Floris Okoth - Keeping Wonder and Hope Alive

 

A few days ago I watched Gladiator II in theaters. Honestly one of the best movies I’ve seen this year. I’m not going to spoil the movie for anyone, but I would like to say that something interesting was how they showed how a changed mindset can do great things. Keeping hope alive and wondering what could come from that I think added to the plot, and that’s something that can be seen in real life also. 

In chapter 6 of John Kaag’s Sick Souls, Healthy Minds, he opens with a late afternoon in October in one of the best places globally - New York. As he’s waking from his hotel in Manhattan to a Bookstore, he sees a sign with a wonderful message. In green lettering and newly painted it states “LIFE IS WORTH LIVING”  at the bottom of the Brooklyn Bridge. After giving it some thought he ask himself the question: “If life’s worth is so obvious, why is the sign up there in the first place?” 

Suicide and loneliness has become more prevalent within recent years. According to the NYC.org, nearly 600 suicides happen annually in New York alone. On average that’s 16 lives per hour. Every 15 days someone jumps into the East River off the Brooklyn Bridge. According to the cdc.org, about 50,000 suicides were successfully committed in the United States in 2022. That’s about 1 life every 11 minutes. Unfortunately those numbers are only increasing. 

James wrote to Benjamin Blood some of his thoughts on suicide in 1870. One of those thoughts is quoted, “no man is educated who has never dallied with the thought of suicide”. Even though James claims this, suicide is not just something people of higher education experience. Suicide and suicidal thoughts do not  discriminate. It does not take prejudice, it has been known to affect many people regardless of gender, age, race, culture, religion, and backgrounds. 

It has been so prominent in many people’s lives, whether they’ve had those thoughts themselves, someone they know has tried it or even a person they’ve heard of successfully committing suicide. It’s so common that now there is a symbolic tattoo for those who have gone through the trauma of unfortunate events. In the image above is a common tattoo, a semi colon tattoo. It is partly hidden in the flowers within this image, but it is more common to get just the semi colon. It’s a symbol of strength, hope, and resilience. In most cases this tattoo is a sign of those who have struggled with mental health and chose to keep going, just like an author or writer would in their media. They chose to keep going, to keep moving forward. That couldn’t be done without hope, hopeful of better times to come.

Kaag claims that pragmatism might save your life, but never once and for all (pg. 170). Going back to the previous semester we learned that pragmatism is about thinking and fixing problems in a practical sense and not fixating on a theoretical idea. James was a very popular Pragmatist and had also seen the sign below the Brooklyn Bridge during his time in New York. In his view though, he believed it was missing something. James believed the sign should say: LIFE IS WORTH LIVING - MAYBE. 

Originally, I didn’t agree with this point and felt like James could easily get “cancelled” for a comment like this, but after listening to his reasoning, I definitely understood where he was coming from. After this comment, Kaag tells the audience that it’s up to each of us individually to make “what we will” of life (pg. 170), that “it depends on the liver” (pg. 170) as William James stated to a group of young men in 1895. This was done outside the Cambridge YMCA at the time. For most people, free will can be exercised in a number of ways. Hopefully no one reading this (or anyone else for that matter) will choose suicide to express free will, but instead choose to embody new habits and thoughts. 

One video I feel could be helpful would be this TEDxTalk with Brian Nandy. He is a great speaker and gives inspiring and excellent advice on how hope can affect you and what you can do to give yourself (possibly others) hope when it may seem difficult. His idea of “tilting” was very interesting to me and I think it’s something I will begin to incorporate in my daily life. 

Within the TEDxTalk, Nandy gives a 4th practice of active hope and calls it “get curious”. That curiosity is what he believes gives you a lowered sense of fear. That lowered sense of fear allows you to allow yourself to go and explore, maybe make new friends or try new things, which in turn can change your habits. You start to pull yourself out of whatever fear and isolation you’ve been in and will help you for the better overall. His example with Mary I think is worth the listen. 

Back to the book and within the chapter, Kaag reminds us that often we don’t have a clue on how someone is experiencing their own life. Like the idea of sonder. If you’ve ever lived or been to New York, you come into contact with a lot of people. After all it is the city that never sleeps. And with that in mind you know there’s no way you could truly know what is going on with anyone. We all live our own lives and because of this fact, James believed it was better to leave it as “maybe”. Like he suggested. I like the example Kaag gave to explain this. New York has many beautiful names, known as the city of skyscrapers, when night falls, the lights would “compete” with the stars in the sky. From our perspective on earth, the lights from the buildings and structures would win, but in the indefinite long term, the stars would come on top. Between the poles however, it’s truly anyone’s gamble. This opened the question to wonder life’s worth and to Kaag, James’ maybe is right to him. This is because it maps his existential situation as not entirely sold. I like to look at it as nothing is written in stone. Without good guess work, growth wouldn’t be a thing because you wouldn’t or couldn’t learn. That in return would make a person to think nothing has meaning. 

William James believed that our lives aren’t settled in advance - stars don’t burn or appear in perfect order (pg. 172). This can be attributed to his ideas on free will. To wonder whether or not everything you do is predetermined, and you choose to believe it isn’t. James goes into detail about this in one of his books, The Principles of Psychology (1890). Kaag specifically got a quote similar to that of the stars from his reading in the 21st chapter. It must’ve taken lots of wondering, questioning, and answering for James to complete the book, as he did start the manuscript in 1878. 

Because of free will and the idea that not everything is entirely concrete (there are still facts and big and little “T”s in James’ view), you have the choice to view this as an opportunity and chance to improve, take action, or change your mindset. A great book that goes into depth about this is the book Atomic Habits by James Clear. My school advisor told me about this book when I was going through a rough time in high school and I definitely left the last chapter with a new mindset and beginning. 

Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help create the fact.

This is one of the many good quotes from the wonderful William James himself from his book The Will to Believe (1896). In his words, hope gives us a “chance” to what is to come, moving forward. Another great quote from James I would like to end with came from his book Varieties of Religious Experience (1902). You have the chance to change your mindset, when you are feeling down and hopeless it’s important to remember: 

The existence of chance makes the differnce.