It Is an Either/Or Choice
When I was in college in the early 60s, Søren Kierkegaard fascinated me. My major was philosophy. Kierkegaard seemed to shatter many of the ideas of those that preceded him. Most scholars view him as the father of existentialism. He wrote about nearly every aspect of philosophy. However, he loved writing in parables about things that were ironic or were metaphors.
Kierkegaard’s first philosophical writing was Either/Or: A Fragment of Life. It was published in 1843 under his pseudonym, Victor Eremita, Latin for Victorious Hermit. He concludes the treatise with a sermon for his readers by challenging them “to discover a second face hidden behind the one you see.”
Therefore, in a Kierkegaardian manner, this essay is about your either/or decisions in life. Soon, I’ll be 82, and in my time on my yellow brick road of life, I see life as an either/or mindset. Either you are a dreamer, or you are a disser...one who disses life. It is your choice. You can decide on either style of living. Neither Kierkegaard nor I were the first to come up with that choice. Others have raised this option of living our lives. Whether you spend your time dreaming of what could be is your decision. George Bernard Shaw wrote the play Back to Methuselah in which he wrote, “You see things; you say, 'Why?' But I dream things that never were; and I say 'Why not? You use a glass mirror to see your face; you use works of art to see your soul.” Bobby Kennedy came up with a shorter paraphrase: “Some men see things as they are and say, why; I dream things that never were and say, why not.”
Each of us has a choice before us. It is either to dream dreams or to diss everything.
And over time, we will all croak. We are finite. So, what is the issue about the either/or way to live life if we all die at some time?
We can spend life dissing everything. Look at Trump. He is the king of the dissers. He will post things on his social media page any time of the day or night. That is his choice. Methinks that he isn’t a very happy human being. I don’t know any happy dissers.
The alternative is to be a dreamer. It does two essential things in one’s life. Being a dreamer makes one happy and driven. It goes back to my mantra: It is giving that we get. If you wish to be happy, you must first reach out to others.
