By Scott Shaw
I was
cruising down the coast between Santa Barbara and L.A. a couple of weeks ago
with this sweet young lady. She was looking at her twitter feed and she noticed
that somebody had quoted me.
It is
pretty common that people quote my books, Zen O’clock, About Peace, and Nirvana
in a Nutshell on twitter, because they are made up of short spiritual
aphorisms.
Anyway, she
noticed that somebody had commented on the original tweet, “That sounds pretty
nihilistic.”
She turned
and asked me, “What does nihilistic mean?”
Her
question made me smile due to the fact that she didn’t know what nihilism was.
I gave her
the basic off-the-cuff definition… Someone who is nihilistic believes that life
has no absolute meaning and that religions and philosophies hold no absolute
truth.
“Are you
nihilistic,” she asked. Again, I smiled.
Do I believe
that life holds an absolute meaning? No.
Do I
believe that religion possesses an absolute truth? No.
Do I
believe in a specific religion or philosophy? No.
Does that
make me a nihilist? Maybe… But, I think it is a bit more complicated than that.
By nature, I am extremely optimistic. I believe in people. I believe in
goodness. I believe that people will make the right choices and do the right
things — even though I have been proven wrong time and time again. But, I
still believe!
So, is
Scott Shaw a nihilist? Maybe. But, as a nihilist that would mean that I also
don’t believe in absolute definitions. So, the whole question possesses
no merit.
Ultimately,
if Scott Shaw is a nihilist, he is an optimistic one. :-)
This is Life.
This is Zen
This is Scott Shaw Signing Out.
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