While reading “The Stranger” I've noticed a reoccurring trend-death. How Meursault reacts to death and his thoughts on it. If "nothing really matters" then what is the point of life/living? Meursault has no concept of life because he doesn't truly know what it means to be alive. He operates with the mentality that "nothing matters" so what is the point?

Beginning with his mother’s death I noticed that he didn't really care that she was no longer alive and it never really hit him on an emotional level. This goes back to lack of an emotional connection (detachment) he has with the people around him. He treated his mother’s death as just another day where "nothing changed".

Then I noticed the same kind of reaction when he shot the Arab man a number of times. Which raises the question- Why shoot the man 4 times if it only took one shot to kill him? Meursault felt no remorse for his actions. It didn't even occur to him that he had killed the man until later. To me this shows that he has no value for life and he thinks he is free to do whatever he wants including kill someone because to him it won't matter and it shouldn't matter because "everyone is going to die".

Meursault takes death lightly. He could care less about it, I think he feels that once someone dies, that's it. It doesn't matter. Being that I am not an existentialist and do not share the same mentality as Meursault, I tend to have the opposite reaction to death. It's a heavy subject I think for most people to talk about. Especially the loss of someone close, many don't just dismiss it like Meursault does.

While in prison Meursault rereads and article a number of times about a man who was murdered by his mother and sister. He feels like the man deserved to die because "you should never play games". This makes me feel like he is an emotionless person, which is why it was so easy for him to kill the Arab man.

It’s also kind of ironic that Meursault is sentenced to death. He doesn’t seem to mind this since his life doesn’t really matter. He doesn’t care and believes no one else will either. As if human lives were meaningless.

Who is this guy? ( The Stranger)

Meursault...
I think that Meursault seems to be very detached from his surroundings and emotions. He doesn't seem to have a connection with the people around him on an emotional level. I think that Meursault would agree with Banach that "we are all alone" because he goes through everyday life almost like nothing matters. He has a careless mentality, he doesn't really care. Things don't really seem to have an effect on him " It occurred to me now that anyway one more Sunday was over, Maman was buried now, that I was going back to work, and that, really, nothing had changed." To me he finds life meaningless which I think is a pretty sad way to look at it. Which could explain his detachment. Life is partly about the connections we make with people and how we interact with them which gives it meaning. Therefore someone's initial reaction to when someone they know dies shouldn't be to just brush it off but to rather mourn. Meursault is lacking in the emotional department, he distracts himself from his feelings " It was pleasant; the coffee had warmed me up, and the smell of flowers on the night air was coming through the open door. I think I dozed off for a while" (before mother's vigil). This is not the type of reaction I would expect from someone whose mother just passed away. Which makes me think that he has no value for life and doesn't seem to care what happens.
Allowing him not to be present.

Huckabees blog post

Do we live in a world that is meaningful and makes sense? I think that we are meaningful human beings who matter to this world. We just may have different definitions or ideas about how significant each of our lives or the world is. If we didn’t live in a meaningful world then what would be the purpose of living? “If nothing matters, how can I matter?”- Tommy’s girlfriend (I <3 Huckabees) If everything and everyone around us is meaningless then life would be pointless. I don’t ever want to feel like I don’t matter. “Everything is connected and everything matters!” it might not always make sense to us but we have a purpose in life. If the world is meaningless then no one would be connected or even care. But that’s not how we should live our lives. We are not alone in this world.

The ways in which we interact with people on a daily basis adds meaning to life so do our experiences and the people we choose to share them with. The people around us and the relationships we have give us a sense of belonging. We might not know all the answers regarding our lives and purpose but living and having a sense of wonder will guide us to those answers. However one chooses to live their lives gives them meaning. We are not separated from life if all things are connected, so it would mean that we are what makes life and the world meaningful.

Without happiness or the value of live would be easy for one to say that the world is meaningless and doesn’t make sense anymore so why even bother. It only becomes meaningless when you give up and don’t open your eyes to what it has to offer us. As long as someone is happy I think their life would be meaningful. Whether it is the happiness we get from within or the happiness we get from others. As long as we value who we are and life itself then we live in a world full of significance. It all depends on our realities and how we choose to perceive life. Meaning in life is the reason why we choose to continue on living, it’s the reason we wake up in the morning and decide to face the day. Without meaning we are lost and our life will make no sense.

HW - blog Comments #3

Shirley,
I liked how you asked the question "Are we free?" then answered it according to what you believe. I though that your thoughts about about everyone having "a choice even if the options aren't to that person's favor." were interesting. I agree because we, in the end choose or decide what to do in the the situations we are put in and under certain circumstances even if it isn't in our favor. we have the freedom to choose and make the best of it. I thought that your ideas on human happiness were insight full because I got to read what you had to say and then compared it to my own thoughts on the topic. "The only happiness that can't be taken away is memories, relationships, and etc. These happiness are caused by other individuals and doesn't exist physically so it can't be taken away.' I believe that too. Happiness can't be taken away from you. I thought that maybe for this paragraph you could have maybe added something personal, like where does your happiness come from? What makes you happy and why? Overall I enjoyed reading your post.

Raven,

I liked how to summarized what the final part of Banach's lecture was about and then stated your thoughts on it. I especially liked what you had to say about our freedom as individuals in the last paragraph- “If we have limits we are not free” but I do think that some of the limits help to keep us sane." I agree , we have freedom to a certain extent. The "limitations" we have keep us from losing control. Which is why we have "higher powers" to offer us some advice in how to live our lives and manage our freedom accordingly. Good post.

Blog post # 3

Where does happiness come from? I desire to be happy and find myself trying to attain happiness. I feel like being happy is a part of living. No one wants to live an unhappy life, but how do we become happy ? Everyone has their own ideas of happiness according to their lives but could everyone's answer to happiness be the same? According to the existentialist point of view "happiness, then, is to get ones value from within oneself." Could our happiness really come from within and not from the external world? I think what it's saying is in order to be happy we first have to be happy with ourselves. Happiness comes from within. We have the power to determine our happiness.

So all this time if the key to being happy comes from within, have I really been looking in the wrong places (in people, material possessions...etc)? when all this time my happiness was always in my control. My happiness lies within me - "one must lose all hope of external value before seeking value within." So in order to attain my happiness from within I must separate myself in a sense from the external world. I have to forget about finding happiness in other people and all the material possessions which bring me joy, to trade it all in for "true happiness" which comes from me. If this existentialist point of view is true, then, the outside world technically doesn't matter because it doesn't contain the answer to my happiness. I agree and somewhat disagree with this point of view because I find that even though being happy with yourself and finding "value" in yourself is important , it's not wrong to find happiness or get happiness from other people. I feel like our external world plays some role in our ultimate happiness.

HW 3 - blog comments 2

Jessica,

I liked how you referred us as being like robots when we try to please others instead of embracing our individuality and freedom. It seems like we basically have the same thoughts about what the second part of Banach's lecture states. A question you asked that stood out to be and made me consider my own life was "if we cant be ourselves who can we be? This question makes me wonder....we can only be who we want to be. I also agree that we shouldn't change just to satisfy others. We should want change because that's what we desire, if that be the case. To make your post longer maybe you could have elaborated more on your thoughts and you could have added quotes from the lecture to support your points.

Nice thoughts.


Michelle,

I noticed that you took what Banach said in his lecture and stated your opinion on it. It was easy to read and get what you were saying.While reading your post I realized that we we shared the same ideas about our absolute freedom and how we sometimes don't exercise it because we either come up with excuses or let other people get in the way.
I think that maybe to make your points a little stronger you could have added a personal experience.In the end I liked how you pointed out that everyone's thoughts are going to be different.

Keep it up!

HW 3

It's like we are our own TV series and every episode (everyday) we play different characters. We are given a script by others to act out who they want us to be. But the question we should be asking ourselves is who do I want to be?

It can be confusing. It's like we have split personalities sometimes “we all to some extent tend to make ourselves into the image other people have of us”. As I see it we are too focused on how we are to act and be around other people, never really considering who we are. How do we show or share the “real” us with people without worrying about their expectations? Other people only see us differently than how we see ourselves because that’s what we allow. It’s like they see us as one person and we see ourselves as a completely different person- “all of this is self -deception”. We are subjecting our freedom. Our freedom from others and their expectations which interferes with what we want.

How can we avoid others from influencing our freedom? When we allow them to influence our thoughts and how we act, “we see our value in terms of the acceptance we get from other people”. We are more than what we think. I think we need to stop making excuses to avoid our freedom to choose for ourselves by creating our own characters (who we want to be) and write our own script.

I agree with Banach “I am free to do whatever I choose”. I can’t avoid my freedom; I just tend to make excuses for it. It’s like I am afraid to make my own choices and decisions and as a result allow others to influence them or make them for me. There is an imbalance between my outside self and my inside self – pleasing others vs. myself. Going back to the article where Banach refers to us as flipping who we are to be accepted. Why do we try to be someone we are not? When we can choose not to and just be ourselves. The freedom to be and create who we want to be and how we want to be seen by people and not the image they see of us. Isn’t that what “absolute freedom” and “individuality” is about?

We are in control of our own lives. We are not puppets for others to control. We should cut our strings because our freedom is inevitable. So we are not trapped into being or portraying someone we are not.