Philosophical Papers --- 2/9/19

Living Inside Out Rather Than Outside In

By living inside out instead of outside in I am saying using our own volition to direct our consciousness and bodily movements and dealings with possessions rather than (outside in) letting possessions, the environment, our body direct our emotions and intellect and volition.  This concept derives from my model of a human being as most essential their volition (related to things like character) then their mind (emotions and intellect) then their body, and finally their environment and possessions (the material world).

This philosophical quip bears a relation to my quip on being yourself.  If you let your society or others define you, you are living outside in.  If you define yourself, according to your own intentions and thoughts regardless of what your environment wants you to do, you are living inside out.  It is a more courageous way to live. 

This concept also connects to one of my definitions of happiness which is when the world (the outside) is as you want (the inside or your volitions).  My Dad said happiness with when inside equals outside, however, a problem with this definition is the outside can be horrible and chaotic and hence the inside (mind) is in a horrible and chaotic state.  Certainly, in this case inside equals outside but there is no happiness.  Happiness is only “inside equals outside” when the outside is as the inside wants.  Now there are further problems with this.  Some happiness can be evil.  A serial killer may want to successfully kill multiple people and do so in such a way that they leave their mark for the police and publicity.  Hence, inside (their evil intention) equals outside (the successful killings and press about them) and hence there is some sort of happiness in the serial killer, yet this happiness is evil happiness.  Not all happiness therefore is good, it can be evil happiness.  In most cases, where the happiness doesn’t involve harming others, it is good happiness.  If you have good or non-harmful intentions and are able to get the world to correspond to those intentions or the world just happens to develop in a way not by your doing which corresponds to your intentions (luck) then you have a healthy happiness.  If you have caused the world to correspond to your positive intentions then you are living inside out and are happy, if this came about by circumstances your happiness is not a result of your living inside out.

Now I will criticize myself a bit with my own philosophy.  When I was in prolonged periods of disturbed environments, I let the external world (disturbed environments) affect my emotions and actions too much, much to my detriment.  This was unforturnately living outside in.  So, I have been a violator of my own principles in certain periods of my life.  When I was able to better ignore the disturbances (after they had ruined my career) I was not living so much outside in.

Now, no matter how much we intend to get the world to be a certain way, we often fail, it will not yield to our intentions for many possible reasons.  We are somewhat unhappy.  Also, many things occur in the world which we did not intend.  Some of these are good for us some of these are not.  The response to negative developments in the environment by someone living inside out is to recognize that we have control over our reaction to environmental developments and intentionally control our reaction.

Copyright Eric Wasiolek 2/9/19