Month: May 2015

A life lived intensely–what is this? Intensity of the kind we seek: never to be the heat of some internal passion, the upsurge of anger, the adamantine fist of stubbornness.

Intensity, more heat than light, flowing from the presence of the Good. Certainly my powers enhanced, yet certainly too the enhancement of my powers is owing to the propinquity of the Good. Approaching it? Yes, I can feel it. Drawing near? Yes.

Intensity is not explosiveness either for, as Nietzsche makes plain in The Will to Power, someone with strength may be able to wait, may hold off reacting until it is time and not, during that time, feel slack or weak, cowed.

Continue reading “The Harmony of the Greatest Power” →

‘What does nihilism mean? That the highest values have devaluated themselves. The aim is lacking; “why?” finds no answer.’

–Nietzsche, The Will to Power

Can nihilism be overcome? Must all of our highest values devaluate themselves? If not, the aim would not be lacking since the “why?” would indeed find an answer.

1. The self is born out of its separation from the Good. Thus, with the birth of the self comes desire: its aversions and its hungers.

Continue reading “Desire and the Good, with a Reply to Nihilism” →

Fiery power is not the sole possession of the Right, and the aspiration for human greatness needn’t be relegated to the past. To make one’s powers, like a whirling dervish, more and more intense is the first task. To raise those powers to the very pitch of beauty is the second.

Why should talk of human greatness elicit snickering from the bleachers? Because it is superannuated and quixotic? True, Achilles was once great, Alexander was once great, but, true also, heroic societies are now gone. Generals and commanders were once great too, yet–again–the arena of battle, particularly after WWI and WWII, has been drawn into question. Statesmen like Pericles were once great, but Obama is ground down into little pieces. Keep running through more cases, and the implicit thesis would turn out to be that greatness–in war, in politics, in art, in business, in philosophy–is no longer really possible since modern life is set up to produce small, nice, easily harmed people.

Continue reading “Reinstating the Project of Human Greatness” →

Eloquence, I argue, is saying the right thing in the right way with a sense of ease. An eloquent person, then, is someone who often or almost always speaks eloquently.

In this episode, my longtime partner Alexandra and I first discuss how she became eloquent. Then we discuss what benefits flow from being an eloquent speaker.

If you would like to learn how to become eloquent, you can visit http://andrewjamestaggart.com/eloquence/.

Who among you has fire in his belly?

Who is a hunter, sly in his approach?

Who has not thought once of dragging his heels or of playing it safe?

Who hears ‘shrink back, O soul,’ and laughs in his belly?

Continue reading “Bring on my Fire People” →