FHC #13 – Spirituality [3 pages]

Concerns of “Selves”

Dignity, Situation and Spirituality

Accepting and dealing with the “facticity of life”, which is the essence of “Spirituality”, pushes at us like an unrelenting force.  It is always about the unalterable, undeniable and uninterested facts of life that never stop producing situations and consequences with which everyone must cope, ever.

We all grow old and die.

We all face a future we cannot control or dominate.

We all live in a body that gets tired, ill and needs care.

We all had parents.

We all need money and face a future of suffering and early death if we run out or don’t have “enough”.

Only we can accept the “facticity of life” or mitigate our suffering.  Others can help us, but it’s up to us to come to acceptance, however we choose to do it.

This is what makes life, marriages, parenting and business a “journey” or wonderful adventure we share with others, rather than a “destination”.

This is true for every human being, including our family and colleagues and customers.

Breakdowns produce an experience about the “facticity of life”, such as when we smack our heads, stub our toes, walk through a screen door or are too sick to think or move.

The “facticity of life” is a human phenomenon that exists in language.  It isn’t “out there”.  It is a fundamental human experience we all have every day, all day, but only if we reflect. 

It is us, runs us and requires us to ACCEPT IT if we intend to survive, adapt and live a good life.  This includes dealing with a new Industrial Revolution. 

The concern of Spirituality is whether we accept how life really is and the way we accept it.

Do we accept and deal with the facticity of life with dignity, or with denial and a sense of entitlement like an arrested adolescent?

Whereas Carnies try to sell us fantasies about how life should be, or the way we want it to be, which can be fun for a few hours, and bullshitters and con artists try to fool us,

… the “facticity of life” is always and simply the truth about the indifference of the circumstances in which we always find ourselves.

The problem we all face is reality doesn’t explain itself or care about us.  It has no intention to communicate with us or help us.  How we accept and deal with this is a dimension of our Spirituality.

On the one hand, we have people speaking at us non-stop about how to think and act to live a good life but who don’t have our best concerns in mind.  I call them Carnies and they include entertainers, politicians, reporters, vendors, sports and shopping of all kinds, etc.

On the other hand, we are gripped by reality’s operations 24 hours a day.  If we don’t work with them, and in them, effectively, we and our family suffer.  But reality doesn’t care and it doesn’t send us memos explaining its operations and their consequences to us or our families. 

If we want or need to know how reality works, or the consequences of a course of action, or non-action, so we can fulfill our intentions to live a good life, it’s up to us to do it.  This is a Spiritual concern and why “Aji” exists.

At the same time, we know that we are surrounded by people who deny or ignore the facticity of life and who, therefore, lack Dignity and are untrustworthy.  Their thoughts, speaking and actions are incoherent with the way life actually works.  Many of them are frauds who are just trying to get away with something. 

Thinking, living, listening to them seriously or working with them makes it difficult, if not impossible, to live a good life.

For example, when businesspeople do not earn and save enough money to afford the goods and services they, and their spouse, will need during 25+ years of old age, they decline to act consistently with the facticity of life and suffer with that knowledge every day.

When businesspeople who are already failing to earn and save enough money to live a good life with their spouse until they are at least 90-years old think they can understand how to use a computer and internet competitively by simply using their common sense to figure it out, they are ignoring the facticity of life because it can’t be done.  There are no patterns for their common sense to see.

Prideful businesspeople work alone, always.  It doesn’t matter how many people surround them and how many they speak with. 

They are alone because their Pride will not allow anyone to affect how they think or act. 

Ignoring the facticity of life betrays everyone’s Spiritual concerns.

Those who do can’t possibly join, build or work with Networks of Capabilities that use “Aji”.

Spirituality is of the “Self” because it is a fact of life that every human being is born alone, dies alone and is alone with their body sensations.

That is, when a person is hungry, they, and only they, feel it. 

Yes.  People can empathize and say, “I feel your pain.”  But, they do not.  Not really.  And everyone knows it.

When we care about our family and suffer because we might not be taking care of them well enough, only we feel that suffering.

Spirituality is “existential” because the knowledge, courage, strength and discipline needed to accept the facticity of life affects every human being’s capabilities to survive, adapt to life’s always changing circumstances and live a good life.

It’s “strategic” because executing strategies, improving them and making new ones possible depends 100% on businesspeople’s willingness and ability to accept and work effectively, strategically and competitively with the facticity of life.

It’s “competitive” because knowing and accepting the facts of life make designing and executing fresh, new, offers, practices, narratives and strategies with highly valued and scarce marginal utilities possible.

End of Fundamental Human Concerns