would my character survive survival?
i finished an incredible book called ‘the road’ by cormac mccarthy while on my travels in the UK. the book is a post-apocalyptic book about a man and his son trying to make their way south to 'the coast' where there is warmer weather and a chance to survive this ash covered world in which they live. it is quite a mystery as to where the man and his son are, and it remains so throughout the book. i theorize that they may be in a post nuclear world and almost all the inhabitants of the earth have died. the book is very much about endurance of the human will, the author said the inspiration for the book came from trying to imagine ‘what the city might look like in the future, and pictured fires on the hill.’ this book led me to many thoughts about the survival of mankind when faced with nothing but himself inside an empty world.
this book reminded me of another one of my favorite books of all time, a simple read called ‘lord of the flies,’ by william golding. the book is about a shipwrecked group of british school boys who must face a deserted island and try to sustain not only life but sanity & order. there are so many layered meanings in the book, but the overall theme is that when challenged with adversity, fear, and survival of self, mankind digresses to a barbaric nature.
so how do we as a people who come from a society where are basic core instincts are never tested? (please forgive my assumption that everyone reading this is at a financial level above absolute poverty, assuming you have a computer in which you are reading this on)
what am i really made of at the center of myself?
if faced with the most severe of circumstance will i have the character to maintain integrity that i think i possess?
i want to believe that at my center the best of people and that i would care more for mankind as a whole than i do for myself even in dire circumstances. i want to think that love conquers fear and deep down people are innately good. but upon reading the road, and rethinking ‘lord of the flies,’ i don’t know. its not that i don’t know if people are born ‘good’ it is that i don’t know if i am ‘good’. i have never been faced with the point of ‘how do i survive’, ‘where will i get my next meal,’ ‘where can i find shelter tonight.’ i have been blessed enough to be born into a family where we were raised in a first world country where these questions were never pondered.
how do we find the center of ourselves when paradise is not lost? maybe i will never know. but i also know life is not perfect; those i love will someday die, situations will not always be so optimal, and i can only pray that in the small moments of adversity and discouragement that i am faithful to react with character and altruism. hopefully maybe.
this book reminded me of another one of my favorite books of all time, a simple read called ‘lord of the flies,’ by william golding. the book is about a shipwrecked group of british school boys who must face a deserted island and try to sustain not only life but sanity & order. there are so many layered meanings in the book, but the overall theme is that when challenged with adversity, fear, and survival of self, mankind digresses to a barbaric nature.
so how do we as a people who come from a society where are basic core instincts are never tested? (please forgive my assumption that everyone reading this is at a financial level above absolute poverty, assuming you have a computer in which you are reading this on)
what am i really made of at the center of myself?
if faced with the most severe of circumstance will i have the character to maintain integrity that i think i possess?
i want to believe that at my center the best of people and that i would care more for mankind as a whole than i do for myself even in dire circumstances. i want to think that love conquers fear and deep down people are innately good. but upon reading the road, and rethinking ‘lord of the flies,’ i don’t know. its not that i don’t know if people are born ‘good’ it is that i don’t know if i am ‘good’. i have never been faced with the point of ‘how do i survive’, ‘where will i get my next meal,’ ‘where can i find shelter tonight.’ i have been blessed enough to be born into a family where we were raised in a first world country where these questions were never pondered.
how do we find the center of ourselves when paradise is not lost? maybe i will never know. but i also know life is not perfect; those i love will someday die, situations will not always be so optimal, and i can only pray that in the small moments of adversity and discouragement that i am faithful to react with character and altruism. hopefully maybe.
Comments
All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.
Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love --a scholar's parrot may talk Greek--
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.
And I think that is my problem. I talk of altruism and love, but do I live it? Oftentimes, most likely not. However, with God's help, I can change. Be renewed.
So thank you, Stephen, for talking about something that always bugs me but is rarely brought forward.
Your friend,
J
i believe that once we've established ourselves a little more, it's a matter of seeing what He's has intended us to do. not to mention, the Bible preaches loving your neighbors and helping others. i think by being selfless, one can fulfull that selfish happiness we strive for. burn out brighter is the most inspirational song i've ever listened to and i think you sum it all up there.
the center of ourselves lies in helping others through whatever way God intends us to.
if, in an extreme situation, i reacted in dark ways inconsistent with my ideals of right and wrong and my understanding of my self, does that mean that my understanding was wrong, that i am made of much darker material than i originally thought? do my actions, reactions, and choices define my self?
...
on a different note, yesterday a friend and i got in a long conversation on whether or not mankind was essentially selfish - not good or evil, not right or wrong, we weren't discussing those at all, just expanding on and trying to contradict the idea that man is almost exclusively self-serving.
this post echoed that to me.
thank you for an interesting read. thank you for something else to think about, to reconsider and re-evaluate.
one more piece to the puzzle.
Think positively and have faith that what you need will come to you.... in a safe, legal and moral way... That is something you have to train yourself to do. Have you seen/read The Secret?
"What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them." Mark 11:24
"Whether you think you can or can't, either way you are right." Henry Ford
Think truly, and they thoughts shall the world's family feed." Horatio Bonar
So... basically, be thankful for what you have, and you will bring more of it about. Be positive in your thoughts and prayers, and what you visualize will materialize. However, thinking negatively and about negative things will only spur more negativity. What we perceive to be real has real consequences.
Do not worry that you may be 'bad' in your core self. Instead be confident that you are GOOD and you have the ability and the means to do good works. Don't question who you are and what your motives are in life... you are your worst enemy. Sometimes, you are all you've got and to be successful, you must be confident in yourself. Trust yourself.
I feel like I rambled a whole lot and I probably didn't make much sense... This topic is something that I struggle with as well. Reading "The Secret" though, has put my mind in a different perspective, and honestly... I see change. :)
Kaulie Janae--I agree that the issue is generally not good vs. evil, but it is selfishness that all humans have. People don't do community service just to be good citizens; they fill a job requirement, they boost their resume, they depend on it to make them feel good. Some parents choose to have kids because it may fill a void in their own lives or help out the current relationship. Selfish. Most things that I analyze that are seen as good works for others, end up going back to us as a way to boost us somehow.
just look at cain and able, even at the dawn of time people resort to murder and deceit.
i believe that most people hope for some benefit at some point or another.
but then how do i explain mother teresa?
i can't even convince myself one way or another. lol
Just think that if a person was entirely altruistic (in the extreme sense), they would not eat without making sure everyone else had eaten. In a survival situation, this person would ensure everyone else had enough to eat and not feed his/herself. This altruistic person would give away all of their warm clothing and blankets to make sure others were warm and end up freezing to death. There must be a certain amount of selfishness within a person to guarantee survival.
Ponder_this, I am not sure I agree completely. I do a lot of volunteering. I am not required to do so by my employer and most of my community service does not appear on my resume. I suppose I do gain the benefit of feeling good, but I would also feel good if I spent my time hanging out with my friends and laughing or getting a full body massage. Yet I feel compelled to use some of my time to improve the world somehow.
But back to the original idea posed by Stephen.....I believe that extreme circumstances uncover extreme behavior. There is no way to really know how one will act when under duress. We can only hope that should such an unusual circumstance arrive, we do our best to be 'good'.
Adversity does bring out who we really are at the core of our being. I think that even though I might want to do for the other person, what really is my motive?
Am I authentic in my actions?
This made me think of our sermon this morning from Romans 12- Displaying a God-like love, regardless of our circumstances.
Here are some verses from Romans
12 (The Message)
"don't be so well adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without thinking. instead fix your attention on God"
"love from the center of who you are, don't fake it"
"don't quit in hard times, pray all the harder"
If the definition of altruism is a selfless concern for the welfare of others, how do I put the other person in the center of myself?
Impossible without divine intervention.
As for which side of the line you fall on...only you can answer that. But it's not fair to say that people are inherently good or evil; they're a motley of the two. The only thing separating us is the part we choose to show.
You are so humble, Stephen, and it's obvious you care deeply about people. And it's these things that I see in you that make me think that you are more than some selfish creature that lies dormant while it's comfortable. Don't lose faith in yourself. Harness your love, and drive it into all that you do, and in the end it will be that that suppresses the inner darkness.
I'll have to check out those books when I get the chance. Thanks for posting. :-)
More importantly, you guys put on an amazing show. I'm not exaggerating when I say half the audience were only there to see Anberlin. I hope you enjoyed yourselves, and the same to the other guys. Here's hoping you come back soon.
Li x
I have always felt this need to be challenged. Like in The Lord of the Flies. To face some real difficulty. I grew up right along with Harry Potter, and I was always jealous of the fact that he had such challenges to prove his character. It's like I feel like I am a marathon runner, but I've never had a marathon to go to and test it.
So what are we, at our core, our deepest self? Are we merely biological, animalistic, barbarians? Or is that part of us just more easily seen when deprived of physical needs? I'd like to think that it's just harder to be a good person when placed under this pressure. But I think it's possible. Maybe that's the measure of a man.
I disagree with your statement that we should have faith in our own goodness. I think we should always constantly question our own motives and delve into our most selfish thoughts.
Some may say that's being too hard on yourself, but if you aren't, then who will be? The only person responsible for your actions is you, so you should constantly inspect your own self, evaluate, and make room for change.
Like you said and everyone else that commented before me said, that we are either born with evils, or born good...possibly born just neutral. I honestly do not know which one we are, but in my opinion i believe that its made up of multiple factors. The first one being nature vs. nuture. the second is situations we tend to be in. and third is the morals we hold dear to us. i believe that people are born. just born. as a clean slate so to speak, and lifes occurances shape us to be who we are.
Thanks for adding a new blog entry. :-) Now I must go and start typing up that interview...
What is 'good', and do I fit into the mold?
Are we inherently evil, or inherently good?
As far as I've experienced there is only one thing I can conclude..
There is no mold for good or evil.. and no man can be the judge of either..
We contain both elements of rage, and elements of compassion. Love and Hate. Selflessness and Selfishness.
Yet the purpose behind our actions will forever be deemed 'good' or 'evil'.
I like to think my will is strong enough to survive an apocalyptic doom or being stranded on a deserted island.. but where is the line between feeling isolation from a deserted world, and isolation in a crowded room?
I'm convinced the only thing that keeps any of us going is love for other beings..
A love for your son at the end of the world..
A love for your friends when a plane crash leaves you stranded..
A love for your God and your family when you're 5000 miles away and isolation seems to envelope every emotion.
The last of these is autobiographical.. but its my only experience with ultimate detachment while studying abroad this summer in oxford..
The will to go on, to do good, to follow in the footsteps which God has set before us, is fueled by love.
For me, it is love for God and for my family.
For others, I cannot be sure..
Perhaps my answer seems romantic, but its the only one I could come up with..
Yesterday I sat in a service that spoke about Elijah and the famine his town suffered. People were so hungry that they ate their own children. That's unimaginable to me! Anyways, the guest speaker mentioned that this was all due to lack. Where we lack, we try to make up for in evil deeds. I love what you were mentioning in your post, and I also wonder what I would be like if I were completely lacking like the man and his son in that novel.
But as to the question on, and perhaps the longing for, dire situations, perhaps it isn't really that hard to asnwer. I think looking at our motivations in reactions to even the littlest things can tell us a lot about ourselves. If we do the right thing, even when it seems insignificant, in our relationships with those around us, even those we dislike or will get no reward from, then most likely we would react the same in a dire situation with survival on the line. If we are honest with ourselves, none of us are even close to doing this perfectly. We all mess up. In a dire situation though, I believe I'd be neither completely good nor completely evil. Sometimes I'd screw up, other times I'd help others. I'd just be striving, as I am in my non-dire life right now.
When challenged with some type of adversity, I've found that the fight or flight syndrome kicks in. As a mother of four, there have been times when you don't want to mess with the lady tiger... seriously, my cubs come first and when they have been threatened, it would seem that I could possibly become barbaric. I'm extremely protective and loyal to those I love, however I am constantly putting my children, husband and others before myself. And yes, it does make me feel more worthwhile and as if I have a real purpose on this planet.
Patricia M... I agree with you.
On the subject of survival of self, I belive we are products of our environment. Born with a blank slate and molded with morals and ethics of those closest to us. Parents, teachers, friends all have roles that we tend to use to create what we are about. Being adopted at 3 days old, yes, the blood that flows through my veins may be like that of my biological parents, but my very soul and being is that of my adoptive parents.
My life is like a pendulum, a yin/yang situation at times. I have been pulled one way and then the other, almost as if I could hear that little voice inside (gut instinct) telling me right from wrong. Our cores are created as we are growing. We want to do good so that we are rewarded by being loved.
The endurance of the human will is amazing. We here in the U.S. need to look beyond our "little bubble" we live in and realize how truly fortunate we are. You mentioned "what a city might look like in the future... and fires on the hill." Immediately, the recent devastating fires in and around L.A. came to mind. I'm sure some of those people living there are at this very moment, in survival mode. Look at the holocaust survivors, who have never forgotten the horrors of what they lived through. It's almost as if a amazing strength comes through us... (god?) and we see light at the end of the tunnel. In the end, I honestly believe each of us will be tested to our very core of being.
Life is brutal, full of horror and violence. Life is beautiful, full of passion and joy. Both things are true at the same time. The paradox extends to my own being. I think of the words of the Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek, who calls Christianity the religion of Love and Comedy: “The point is not that, due to the limitations of his mortal sinful nature, man cannot ever become fully divine, but that due to the divine spark in him, man cannot become fully man.”
<< that was quoted from Rob Bell. I wish those were my own thoughts, but I have to say they do coincide with my own beliefs on this subject fairly exactly.
speaking of great reads... while in london, check out this place!
http://www.fancyapint.com/pubs/pub576.html
I DO believe we are born absolutely evil. Like little cold, hard seeds, buried in darkness. As we are given light and nourishment, we begin to grow. Not everyone grows at the same rate. Siblings under the same parents can turn out So very differently. Perhaps our outer coverings are different. Some are really hard and need more to get moving toward the light. Others are just bursting out of the pod and strive toward the light with just the bare minimum of care. You have to want the light of the surface to find it. Others seem to just be content to stay in the dark. They are comfortable wallowing there.
I believe we all know that there is a God to reach towards, it is inner born. What we do with it is another question. The choice being ignore it or make it a passion to run towards Him? Perhaps it is just easier to stay unenlightened.....selfish and lost.
I have seen many wonderful places and enjoyed doing fantastic things, I like my life: BUT
For me to survive really bleak, life threatening conditions, I believe It would have to be for the sake of another. Maybe carrying another soul back to those who love and need them. Or if there was someone at the other end whose survival depended on me getting out alive. But for the sake of myself, by myself, I doubt I would make it. I don't love this life that much. I believe in an afterlife, and I am not afraid to go to it. Maybe I would surprise myself, but I would not mind going home to the Father. Perhaps that is ultimate selfishness on my part?
This reminds me of a story my friend told me, whether its true or not I'm not sure. Apparently during the cold war Christian worship was prohibited in the Soviet Union. Because of that many underground churches arose. The KGB upon infiltrating one of these underground churches gave everyone the choice to renounce their faith and leave alive, or stay and be killed. Very quickly many of people from the congregation left. When everybody had made their decision the KGB closed the doors, and wanted to talk with the remaining people. Apparently they wanted to find out who the real Christians were.
I'm convinced if I were tested I would do the right thing, but its hard to imagine what kind of pain that would invovle, dieing and everything.
Each citizen is inherently selfish and ruthless.
In times of privation and tribulation, people will ensure that they and their households survive. Poverty often results in crime. I believe the human will persist, but it will not always follow the "good" path.
i think we are not good or bad, we're both of them at the same time, we're made of contradictions. the 'good' and 'bad' adjetives were made by humen in their way to find the truth, the reality.
i hope we all dont turn into animals and kill each other when something tragic happens on earth..
Could you get through it all and survive with what you have as a person...your character?
I, too, hope that I would put others before myself, but you never know how you actually will react in such a situation. Which is a bit scary to consider, in a way - that you're one way when everything's fine, but can become a completely different person faced with an issue of survival.
I too contemplated these thoughts. I suppose Biblically speaking, we're all born with sin (since we are all children of procreation and sex). That being said, we also have Jesus and I think He's the difference in whatever digressions we may face.
Yesterday I sat in a service that spoke about Elijah and the famine his town suffered. People were so hungry that they ate their own children. That's unimaginable to me! Anyways, the guest speaker mentioned that this was all due to lack. Where we lack, we try to make up for in evil deeds. I love what you were mentioning in your post, and I also wonder what I would be like if I were completely lacking like the man and his son in that novel.
Sorry raechel,
but i have to completely disagree with your comment of being born with sin, due to procreation and sex. God, created sex and the bible teaches that everything God created was good. Secondly, if people were born with sin, biblically speaking as you stated, than infants that died would go to hell. As they are not able to repent of their sin and ask forgiveness.
i think i read this post just at the right time. i've just listened to Anberlin's AP Podcast just when you were talking about faceless organization and so it sorta linked to this post.
i think that people are just born neutral and the things they do in life affects if they're good or bad. so there is a decision and it fully up to you. there is no definitive classification to good or bad. there is always a good in everything and so its hard to really say. it always comes down to what you choose that makes who you are.
That being said, I think that everyday we see the core of ourselves. I am in the same boat – I’ve grown up blessed with more things than I could ever ask for, and have never had to face an extreme urgency of danger. BUT I think that we don’t need that to drive us to that emotional state. At the end of every day, we are our own worst enemies and we will ultimately be the ones to drive ourselves to success or total destruction. The urgency and desperation that comes with being homeless and just trying to get by the forces of nature is something I cannot speak for. From what I have gathered and observed is that it lies at the core of ourselves, desperately searching within to find the internal resources that will get us by the moment and hopefully into the next day which promises to be better. In the same sense, any loss, bout of desperation, moment of pain, or tragic event that occurs in our life, no matter how small or how big, forces us to face the same question: do we have the internal resources to carry on? And most of the time we automatically think NO, because at the end of the day it is so much easier to give up then to keep on walking. But days, weeks, and months later when we are still walking and still struggling,….we realize that somehow, somewhere we subconsciously have made it 100 miles further, 4,000 breaths later, and 10,000 heartbeats and still pumping.
I know that these resources may be undeveloped in some, and in others more fully developed due to practice. You may be thinking, what about the people who commit suicide, who ultimately didn’t have the resources to keep going, but this is not true. Deep within, somewhere we don’t know exists lays the instincts to avoid death. In times of hopelessness I believe that the resources are there, just we psych ourselves out to think that they don’t exist. It is ultimately a choice rather than a lack of strength.
Next time you ever think you can’t make it through the night, through the storm, or through the starvation, know that it can be done. I have doubted the human strength every single day, yet every time I prove myself wrong subconsciously. I am still at the beginning of my world war, but I know that if I believe that I will survive in those rare moments of clarity, somehow subconsciously my body will follow.
I know alot of people have seen this on the news but I just ran into it. Pretty awesome...
http://cbs2.com/health/Brendon.Foster.Wish.2.862045.html
This post also reminds me of history class, Hobbes and Locke, where Hobbes believed everyone was born inherently evil, and Locke believed the opposite. Maybe you've read their books...
I also wanted to say that you inspire me alot with your posts. I want to help/volunteer after reading your blog. I think I'm going to spend summer volunteering.
I saw you tonight at Mosaic. Of all the churches I have been to in LA, none of them speak to me like that one. I have a friend that knows you (does that sound creepy? he's in a band too and I'll leave him anonymous because of that) and he said he thought you'd moved out here recently.
So now that I sound like I stalker, I just wanted to say, welcome.
i still believe we are generally good-natured but without faith, hope, love, and trust, i don't think we could survive. the cannibals didn't have those things, they just had that barbaric instinct you were speaking of. and as you said, it is of course difficult to understand what we'd really do. as i was reading about the cellar with all the food and feeling so elated for them, i took a step out of the book and realized i was living that tenfold and not at all happy as they were.
so i think building relationships is key to survival. without God and other people, you're left to your own selfish self where all you think about is, "i don't care if this is moral or not, i need to live." in the end it's God who really decides and if we're there for him, he'll be there for us.
Thanks for the chat today.
Jen Pider
The structure of the book did not appeal to me, but in all opinion I think the meaning behind it is good.
I actually thought that in the book, it sort of emphasizes that people are born good. Especially with the boy. He was not exposed to the pre-war society and only knows a dead world. and despite the cannibals and slavery that he sees, he is unchanged and wants to help everyone he meets on the road.
But wow this is crazy, that we read the book simultaneously, and I am glad that you mentioned something about the book. I really would not have thought deeper into it.
I figure that given survival situations like that, a person must make the choice whether to betray themselves and their beliefs(which i'd assume that would only be revealing one's true character), OR a person would stick with what they believe and suffer the consequences.
i, personally, would be afraid to venture there, I feel my flesh would overtake me, and my worst sin be exposed (worst of worst). I would honestly hope then that i am removed by life or by death from the situation to save me from myself... and hey, i think that'd actually would happen. it did happen. help from above. Divine intervention... if that isnt too cliche
it makes me think of what my psychology professor once told me about how abnormal situations create abnormal reactions.
i can testify to that just the same. for some people, it doesn't take the whole world to be destroyed, just their own lives. at my job as a firefighter, i've seen crazy things happen to people, and have seen those people either completely crumble or rise to the challenge.
and in my opinion, the difference is made when people who call for help know their limitations. emergencies, by nature, are situations where a person's ability to handle a situation has been surpassed by the demands of the situation.
so that is said to make the point that when you know what you are not, you know what you are.
and ultimately, it is the situations like these, where everything is opened up, and the urgency, chaos, and confusion exist that an opportunity exists to define the parameters of what we know, and what we do not know. this sometimes leads to a greater sense of purpose temporarily, at least.
the interesting thing is, you tend to find that you have more questions than answers.
and so my answer ends with a question-where do you go from there? what is the absolute?
Good topic, I'm going to have to think it over.
although we can never know what our reactions will be like until we actually live through the situation. we always assume we'll react a certain way (the better way), and hope for it. but we never really know.
alot of people keep coming back to this one point... if being selfless makes you happy then is it really selfish? then is it even possible to be selfless? People think I'm a good person, but the truth is, I do whatever I want, whatever makes me happy. What makes me happy is being a servant. so - there is no choice made. But isn't the choice supposed to be important part? Aren't good choices what make good people? Therefore I don't FEEL like a good person alot of the time. Same point for being a virgin or not trying drugs. I hate taking credit for that stuff because I've never actually been in a situation where I could have had sex or tried drugs... no temptation. So I guess I'm afraid if I had a choice in all this stuff I would make the wrong one. (well except for the drugs.. I'm scared of those..)
I guess that was kind of on topic, anyways I've needed to that off my chest a while.
personally I think I'd be quite a savage if I had to survive on my own. But now I'm inspired to make more good choices and that IS the point of this blog. so thank you kind people of the modesty guild.
While I enjoyed the book, I do not feel that it should have won the awards that it did.
With God, our character is indomitable.
I'd like to think that having to survive an apocalypse, end of times, the breakdown of all social systems, and absence of other people would not faze me, that I would be all right, but I think the loss of the support system I depend on would be hard.
I watched a show on the history channel once called 'life after people'. It was a very eloquent representation of how resilient this world we live on is. The planet would survive quite fine without us and our footprints... but we have yet to find a way to survive without it.
There is a lot to be said about human strength, and I don't mean physically. Some of us use situations to bend and grow, some of us are broken instead. I'm still at a loss to understand why. I guess it ties back to your foundation, if it is not solid, then you have nothing to carry you through when adversity calls. I don't particularly want to test the theory but I do trust it, I have survived a number of things and still look forward to another day. =)
1 John 4:18
In my opinion, we are not whole until we have experienced God's perfect, unconditional love. A fraction of this can be shown through others. However, we, being animals who inhabit time, cannot fully be in and experience the presence of God until we transition into eternity as spirits. Then, there will be no fear and uncertainty.
Although you do not know if you are "good" know this: listeners of Anberlin and readers of Stephen Christian's writing are blessed. Thank you for sharing your thoughts.
Remember "If we are faithless, He remains faithful." (2 Timothy 2:13)