“Il y a” as discussed by Doc G is a situation where there’s an indeterminacy of being, in the sense that beings are disintegrate into “no thing” --- that is neither nothing nor something. “Il y a” describes the lack of subjectivity, it’s the darkness that gives no orientation, no perspective, no meaning.
But “no meaning” doesn’t mean that the meaning does not exist. “No orientation” doesn’t mean that there are no light in front of us… maybe we just closed our eyes.
Sometimes we close our eyes because it’s effortless, and can in some way wash away our problems. By closing our eyes we don’t have to worry about judgments from other people, we just have to be one of the people walking down the street. And because it’s so comfortable to be in the darkness and sleep, we have forgotten to search for the light. “Hassle eh.”
In the darkness we can’t see clearly even ourselves. In this darkness we don’t have any goal, and we are not going for anything. There’s no meaning and we are not going to find it. “Wala nga eh.”
So what do we mean by truly exist or be a being is to get out of our “Il y a”. To be able to get out of “Il y a”, to get out of the darkness and be unique, different, special, one needs to exert a great amount of effort and initiative. We have to take up the responsibility, and to exercise wisdom of love --- “what we can do for the Others?” Because what we have done define ourselves, so for us to really determine ourselves, we must first be Conscious-Beings-In-The-World-For-Others.
I agree with your point. Sometimes in life, when we are burdened with problems and uncertainties, we feel that it's easier to just fall back and not mind anything else in this world. We shut everything out and we close our eyes. But by doing so, we are not living authentically. We are here physically but we are not really existing. This probably stems from us not wanting to be disturbed, because as you said, it's already comfortable in this darkness. This is why we need to let ourselves be disturbed by the Other. It is only by doing so that we can go beyond ourselves and truly exist.
ReplyDeleteMarika King
PH 102 - A
I think, that sometimes we are just to lazy to stand up and be responsible, but life, just staying in the Il ya, is pointless. This is not being human, thus, we need to be disturbed, get out of the il ya and live life with responsibility.
ReplyDelete-Diane Cheng (A)
For me, I think Il y a is a state wherein we are just afraid of breaking out of society's normal flow. We are afraid of the consequences our actions may bring upon us so we just sit down in a dark corner and do nothing. In Il y a, we are scared to take responsibility for our actions. We are afraid that taking responsibility for our actions may do more harm to us than good. We fail to realize that in order to give meaning to our lives, we have to take this responsibility. Living a life full of familiarity is meaningless. We have to be brave enough to face the unfamiliar and deal with the unexpected in order to break out of Il y a.
ReplyDeleteKass Sun
Ph102 Section A