Tag: philosophy

What life shows is that, sooner or later, man becomes what he feeds. This is the fate from which he can never escape, and which can be his fortune or his disgrace. That’s why, if not innate, visualization must be cultivated continuously. We are all, to a greater or lesser extent, like the boy in that beautiful Sabian symbol who, idealizing a great stone face and taking it as an ideal of greatness, becomes like it as he grows up. We all are, or rather, we can all be; before we can be, however, we have to want to be.

Intellectually, planning is always more stimulating than acting. For many reasons, especially because of the broader, sometimes unlimited horizons and the possibility of changing them entirely without damage or complications. In other words: plans exist as if suspended in mid-air; nothing pulls them, nothing pushes them, the connections they establish are ethereal, malleable, until the very moment they are put into practice. Here, the entire structure crystallizes, and if it does not do so definitively, it does so in such a way that, from that point on, to change is to break. Intellectually, planning is undoubtedly more stimulating than acting. But action, bearing the weight of responsibility and the risk of error, is superior in terms of emotion.

By himself, man is nothing. But in him lies the potentiality of visualization which, when exercised, allows him to realize. His primary value is therefore limited to a potency. To realize it, he needs will. And he becomes something as he accomplishes something. Finally, he is destined to become the work itself.

Fiber and resilience are only possible in a man who is humble enough to admit the need to anchor his spirit in something greater. Only those whose mission does not require virtue will claim otherwise, since virtue is necessarily a continuous effort, contrary to the comfort of matter. There is no man whose spirit does not oscillate, and the higher the spirit, the more it is capable of oscillating. To realize this is to admit the need for a support, outside oneself, to push one towards the ideal that one has defined.