowardly to a certain degree." No. I must at oncce be and not be totally and in all respects a coward."
Cowardliness, like kindness and other such concepts remain what they are - concepts. Concepts which, like freedom, are in their very essence absolute. Such is how one has no ability to be "a little" of this or another. One is cowardly, or one is not cowardly. Yet this adjectival association, this being-a-characteristic trait of cowardliness and its fellow concepts hints towards such - that such being, such relation to adjectival concepts, in reality lies nowhere. Present out cowardliness, kindness, in a green box, perhaps? Still, its ability to amend or align the choices of the human consciousness is undeniable, whether in bad faith, good faith, or in true raw being. They can be links, relations, between multiple human consciousnesses. 'He is a coward, and thus I treat him like I should cowards'. [Are] we then, in this context [have we such embodied or in our being 'is], in essence, any concept at all? That the human mind may believe itself to be, in its flesh, meat, cells, and concepts, is absurd, silly. It is perhaps then, consciousness itself, which may bear, in its essence, concepts.
How should this consciousness comprehend these concepts, then? Certainly consciousness relates to these concepts in ways. Perhaps just as our selves relate to trees and pillars in ways. We sway across the mental, finally settling on a(or multiple) concept(s) upon which to feed, to grow, to determine, to become idolised. Such could then it be, a 'determined' consciousness, a 'clear' personality. That which integrates the concepts into its very essence. This notion, however, indicates that the pre-integrated consciousness in its very fact bears essence. A spontaneity, a being far beyond the outlines of the logical, conceptual realm. Perhaps it is this which Sartre seeks, to exist as a consciousness merely as itself. A freedom from the concepts of one or all.
As such, how is one completely and totally cowardly, and while being so, is not cowardly at all? What might being be, then?
Envy, envy, my vice and my fall.
Deus, allow me to free myself from my torment.
Please direct semantic horseplay or an unfreedom from preconceived notions and associations to an indulging party. Especially the arguable.
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