#nihilate

[retr0scum]

[athousandgateaux]

It is certain that we can not overcome anguish, for we are anguish. As for veiling it, aside from the fact that the very nature of consciousness and its translucency forbid us to take the expression literally, we must note the particular type of behavior which it indicates. We can hide an external object because it exists independently of us. For the same reason we can turn our look or our attention away from it – that is, very simply, fix our eyes on some other object; henceforth each reality – mine and that of the object – resumes its own life, and the accidental relation which united consciousness to the thing disappears without thereby altering either existence. But if I am what I wish to veil, the questioning takes on quite another aspect. I can in fact wish ‘not to see’ a certain aspect of my being only if I am acquainted with the aspect which I do not wish to see. This means that in my being I must indicate this aspect in order to be able to turn myself away from it; better yet, I must think of it constantly in order to take care not to think of it. In this connection it must be understood not only that I must of necessity perpetually carry within me what I wish to flee but also that I must aim at the object of my flight in order to flee it. This means that anguish, the intentional aim of anguish, and a flight from anguish toward reassuring myths must all be given in the unity of the same consciousness. In a word, I flee in order not to know, but I can not avoid knowing that I am fleeing; and the flight from anguish is only a mode of becoming conscious of anguish Thus anguish, properly speaking, can be neither hidden nor avoided. Yet to flee anguish and to be anguish can not be exactly the same thing. If I am my anguish in order to flee it, that presupposes that I can decenter myself in relation to what I am, that I can be anguish in the form of ‘not-being it,’ that I can dispose of a nihilating power at the heart of anguish itself. This nihilating power nihilates anguish in so far as I flee it and nihilates itself in so far as I am anguish in order to flee it. This attitude is what we call bad faith

Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, pg. 82-83

[whiskeyflavoredgum-blog]

Here is a little film I made, if anyone is interested.  April 19th, 2013.