Kierkegaard on Escaping the Cult of Busyness | Hacker News Reader

Kierkegaard on Escaping the Cult of Busyness

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92 pointskeiferski14 comments

Coming from a highly prolific author who rarely kept idle it’s an interesting observation - though, and as the author of the article points out, it’s likely a perspective on a theme that he debates himself either/or...and of course it goes without saying that Kierkegaard was an absolute genius and well worth reading!

On the topic of idleness, you may also find Russell's In Praise of Idleness interesting (it has been discussed on HN before)

https://harpers.org/archive/1932/10/in-praise-of-idleness/

It is where the following famous quote comes from:

"First of all: what is work? Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the earth’s surface relatively to other such matter; second, telling other people to do so."

He was fairly open about his ground depression as well.

I've recently started reading Drucker's Lost Art of Management and have discovered that Drucker's work has significant Kierkegaardian influences, amongst other writers: https://books.google.lk/books?id=Pm4CHo6IdKIC&lpg=PA35&vq=Ki...

I've always thought of Drucker as the quintessential management guru disconnected from reality, but reading through this is starting to change my view about the man and his work...

I love hearing about how people changed their minds.

From Kierkegaard's Works Of Love, pg. 103: "If you want to be well off and yet easily manage to become something, then forget God, never let yourself really become aware, never let it become really clear to you that it is he who has created you from nothing; proceed on the presupposition that a human being does not have time to waste on keeping in mind the one to whom he infinitely and unconditionally owes everything... Forget it and be noisy along with the crowd, laugh or cry, be busy from morning until night, be loved and respected and esteemed as a friend, as a public official, as a king, as a pallbearer. Above all be an earnest person by having forgotten the one and only earnestness, to relate yourself to God, to become nothing."

This is great, thanks! This is very similar to one of my favorite parts from Sickness Unto Death:

"Now this form of despair goes virtually unnoticed in the world. Precisely by losing oneself in this way, a person gains all that is required for a flawless performance in everyday life, yes, for making a great success out of life. One is ground as smooth as a pebble. Far from anyone thinking of such a person as being in despair, he is just what a human being ought to be. He is praised by others; honored, esteemed, and occupied with all the goals of temporal life.

Yes, what we call worldliness simply consists of such people who, if one may so express it, pawn themselves to the world. They use their abilities, amass wealth, carry out enterprises, make prudent calculations, and the like, and perhaps are mentioned in history, but they are not authentic selves. They are copies. In a spiritual sense they have no self, no self for whose sake they could venture everything, no self for God, however self-consumed they are otherwise."

From one of my favorite Christian prayers:

From the desire of being esteemed, Deliver me, Jesus.

From the desire of being loved...

From the desire of being extolled ...

From the desire of being honored ...

From the desire of being praised ...

From the desire of being preferred to others...

From the desire of being consulted ...

From the desire of being approved ...

Kierkegaard used to make appearances at the theatre, but never staying long, to make it look like he wasn't busy. Now that's going a bit far.

I also love Either/Or, parts of it, anyway - it's some of the funniest writing I know. So many classic bits.

Kierkegaard might not have had a mortgage, kids vectoring toward absurdly expensive college, a shaky economy, the knowledge at any moment one could lose health care. In the modern economy, the sword of economic Damocles hangs above us all.

> ..Absurdly expensive college, a shaky economy, the knowledge at any moment one could lose health care.

Hundreds of millions of people living in First World countries don't have these things hanging over them. I personally feel the things you have mentioned are a basic human right.

Did you just compare modern life/economy to that of a hundred and fifty years ago? Really? Back in Kierkegaard's day it was considered normal to own another human being, there was almost no medical care, and vast majority of people in first world countries were illiterate, and lived in extreme poverty (by modern standards).

Even if you compare people of Kierkegaard's means (i.e. rich) then and now, it's still very clear that life is better today in pretty much every way.

I must apologize for my whiny comment. Looking back, yeah, I was being whiny. I know I am fortunate to live where I do and live when I do. I'll shut up now.

Yeah, people of previous ages had it too easy /s

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