Philosophy
11/09/2014
Mastery
Does life have a meaning? If so what is it? I cannot presume to theorize on such a vast subject. I am however capable of theorizing the meaning of a single life, more particularly, my own. What I can tell you about my life right here and now is that it does have purpose. I can prove that my life is meaningful due to the concepts of mastery and unity.
Let us begin with some exposition: I am a recovering drug addict. I started doing drugs around the age of fourteen and absolutely fell in love with them. It started out harmlessly enough with heavy drinking combined with the use of marijuana, cocaine, and ecstasy. My life was manageable for many years and it would not have been out of the ordinary for me to have one day simply stop partying and start a family, as many of my associates from that era did. I, however, was in love; I progressed into heavy use of methamphetamine and barbiturates. The people I then associated with were lifers, many had ten to twenty years under their belt and although these persons' often fantasized about quitting, one can only go so deep before it is too late.
I have always wanted to make a difference. When I played sports, as a young lad, I annihilated my opponents (did all I could to do so, at the very least). Many times after a match, the opponent would be left not only physically, but emotionally violated as well. I made sure of it because I wanted to create experiences in others' lives that would be difficult for them to forget.
So it was that I took to my addictions. I studied the workings of the streets and the philosophies of underground business and I strived to excel, thinking I could make a difference in how the industry was run. I exceled, straight down; straight into the clutches of the demon known as meth addiction.
Without writing an autobiography here, one thing led to another and I knew I had sunk too deep. I was deeper than many around me whom I knew would never come to surface if they tried, but my stubbornness had me swimming like a mad man for the shallows. I made it there, but not without help. I had many encounters along my perilous journey with masters that taught me the tools, and tricks of the trade, I would require if I desired to feel the warmth of the sun again. I encountered other addicts who held long-term sobriety. As well as psychologists, therapists, and counsellors who had never used drugs but had studied the effects of them their entire life. I absorbed the teachings of them all, entirely, and took that which I had been taught and modified it to suit me more properly.
Here I am now, I have escaped the treacherous depths of the ocean and the last beads of salty water have long since evaporated from my skin. I am now a master in one sense, having surmounted such an insurmountable toil, although in another (sense) I am but a child. I have lived my entire life amongst the drug sub-culture and to now live without it is to know nothing of the world around me. I must learn to walk, talk, and think again; as though I never knew how to do these things in the first place.
The concept of mastery is not to have mastered some thing or another and it is not to be the best at some thing. The concept of mastery is to possess the tools/abilities to overcome, and to teach those tools to those without, to give back that which you have been given; to complete the circle. I strive for this every day. I mentor young men who seek to achieve the things I have achieved and I encourage and embolden them with new strengths, fresh perspectives, and hope to accomplish that which they have set out to do. I expect nothing in return, save that they too help those beneath them to rise up.
Albert Camus speaks of “a universe suddenly divested of illusions and lights, [in which] man feels alien, a stranger” (Camus 644). When I was young, very young, the world was filled with bright lights, and curious scents, and interesting sounds: wee-ooh wee-ooh! I was filled with wonder and awe and would fall asleep at night imaginatively wondering what could possibly be the cause of such great and incredible things. As I grew older I came to understand that the bright lights were focused electricity, the curious scents were just food being cooked in peoples' homes, and the interesting sounds would happen because some person somewhere was hurt or in trouble. All of my illusions and lights were stripped from my universe as I came to comprehend the simplicity of them. My peers were fascinated with all these phenomena, yet I did not think they were so special anymore. It was as though I had been divorced from the natural order of things. As though my “heart vainly [sought] the link that [would] connect it again” (644). When drugs came along, they lit my world back up. Suddenly I could experience things that had no explanation. There was no way to describe, or explain, or reverse-engineer the occurrences of an ecstasy trip or an ether binge. Life was wonderful again, I was again at one with nature.
Absurdity stems from the juxtaposition of man desiring to know the meaning of the universe, with the universe providing no meaning to find (SparkNotes 4). In recovery we are faced with the absurdity of desiring to stay sober forever juxtaposed with the unfathomable concept of forever. To combat this absurdity recovering addicts are advised to take it one day at a time. One need not think about tomorrow, as it has yet to come along. This takes a huge amount of pressure off an addict struggling with an attempt to comprehend never getting high again. Instead it allows one to think ‘I can get high whenever I want, just not today’. In a similar fashion I have divested my own curiosity of life’s meaning, of life itself. I focus on the meaning of today, does today have meaning? Yes because I am doing what I want to be doing. So just as staying sober for a day at a time can bring about a lifetime of sobriety, so too can finding meaning one day at a time bring about a meaningful life.
Works Cited
“An Absurd Reasoning: Absurd Walls”. SparkNotes Editors. “SparkNote on The Myth of Sisyphus.” SparkNotes.com. SparkNotes LLC. N.p.. N.d. Paragraph 4. Web. September 2, 2014.
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