On Finding Your Philosophy

Our philosophies are like shells that give us a home.

Hello and welcome to rewilding philosophy, your newsletter about ekoPhilosophical health for our times or how I like to describe it lately: life advice, but with values.

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The great question that this newsletter tries to answer is how to live within the metamorphosis of social-ecological realities.

A life’s philosophy guides us on how to live well. The philosophies many of us in the WEIRD world live by are utterly inadequate for our times. If we continue to chase material abundance, uphold the notion of the lone individual, or believe that fixing parts will fix the whole, something is clearly wrong.

Personally, I feel like I fell out of the dominant philosophy of my culture. I am no longer interested in entertainment, material achievement, great adventures that require a lot of natural resources, or in pursuing a career that impresses. The way of life that I inherited from previous generations no longer satisfies me.

The dominant philosophy—while I see its allure and usefulness in some parts—is dead to me.

Yet, despite its death, when a philosophy dies, its shell remains. What leaves is the energy and aliveness that make a philosophy worthwhile. What was once a shrine becomes a shelter. What was once a prayer becomes a habit. What was once a ceremony becomes an obligation. What was once a pilgrimage becomes a hike. What was once a philosophy to live by becomes a shell of pretenses without substance.

Like a hermit crab that leaves its shell because it becomes too small, too confined, and doesn’t quite fit anymore, I am searching for a new one to replace the old.

I want my new shell to be alive by showing me a way of life, a lifestyle, and a structure to live by daily. I want my new shell to turn every obligation into a ceremony, every habit into a prayer, every hike into a pilgrimage, and every shelter into a shrine.

And I want this new shell to fit the circumstances: to relate me to the living processes that surround me—humans, nonhumans, the land, the biosphere, the geosphere. If I cannot relate my bodymind to these processes, the philosophy is dead. It can no longer connect me to my world, but instead disconnects me from it. In such a relationship, no resonance is possible.

As Hartmut Rosa explains,

“resonance can be defined as a form of world-relation, in which subject and world meet and transform each other. The emergence of resonance is possible only through affection and emotion, intrinsic interest and expectation of self-efficacy, entailing the construction of a meaningful, dynamic, and transformative rapport between actors and their environment.”

Without the right shell, such resonance is impossible. In fact, as Rosa argues, our dominant philosophies in the WEIRD world enforce a dissonance or foster, as he calls them, “mute relationships” in which mutual transformation ceases to exist. Resonance can only be experienced if the shell fits, if the philosophy connecting me to the world is alive. When existing philosophies cease to be alive, we also cease to be in resonance with the world.

The process of recreating a philosophy is a process of trial and error. I haven’t found an existing one that satisfies my needs. And even if some do theoretically, they also have to be tried, tested, and practiced in real life. I also came to understand that holding a philosophy lightly is more appropriate in our times than clinging to one strongly.

I believe the future will be a meshwork of individual philosophies with common values. Maybe this will look like a beach full of shells: From far away, they appear to be one Gestalt; from close by, each differs from the other.

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Doing research, creating educational programs and developing institutionalised spaces to help people on this process is what IPeP is aiming for. We are currently looking for further funding. If you know anyone who knows anyone who might be interested in supporting such a cause, I’d greatly appreciate any hints.