Living Spartan - Intro

Living Spartan 

STOP  

To understand this text, you need to have the mentality of a warrior.

Before you read this document you should have gone through a basic ritual of warriorship.  You need to have experienced physical pain, inflicted on you by another person.  You need to have tasted that salty flavor of blood in your mouth.  You need to have been humbled but also realized that you are capable of taking blows.  Realized that you are a physical being that can be touched, hurt and killed.  Understand that your mind has the power to get you back up, and endure.  Let me say this with more simplicity. 

You need to have been punched in the face.

This will unlock pathways of your mind, to begin to understand the warrior's mindset.  If you have not done that, then you won't understand it.  More importantly you are also not worthy of it.

Living Spartan
You are here. GOOD. Lets get bloody.

Sparta was a prominent Greek city state that arose as a military and political power between 900 and 200 BC.  While the legendary actions of the Spartans have inspired generations of warriors very few hard facts are known about their philosophy.  There are only handful of sentences that were written by Spartans that have survived.  They were secretive about what they knew, possibly because they deemed others unworthy of it.  Luckily, the actions and culture of the Spartans was recorded by others, who generally held a mixture of awe and horror of them.  They are the legends, the epoch of warriordom to which all warriors aspire to.  I have worked to gather and study what accounts do exist.  From this I have distilled the elements of their view on life.  To the Spartans the life worth living was one that led to them to being a whole Spartan.  A wholeness to personhood that included self understanding, and a balance within itself and the world around it.

Living Spartan is my work to blend together aspects of modern life with the warrior philosophy of the ancient Spartans.  It is not intended to be a religion or an economic theory.  It is a philosophy of life, a set of directions on how to think, and act to find contentment. These are thoughts that fill me with fire, and make me eager to engage with life. They have led me to my own place of contentment.  If you disagree with it, GOOD.  Take these ideas out onto battlefields of your mind and have at them.  If they fall there so be it, let the best ideas win and let that which was slain, rot.

In no way do I claim to own the Truth.  I came to this philosophy because I saw problems in myself.  You may not have these problems and if the problems I am discussing seem alien... GOOD. You are not wrong, you are right, move forward and toss this into the fire.

I will also give you this warning, and I will only write this once.  This is a philosophy for those who have a warrior's mentality.  It is based on the greatest warriors to have ever walked the Earth.  I am not worthy of writing it, you are not worthy of reading it.  So with every word we must attempt to grow as best we are able, to rise, to meet it.  Truths will be said as they are meant to be said.  Words and critiques will NOT have softened edges, they will be sharpened, let afire, poisoned and plunged into your mind without any mercy  The blows will rain on you like a deluge.  I do not care how much the thoughts and revelations hurt you, there is no safety here. You are sailing your puny philosophical ship into the hard rocks of truth.  This is where weak ideas die.   What ever is left will be made stronger.  If you don't like it, Leave.  This is written for myself and other warriors.  If it is too tough for you then... GOOD.

Take your lunchbox, soap operas and inhaler and get out of here.  Go eat a cup cake.

To those who want to study the philosophy of the Spartans prepare yourself, because you are not ready.

There are problems in our world, and the time to correct them is now.

Talking too much about problems can quickly turn into whining and whining is useless.  I do not want to spend too much time on the next subject.  This subject is about the weakling ethos that permeates our modern life.   However, if you do not understand the problem then you will never comprehend the solution.

The world is moving fast, and humans have become very abstract thinkers in order to adapt to it.  However, in our attempts to adapt we have also become untethered to the basic, the simple, the earthbound, the fundamental aspects of life.  The core components of what we are, those aspects that used to be known are now mysterious.  We have become technological wunderkinds in some areas, but  have become ignoramus children in others.  We don't know who we are at our cores or what actually makes us happy.  Signs of this contrast are everywhere.

By any measure, humans have done some extraordinary things.  Our current economic knowledge and systems are amazing.  Our technology and what it is capable of doing is phenomenal.   These advancements have led people to have access to more resources, more travel, and more time.  Modern medicine has cured diseases and our life spans have lengthened  People are more educated than ever before and despite what many alarmists will say people are better abstract thinkers on the whole, than in previous generations.

However, for all of our advancement there are contrasting signs of philosophical decay.  In the developed world there are growing signs that people are not content, people are depressed.  People are fat. People all over the world are eating themselves to death and unhealthy.  We are consuming too much for our world to bear.  Our present systems can not be sustained on their present course.  The environment of  the world in many places is beginning to fail.  Personal debts are higher, people are working more despite all the added productivity gains.  Personal connections seem rarer even though they are heavily desired and modern technology should makes them easier.  People seem less connected to their friends, communities and even to their own families.  Psychotics everywhere mistake infamy for honor. People are having less sex, even though they watch ever increasing quantities of people faking it on the internet.  People are turning toward extremist political ideas.  People are not content, they are angry, small minded, bitter and unhappy.

Why for all of our advancement, and are phenomenal wealth are we still not content and fulfilled?

I see many engage in a form of ludditism at this question.  They attempt to throw rocks at the free market economy, or advanced technology that has given us great economic gains.  I do not find those answers satisfying.  I don't see how destroying technology or the free market that has given us production gains will make us more happy.  I think the real question is this,  How are we allocating resources?  Technology has given rise to an abundance of resources but if we spend those resources without wisdom they will never mean anything.  We will forever be attempting to fill a void with nothingness.  How do we use these tools, instead of letting these tools use us.

The key to contentment is not an external one, it is an internal one.   As uncomfortable as it may make you, you are the key to your own contentment.  There is no thing that can be given you, no person outside you, no machine, no medicine, no place, no event,  no externality that can make you happy, only you can do it.    THE PROBLEM IS YOU.  Why is the world out of balance?  Because you are out of balance.

Why is this?
The reason is simple.  We have become WEAK.  In particular we have lost a meaningful philosophy to guide us in life.  That weakness can not be overcome by food, by security, by shelter, by stuff, by hedonism, by drugs, or by technology.  Having a philosophy is a core part of living life in a meaningful way, if you don't have one, nothing else will matter.  Without one you will be too WEAK.  You will be stressed, you will be fat,  and you will be unhappy.  With out a philosophy you will encounter the POWERFUL forces of life and they will knock you on your ass.  They will do this because your philosophy, the core of your being is WEAK.  Spartans recognized this, they focused on building a STRONG philosophy in all of their people and could thus fight against anything and everything.

How did we get to this pathetic place?
People have left religious philosophy and tried to back fill it with economic theory, politics and science and a whole slew of Isms.  These things are not adequate for the loss of a personal philosophy and ethical structure that religious beliefs previousily provided.  The modern world has become enamored with its own power to do things and have developed a kind of chronocentrism.  Chronocentrism is a putrid mental illness that many are infected by in today's world, it is the assumption that today's ideas are better than past ideas only because they occurred later.  People who follow this do not learn from previous generations, they do not study history because they see it as valueless.  Those that do not study history are left lost without the real weapons to understand the world and themselves.  People become a mystery to themselves.  This is the epoch of ignorance and misery. Eliminate chronocentrism from your mind and let ideas old and new have an equal footing on your philosophical battlefield.  This act opens you up to more ideas and will make your personal philosophy battle tested and powerful.



The rise the fake philosophy of the Isms.



Secular culture has lost a great deal of the philosophical underpinnings that used to be reinforced by religion.  In the place of the ancient religious moral systems have been crudely stuffed various modern ISMs.  While I don't see any of them as totally wrong, none are totally right either.   With each it is easy to see how they lead to an unbalanced life.  While they don't have high priests or a church, we all know people who subscribe to one of these Isms.   If you are honest to yourself you have subscribed to a degree to them as well.

Consumerism - Get as much crap as you can.  There are items that do add value to your life but this has limits.  There are two key problems with buying things for fullfillment, the first is decreasing marginal utility and the 2nd is maintenance.  Decreasing Marginal Utility is a problem where the next thing add less utility than the prior thing.   Eventually, creating happiness through things does not work you will begin to become bored with stuff nearly as fast you open it up from the package.  People who seek happyness from things often find themselves buying, and storing ever greater amounts of things chasing a feeling that occured when they first bought something.
Materials also must be managed, organized and maintained leading to ever increasing allocations of your resources the more you purchase.  If you buy a 2nd home you must spend time and money to manage that home.  This is true of all things you buy.  Often times people feel guilty because they are not managing the things the way they feel they should be managed.  Having too much material can thus lead to less happyness.  The erosion of time and resources here can also not be understated.

Travel-ISM - Travel to exciting places and see how other people live may seem like a great way to open up the mind.   Travel may enlighten you that you are lacking a verbose philosophy but it won't provide you with what you need to fill it.  It is also completely and entirely unnecessary.  People who travel a lot are either A) Running from something, or be B) Searching for something.  That thing is normally a grounded personal philosophy that they could have found at home.

Hedon-ISM
-Indulge in sexual activities to live out as much physical pleasure as you can.  Like consumerism you may get temporary pleasurable experiences but decreasing marginal utility will kick in and leave you with less and less. Pleasure here is also extremely temporary and a poor building block to build a life upon.   In the end  you will feel empty, alone and eventually bored.

Glutton-ISM
- Eating, drinking your way to happiness.  Like the others it will result in temporary forms of pleasure.  Gluttonism will not lead to happiness in the end it will make you unhealthy, weak and miserable.

Living Vicariously-ISM - Living through others.  Crazily cheering sports on TV or at a game.  Reading novels or comic books about heroes.  Going to concerts or buying CDs.  These things are fine in balance, they can inspire us to be better ourselves.  However, you should never be a hardcore fan of anyone or anything.  A fan is someone who is living through someone else.  In the modern world people think by buying someone's CD they take the essence of that person into themselves.  That does not happen.  You are what you make yourself and you can not attach other people's essences onto you.  Their achievements, skills, knowledge and wisdom are theirs, and yours are yours.  Own your shit and accept who you are.
You should listen to others, learn from them, and be inspired by them.  However, that should not stop you from living your own journey.  Don't be afraid to be your own musician, your own writer, your own philosopher, and your own athlete.  In terms of what I am writing. Take my experience and let it make you better but NEVER TELL ME YOU ARE MY FAN.  Do the things that you admire in others.  Go out and live yourself.

Political and Economic ISMs
-These are great things to debate about when running countries but individuals are different.  You can debate and argue these things but they do not illuminate a person's personal actions or morality.

Achievement-ISM  - Both Ayn Rand and Friedrich Nietzsche have made a point of making Achievement the virtue that leads men to happyness.  I disagree.  Successful people are happy at times, miserable and borderline suicidal at others.  People who live in straw huts with few notable achievements are quite often content and happy.

Minimal-ISM
-Minimalism is an interesting Ism to consider.  On its face it is a counter reaction to Consumerism where you attempt to get rid of as much stuff as possible to achieve happiness.  There are parallels between Minimalism and Spartan philosophy but there is a problem with calling this an ethos.  By focusing on the lack of stuff, you are still focusing on stuff.  Minimalism is right in that stuff is not the source of happiness but the lack of stuff can not lead you to happiness anymore than an abundance of stuff.  There does seem to be a correlation between minimalism and warrior philosophy though.  The Japan / Samurai culture, Sweden Viking culture both have enduring flavors of minimalism to them.  The correlation between warrior cultures and minimalism is likely meaningful but as statistical professor will tell you, correlations does not equal causation.    Minimalism is likely the result of the warrior ethos and not the source itself.  Minimalism and its bretheren like Lagom in Sweden are worthy of study.  However, for its merits I see minimalism as a kind of 2nd hand philosophy that is not the source.  Chose if you want to drink from the bucket or the well.
I also think that warrior cultures have a counterpoint to minimalism in being prepared.  While the warrior cultures may have indeed thought a great deal about traveling light, they also were careful to have stores of weapons, tools and food as needed.  The Spartan mindset is more balanced and complex than minimalism.

All these Isms exist.  Some are even worth study.  However, none should be mistaken as a full fledged ethos.  Even those that have cogency like Minimalism tend to be reactive or superficially tied to something else.  They are all half thought out philosophies.  While derided the religious philosophies that preceded the modern Isms were more complete moral systems (and I will not deride them).  I believe that a warrior's philosophy can be combined with any religious belief successfully.  If you are after contentment always seek the deepest source.

Happiness does not come from stuff
Happiness does not come from eating, or traveling
Happiness does not come from experiences
Happiness does not come from your family
Happiness does not come from achievements
Happiness does not come from God or spirits
It can not be given to you, it can not come from someone else.
Its does not flow from the external
Happiness comes from wholeness and balance within yourself
It flows from the internal