Peripatetic Philosopher has a conversation:

The Peripatetic Philosopher has a conversation with a reader!

James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D.

© April 28, 2017

Book Reader (BR): “I understand you’ve written a motivational book.  I’m into motivational books, tapes, and have attended a batch of motivational seminars.  I look forward to reading your book.”

Peripatetic Philosopher (PP): “It’s not a motivational book.”

BR: “It’s not, then, what is it?”

PP: “It’s a book about putting you in the center of your life.”

BR: “I don’t follow.  That tells me nothing.  How do you expect to get readers to buy your book if that is all it is about?”

PP: “You find that not important?”

BR: “Of course, I’m in the center of my life, but I’m not narcissistic.  Is your book about making me narcissistic?”

PP: “Explain to me what you mean by ‘narcissistic.’

BR: “Self-centered, only thinking about myself and nobody else.  Is that what the book is about?”

PP: “No.”

BR: “Then what?”

PP: “The book is about thinking with your whole body, not just your mind; and not just about your conscious mind, but your subconscious mind as well.”

BR: “Well, that’s what motivational speakers talk about.  How is this book different?”

PP: “Thinking with your whole body is not a quid pro quo mechanism.  It is not about winning friends and influencing people; it is about putting yourself into the center of the frame; not as a getter but as a giver; and not as a giver so that people think well of you, praise you, and make you feel esteemed.  It is being a giver because your heart as well as your head tells you it is the right thing to do, not because you’re being generous, but because you are self-aware and self-accepting in that awareness so that your generously emanates from you naturally, but not mechanistically.”

BR: “I’m not sure I follow.”

PP: “What part do you have trouble with?”

BR: “All of it.”

PP: “Explain to me why you have such trouble.”

BR: “I don’t know where to start.”

PP: “Start anywhere.”

BR: “I don’t know where to start, okay, leave it at that.”

PP: “All right, then, tell me why you read motivational books, and what you get out of them.”

BR: “They make me feel better about myself.”

PP: “How?”

BR: “How?  I don’t know; in every way I guess.”

PP: “Explain every way.”

BR: “Well, I just feel better about myself after I read one of these books, listen to a tape, or attend a seminar; I guess more engaged.”

PP: “In what way, more engaged?”

BR: “Oh, I don’t know, just better; motivated to do something; be somebody, I guess.”

PP: “How long does it last; that feeling?”

BR: “How long does it last?  Emm, I never thought of that.  For a while.”

PP: “An hour?  A day?  A month?”

BR: “Oh, I see what you mean.  Until I get down on myself again, or run into someone or some situation that throws me off my stride, something like that.”

PP: “How often does that happen?”

BR: “How often?  About the same as everyone else, I guess, more than I would like; I think it happens to everyone, right?”

PP: “No, I don’t think so.  You see, motivational books and speakers, indeed, most promulgators of what is good for you are mainly attempting to motivate themselves.  You need a book; they need an audience.  They touch cords of your experience, and only cords because they are similar cords to their own, only magnified because they need an audience of adulators.”

BR: “But they are experts; they’ve gone to school to know what’s good for me.  Are you saying they’re frauds?”

PP: “No, I’m saying they are in the self-convincing business, and they have been with us since man became aware that he was a conscious thinking animal.  They have assumed the role that we refuse to accept for ourselves, a role we don’t feel qualified to manage.”

BR: “Then what are you saying?  Are you saying I am more qualified to say these things then they are?”

PP: “No, I’m saying your experience is your guide to what is right for you and what is not; that your life as it unfolds teaches you about yourself and what has worked for you and what has not; what you are good at, your strengths; and where you need help, your weaknesses.”

BR: “Well, I’m weak in thinking well of myself, okay!  And they make me feel good about myself by telling me things I don’t know.  You have a problem with that?”

PP: “No.”

BR: “Then what is your beef?”

PP: “I have none.”

BR: “Now, you have me confused.  To be polite, I would like to ask you what you mean.”

PP: “Your problems are not my problems; and your problems are not that of your motivator if that motivator happens to be someone other than yourself.  Only you know what is your experience, what is your history, what you value and believe, what interests you, and what you cherish and live for realizing.  

I cannot know that.  Nor can a motivator other than yourself know that.  Only you can know that and you can only know that if you know and understand yourself.  

To know and understand yourself you need to accept yourself as you are, right now; not as you would like to be or wish that you were, but as you are, right now.  To accept yourself as you are, you must be aware of yourself, warts and all, and not be hard on yourself for not being perfect or not being what everyone else expects you to be, but as you are.  You need a friend.

BR: “I have a lot of friends, people like myself who have a lot of the same problems, okay?”

PP: “Those are not  your friends; those are acquaintances.  You cannot have any friends if you are not your own best friend; and you cannot be your own best friend if you are not fully accepting of yourself as you are.

BR: “I have a problem with that; I’m working on it.”

PP: “By seeking answers outside yourself?  By reading motivational books?”

BR: “If you like, yes?”

PP: “How is it working?”

BR: “According to you, not very well.”

PP: “No, no, not according to me.  I am not in the equation.  I cannot own your problems because I am outside you and I cannot solve your problems in any case.  I can only solve problems relating to myself.  I can listen to you and in listening you can hear back to yourself what those problems are, and then decide to accept them or work on them, or deny they even exist.  That is up to you, not up to me, or anyone else."  

BR: “Then, your book is not about answers?  So, what is the point of writing it or for anyone to read it?”

PP: “That is the wrong question.  The right question is how do I find solutions to my own problems, and the only way is by creating the solutions out of the problems themselves, which are privy to you, alone.  That is a process of self-discovery.”

BR: “Self-discovery?  What is that?”

PP: “It is the confidence to listen to your own subconscious which is a conduit from your intuitive mind that tells you what is good for you and what is not; what commitments and involvements will benefit you and which ones will not.  The cognitive mind, the mind we all depend on; the mind that the motivational writers and speakers appeal to can often be misleading.”

BR: “Misleading?  In what way?”

PP: “To put it simply here for this conversation, our cultural programming dictates what we do mainly without thinking, and it is predicated on the cognitive mind, on what our culture tells us is sensible, desirable, important and necessary.  Culture is always out of tune with the times because it has an investment in the past and a reluctance to adapt to the present.  In this book, I call that a ‘hole in the soul,’ and then illustrate how that is so.”

BR: “That’s not fair!  Give me a clue.  How does it show this?”

PP: “My book attempts to show how materialism at the expense of spiritual health; sexual exhibitionism and gratuitous coupling without love; and how being married to a career for the money and not for the pleasure of work can lead to unhappiness.”

BR: “I’ve never found any kind of happiness in work.  It is the reason I’ve taken a number of on-line tests to see who I am and what I am best suited for.  I suppose you’re going to tell me that this has been a waste of time.”

PP: “No.”

BR: “No, but.  I’m sure there is a ‘but’ in there somewhere.”

PP: “What have you gained or learned from these tests?”

BR: “The kind of person I should be and the kind of work I should be pursuing.”

PP: “Any surprises?”

BR: “No, not really.  They've come out surprisingly close to what I've suspected.  Isn’t that funny?”

PP: “Why would I think that funny?”

BR: “Well, I expect you were going to tell me they are a waste of time, and see, they are not?”

PP: “Have they changed you; changed your work; changed your life in any appreciable way?”

BR: “No, but they could one day.”

PP: “What do you mean by, ‘one day’?”

BR: “In due time, once I get my act together.”

PP: “But that is not your problem.”

BR: “No, then what is?”

PP: “You’re still looking for answers outside yourself, and they are not ‘out there,’ but inside yourself; in what you’re doing, right now.  Change doesn’t occur in chronological time.  It never has; it never does.  Change occurs only in psychological time, which is right now.”

BR: “The book is about that?  About all this?”

PP: “Yes.”

BR: “What is the title of the book again?”

PP: “Confidence in Subtext.”

BR: “I might think about getting a copy of it.”

PP: “That would be nice.”