Showing posts with label affirmation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label affirmation. Show all posts

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Exclamation of spells: questioning

No question mark is floating in an empty space. I mean, no question is objective. To have a question, you have to desire. It is not desiring something real, but close enough. You have an inclination to that question and not to the other. It is not asking just to ask. It has a will. It is another world you've had glimpses of. Another universe. The possibility of another universe within this one, that is the will to question. Intricate...

I question only the ones I want. Or maybe I only want the ones I have big questions about. Doesn't really matter. It is the same. To question and to want, to desire. The others do not relate to me at all. If I was objective, you know, like a subject who is the master of objects including others, I should have been putting question marks on everybody. That doesn't happen. You pass many people without having any interest in them. But ones that I relate myself or the ones that relate themselves to me in a seductive way, forcing me to question them (what is seduction anyway if it is not the force that drives you to a particular place, a particular mood, a particular sensation, it is spell) while being interesting enough or promising a land that is not yet discovered, even by themselves, those are the ones who promise another universe. Almost like a spell, a force drives you to question something in particular. I think it was Bergson who said "a philosopher has only one question." One real question that animates her thinking. A will to something, to a way of existing in other words. The seductiveness of other universes belongs to the will to create, I think. Asking a question becomes like a dance almost. I don't want to tango for example. Tango is a style of questioning far away from my standing. I want to invent the rules of dancing, invent the postures while dancing. Real education within the concept of dance itself. To be challenged with the complexity of dancing. Of course if you are willing to dance from the beginning, that complexity would be a creation of yours. That feels good no matter how confusing it is. There is an atmosphere of a spell of another universe in questioning/dancing. You are forced to do certain things and not others. Rules are inventing themselves if you are under the spell of that other universe where everything is strange. You discover the rules of the moment in that other universe. And if you are under the spell of that other universe, if you will to question it, if it is seducing you to come and discover, you live there, in that moment, as an exclamation.

I know it has been very confusing. But it is confusing. I am just trying to make sense of my questions/exclamations. At the end I now see that they are the product of the same: a spell of a kind that rules over the life itself. Maybe curiosity and the will to curiosity is THE spell... And it is never objective. Curiosity is being under a spell, allow it or not, it will take you over.



Friday, August 17, 2012

Give back the problem its exclamation mark!

When exactly did the word "problem" get a negative meaning? Let's return back to the very dear etymology dictionary.

problem
late 14c., "a difficult question proposed for solution," from O.Fr. problème (14c.), from L. problema, from Gk. problema "a problem, a question," lit. "thing put forward," from proballein "propose," from pro "forward" (see pro-) + ballein "to throw" (see ballistics). Meaning "a difficulty" is mid-15c. Problem child first recorded 1920.

So, it was "pro" "putting forward",  in other words, "in favor of" doing something that has an effect. Well, I would call that "existence", standing forth in a certain way. Standing forth is always in a certain way anyway. A way that is changing other ways, allowing other certain ways to do certain things and standing in the way of other certain things, obstructing or even destroying their way of being.

For example, if you think that I am talking gibberish, you won't be allowing "my way" to exist in your world and do things to you. You will just surf on to another web page and continue on surfing until you find something that passes through the pours of your mind's skin, making a difference for (on) you, "interesting" you. Off you go...

And the others who still stay on this page and continue reading probably have the same vague feeling that I have now: there is something important about this question of problem and existence and the negative meaning "problem" has in the everyday life, something that makes a difference in our existence, but what?

To my surprise, I often come across as a negative person when I talk to others. I've been thinking about what could be the thing I do to make people understand me as oppositional all the time since all I actually want to do is to have a nice conversation, stimulating and interesting enough to make me want to keep going, to feel as if something else is happening. Of course it is impossible to be objective when one tries to understand how one comes across to others but I think, in my situation, the negativity they feel is more about how they understand questions than it is about the negativity itself. People feel that questions (provocative ones, the ones that pushes you outside your limits) are signs of not-accepting, not-agreeing, not-liking, and all the "not"s. When all I do is to point out that there is another thing and another and another... waiting to be considered in any subject, they feel that I oppose them by not staying in the comfort zone of their own making. Well, maybe it is just my "problem" but I feel that there would be nothing to talk about if everybody just agrees and feels comfortable within one line of thought, without even going till the end point of that line which almost always consists of a jump to another line, and goes on to the next and so on... The "problem" is not taking the problem seriously enough to follow through. The "problem" is not wanting to deal with the problem(s).

Actually my intent was to try to explore the quality of problems when I began writing, but now I see that before passing to the question of the quality of problems, we have to first pass through the will to problems, the will to follow their lines which are always intersecting with, crossing across other lines and creating "shining points" from where they open themselves up to other lines. The more "shining points" the better the quality of the problem.

And not everything is a problem. For example, if you want to change your job because it pays less than you need and all you consider about your job is the benefits, there is not much to talk about on this line. What your "problem" is here, is not an actual problem. It is merely an obstruction, a difficulty waiting to be solved by acting on it. But it will become a real problem once you start to question what you do as a job and how that effects you, changes you. You will still be unhappy about the job but instead of thinking that there is a solution (and in many cases there are solutions with which the "problem" itself disappears and everybody lives happily ever after), you will be on a constant search, problematising the very subject of how you live your life, how you spend your time while you are going through all the actual changes...  The way you put yourself forward is the problem which doesn't -fortunately!- have a solution.

My "problem" is my very own questioning but more with exclamation marks than neutral question marks. It is me following the lines while putting myself forward in a certain way that only I am capable of. It is me making a difference, being difference as I jump to that line instead of this willing to go on an almost infinite journey.

The problem should be understood as a verb. Problematising that is... Your problematising is your very own exclamation mark, the meaning of your problem which happens to be you leaving an affective trace in the world.