A couple quotes from the prologue

I picked this up at Powell’s City of Books in Portland because it’s been referenced in so many things that I’ve read, most recently Memories Dreams Reflections by C.G. Jung.

What good is my virtue! As yet it hath not made me passionate.

Thus Spake Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche

This quote stood out to me because I had a conversation recently with a friend where we came to the conclusion that the most important thing in life is to be passionate (about anything). The context was that I was criticizing a friend for his lack of passion for his work, the only passion being money and security; a desire to keep everything the same, to stop life from changing, which is impossible, and a rejection of what it means to live. Life is change. And I’m reminded of Jung: “Anyone who takes the sure road is as good as dead.”

At some age it becomes impossible for someone to question their big decisions and beliefs. It becomes too painful to accept a serious mistake in judgement that has had a profound effect on one’s life. If one is confronted with this situation it could mean the collapse of the ego and a total mental breakdown. The ego and the mind protect itself. And so the big things are not questioned in our later years, and so I think it is important to constantly question yourself and your beliefs and have your life be a semi-continuous stream of improvement and modification of beliefs. Or else be crushed by the consequences of not doing so.

“A child has Zarathustra become; an awakened one is Zarathustra: what will thou do in the land of the sleepers?”

Thus Spake Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche

This line makes me wonder about how much exposure Nietzsche had to Eastern religions: Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism. ” “Awakened” is an adjective that I associate with “enlightenment” and these Eastern religions. And the idea that the highest achievement is to retain a “child’s mind” I associate with Buddhism and the acceptance and belief that our reality is pattern and change and nothing is eternal. This is related to the first quote / idea I mentioned above, that it is best to continually evolve over the course of one’s life.

“Believe not those who speak unto you of superearthly hopes! Poisoners are they, whether they know it or not.. Despisers of life are they.”

Thus Spake Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche

I would like to leave this quote as a comment on one of my “born again” Facebook friend’s posts. But I won’t. It would be too much. Which brings me back to that idea that at some point… it’s better not to question the big decisions but rather to just “ride it out” to the grave.

I’m reminded of Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari where he writes a bit about how the father who sends his son off to war and then to have him be killed, the father only becomes more patriotic, can only support the nation and the war more. It is too much to accept that the decision and initial judgement was foolish. Also, not wearing masks during Covid, anyone who took this position and then had a relative die of Covid… the only thing that makes sense is to hate Fauci and the CDC more, it’s too much to accept that a different decision could have prevented the death of a loved one…

This post got a little dark… My first impressions are that Zarathustra was a good buy and I expect I’ll find hundreds of quotes that could warrant a blog post each. Even after the first couple pages, I just picked out a couple of the quotes I underlined.