tonytan4ever · March 16, 2021 15:15 · tonytan4ever · Mar 16, 2021
diff --git a/Dictation 2020.04.27 b/Dictation 2020.04.27
 One of the strangest yet most intriguing aspects of Friedrich Nietzsche's ideas is his repeated enthusiasm for a concept
 that he called Amor Fati. Translated from the Latin, as a love of one's fate, or as we might put it, a resolute and entus-
 -iastic acceptance of everything that has happened in one's life. The person of Amor Fati doesn't seek to erase anything
 of their past, but rather accepts what has occured -- the good and the bad, the mistaken and the wise, with strength and
 an  all-embracing gratitude that borders on a kind of enthusiastic affection. 

 This refusal to regret and retouch the past is heralded as a virtue at many points in Nietzsche's work. In his book The Gay
 Science, written during a period of great personal hardship for the philosopher, Nietzsche writes, "I want to learn more 
 and more, to see as beautiful what is necessary in things; then I shall be one of those who makes things beautiful. Amor
 Fati, let that be my love henceforth! I don't want to wage war against ugly; I don't want to accuse; I don't even want to
 accuse those who accuse. Looking away shall be my only negation; and all in all, and on the whole,: someday I wish to be only
 a "yes"-sayer."

 And a few years later, in Ecce Homo, Nietzsche writes, "my formula for greatness in a human being is Amor Fati; that one
 wants nothing to be different -- not forward, not backwards, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still
 less conceal it, but love it."

 In most areas of life, most of the time, we do the very opposite. We spend a huge amount of time taking stock of our errors
 regreting and lamenting the unfortunate twists of fate, and wishing that things could've gone differently. We are typically
 mighty opponents of anything that smacks of resignation or fatalism. We want to alter and improve things -- ourselves, 
 politics, the economy, the course of history. And part of this means refusing to be passive about the errors, injustices,
 and ugliness of our own and collective past. 

 Nietzsche himself in some moods knows this defiance full well. There is much emphasis in his work on action, initiative,
 and self-assertion. His concept of the "Willie zur Macht", or will to power, emboides just this attitude of vitality and
 conquest of obstacles. However, he is aware that in order to lead a good life, we need to keep in mind plenty of opposing
 ideas, and marshall them as and when they become relevant. We don't in Nietzsche's eyes need to be consistent. We need to
 have the ideas to hand that can salve our wounds. 

 Nietzsche isn't therefore asking us to choose between glorious fatalism on the one hand, or a vigorous willing on the 
 other. He is allowing us to have a course to either intellectual move depending on the occasion. He wishes our mental 
 toolkit to have more than one set of ideas, to have, as it were, both hammer and a saw. 

 Certain occasions particularly need the wisdom of a will-driven philosophy. Others demand that we know how to accept, em-
 -brace, and stop fighting the inevitable. In Nietzsche's own life, there was much he had tried to change and overcome. He
 had fled his restrictive family in Germany, and escape to the Swiss Alps; He had tried to get away from the narrowness of
 academia, and become a freelance writer; he had tried to find a wife who could be both a lover and an intellectual soul-
 -mate. But a lot in his project of self-creation and self-overcoming had gone terribly wrong. 

 He couldn't get his parents, especially his mother and sister out of his head. Nietzsche's books sold dismally, and he was
 forced to more or less to beg from friends and family in order to keep going. Meanwhile, his halting, gauche attempts to
 seduce women were met by ridicule and rejection. There must have been so many lamentations and regrets running through 
 his mind in his walks accross the upper Engadine, and his nights and his modest wooden chalet in Sils Maria. 

 "If only I had stuck with an academic career; if only I had been more confident around certain women; if only I had written 
 in a more popular style; if only I had been born in France..." It was because such thoughts and everyone of us has our own
 distinct variety of them, can ultimately be so destructive and so soul-sapping that the idea of Amor Fati grew compelling 
 to Nietzsche. Amor Fati was the idea that he needed in order to regain sanity, after hours of self-recrimination and 
 criticism. It's the idea we ourselves may need at 4AM, finally to quieten a mind that has started gnawing into itself 
 shortly after midnight. It's an idea with which a troubled spirit can greet first signs of dawn. 

 At the height of the mood of Amor Fati, we recognize that things really could been not otherwise, because everything we
 are and have done is bound closely together, in a web of consequences that began with our birth in which we are powerless
 to alter att will. We see that what went right and what went horribly wrong; our "as one", and we committ ourselves to 
 accepting both to no longer destructively hoping that things could've been otherwise. We were headed to a degree of cata-
 -strophe from the start. We end up saying with tears in which they mingle grief and a sort of ecstasy, a large "yes" to 
 the whole of life, in its absolute horror and occasional moments of awesome beauty. 

 In a letter to a friend, written in the summer of 1882, Nietzsche tried to sum up the new spirit of acceptance that he
 had learn to lean on to protect him from the agony of regret -- "I am in a mood of fatalistic surrender to God, I call it
 Amor Fati, so much so that I would be willing to rush into a lion's jaws." -- and that is where after a bit too much re-
 -gret, we should learn sometimes, to join him. 

 Thank you for watching. If you want to learn more about the thinkers from our videos, check out our Great Thinkers book,
 available worldwide, and now as an ebook.
	One of the strangest yet most intriguing aspects of Friedrich Nietzsche's ideas is his repeated enthusiasm for a concept
	that he called Amor Fati. Translated from the Latin, as a love of one's fate, or as we might put it, a resolute and entus-
	-iastic acceptance of everything that has happened in one's life. The person of Amor Fati doesn't seek to erase anything
	of their past, but rather accepts what has occured -- the good and the bad, the mistaken and the wise, with strength and
	an all-embracing gratitude that borders on a kind of enthusiastic affection.

	This refusal to regret and retouch the past is heralded as a virtue at many points in Nietzsche's work. In his book The Gay
	Science, written during a period of great personal hardship for the philosopher, Nietzsche writes, "I want to learn more
	and more, to see as beautiful what is necessary in things; then I shall be one of those who makes things beautiful. Amor
	Fati, let that be my love henceforth! I don't want to wage war against ugly; I don't want to accuse; I don't even want to
	accuse those who accuse. Looking away shall be my only negation; and all in all, and on the whole,: someday I wish to be only
	a "yes"-sayer."

	And a few years later, in Ecce Homo, Nietzsche writes, "my formula for greatness in a human being is Amor Fati; that one
	wants nothing to be different -- not forward, not backwards, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still
	less conceal it, but love it."

	In most areas of life, most of the time, we do the very opposite. We spend a huge amount of time taking stock of our errors
	regreting and lamenting the unfortunate twists of fate, and wishing that things could've gone differently. We are typically
	mighty opponents of anything that smacks of resignation or fatalism. We want to alter and improve things -- ourselves,
	politics, the economy, the course of history. And part of this means refusing to be passive about the errors, injustices,
	and ugliness of our own and collective past.

	Nietzsche himself in some moods knows this defiance full well. There is much emphasis in his work on action, initiative,
	and self-assertion. His concept of the "Willie zur Macht", or will to power, emboides just this attitude of vitality and
	conquest of obstacles. However, he is aware that in order to lead a good life, we need to keep in mind plenty of opposing
	ideas, and marshall them as and when they become relevant. We don't in Nietzsche's eyes need to be consistent. We need to
	have the ideas to hand that can salve our wounds.

	Nietzsche isn't therefore asking us to choose between glorious fatalism on the one hand, or a vigorous willing on the
	other. He is allowing us to have a course to either intellectual move depending on the occasion. He wishes our mental
	toolkit to have more than one set of ideas, to have, as it were, both hammer and a saw.

	Certain occasions particularly need the wisdom of a will-driven philosophy. Others demand that we know how to accept, em-
	-brace, and stop fighting the inevitable. In Nietzsche's own life, there was much he had tried to change and overcome. He
	had fled his restrictive family in Germany, and escape to the Swiss Alps; He had tried to get away from the narrowness of
	academia, and become a freelance writer; he had tried to find a wife who could be both a lover and an intellectual soul-
	-mate. But a lot in his project of self-creation and self-overcoming had gone terribly wrong.

	He couldn't get his parents, especially his mother and sister out of his head. Nietzsche's books sold dismally, and he was
	forced to more or less to beg from friends and family in order to keep going. Meanwhile, his halting, gauche attempts to
	seduce women were met by ridicule and rejection. There must have been so many lamentations and regrets running through
	his mind in his walks accross the upper Engadine, and his nights and his modest wooden chalet in Sils Maria.

	"If only I had stuck with an academic career; if only I had been more confident around certain women; if only I had written
	in a more popular style; if only I had been born in France..." It was because such thoughts and everyone of us has our own
	distinct variety of them, can ultimately be so destructive and so soul-sapping that the idea of Amor Fati grew compelling
	to Nietzsche. Amor Fati was the idea that he needed in order to regain sanity, after hours of self-recrimination and
	criticism. It's the idea we ourselves may need at 4AM, finally to quieten a mind that has started gnawing into itself
	shortly after midnight. It's an idea with which a troubled spirit can greet first signs of dawn.

	At the height of the mood of Amor Fati, we recognize that things really could been not otherwise, because everything we
	are and have done is bound closely together, in a web of consequences that began with our birth in which we are powerless
	to alter att will. We see that what went right and what went horribly wrong; our "as one", and we committ ourselves to
	accepting both to no longer destructively hoping that things could've been otherwise. We were headed to a degree of cata-
	-strophe from the start. We end up saying with tears in which they mingle grief and a sort of ecstasy, a large "yes" to
	the whole of life, in its absolute horror and occasional moments of awesome beauty.

	In a letter to a friend, written in the summer of 1882, Nietzsche tried to sum up the new spirit of acceptance that he
	had learn to lean on to protect him from the agony of regret -- "I am in a mood of fatalistic surrender to God, I call it
	Amor Fati, so much so that I would be willing to rush into a lion's jaws." -- and that is where after a bit too much re-
	-gret, we should learn sometimes, to join him.

	Thank you for watching. If you want to learn more about the thinkers from our videos, check out our Great Thinkers book,
	available worldwide, and now as an ebook.