My Journey of Personal Growth: A Forty-something’s Self-Reflection

As a kid, I dreamed of becoming an adult. Join me on a reflective journey of personal transformation—through youth, monastic life, teaching, and the Nietzschean notion of amor fati—as I navigate the complexities of turning forty with hope, introspection, and an unyielding embrace of life’s uncertainties.

Me in a family Christmas photo—I'm like nine or ten (circa 1989)

As a kid, I dreamed of becoming an adult. From my early adolescence to the present, my life has been marked by transformative periods of personal growth and self-discovery. I see these phases as chapters, each contributing to my evolving identity as an individual and as an educator.

Me in the Late Nineties Entering Ms. Decker's Freshman Biology Class
Image Credit: Mandeville High School Yearbook

Youthful Exploration (Ages 12 to 18)

Between the ages of 12 and 18, I was in a stage of youthful exploration, where my interests spanned from joining the book club and library club to participating in theater. I started understanding my identity better, acknowledging my sexuality, and embracing my “Louisiana-ness.” This was also a period of profound spiritual exploration as I deeply engaged with Catholicism. At the same time, I was fortunate enough to travel and broaden my perspectives, continually feeding my voracious appetite for reading and learning.

The ‘Monastic Period’ (Ages 18 to 28)

The next ten years, from 18 to 28, I describe as my “monastic period.” I embraced a life of simplicity and devotion as a Benedictine in the seminary. Besides living in Europe, I completed my undergraduate and graduate studies during this time. The benefits were many: a carefree existence without the worry of rent or expenses. However, this period also marked a time of suppressed sexuality—an important aspect of my identity.

Shifting Gears: Teaching and Life Changes (Age 28 and Onward)

At 28, I decided to leave the monastic life and ventured into the world of teaching high school. This marked the beginning of another transformative chapter that spanned 14 years. During this time, I earned a second master’s degree, taught in various New York neighborhoods, and I finished an advanced certification to teach adolescent English from Hunter College. It’s a defining moment as I’m equipped with a robust educational background and valuable experience.

Me in my early 30s

Comparing Generations, Embracing the Future

Reflecting on these experiences in my 40s, on the cusp of turning 45 years and one month old (tomorrow), I can’t help but make comparisons to my mother’s life at my age—hers was marked by tumultuous times. Today, Mom sent me a sweet text message (funny how when she was in her 40s, she had a pager):

“I pray you are having a good day. Stay safe!! I’m proud of the hard work you do. Love you!—Mom!”

Mom had it tough—both of her parents had died before she graduated high school. She divorced bitterly from my father after a marriage of twenty years. She had Cancer, then a series of other health setbacks—and then a diseased aorta—but she made it through strong each time. Mom attributes it to her faith. I attribute it to her tenacity and very strong ego (but not egotistical).

As I consider my own future, and think of my own troubles, they pale in comparison. I live a single life; I am a high school English teacher, and I don’t own a house or a car (but I live in New York City, so that’s normal). I still hold onto the belief that I can cultivate a happier existence than the generations before me. I am excited about making decisions that align with my aspirations and moving forward, free from self-imposed limitations.

But it is scary.

Navigating the Complexities of Adulthood

The last 14 years have been a challenging journey—one where I truly learned to navigate the complexities of adulthood. I went from hoping and dreaming for financial independence to living in different cities, with a host of different living situations along the way (and did I mention I was once a Benedictine monk?). These experiences have empowered me to set ambitious goals for myself and instilled the confidence that I am the architect of my own destiny.

Nietzsche’s Amor Fati and the “Loneliest Loneliness”

Is it Nietzsche who wrote about amor fati—loving your fate, your destiny, embracing one’s limitations not as weaknesses but rather as signs of fallibility, yet also a freedom from illusion? I am finite. Attempting to contemplate the infinite. Now—of course, those are nice philosophical musings. It is easier to embrace amor fati when all goes well—but what about that “loneliest loneliness” Nietzsche writes about? Even then, my response must be, romantically, “yes!”

Yet I find myself more like an outlier—where the excitement of my days are in the peripheries: the early morning hours when I wake up, the brief encounters with commuters on the Q66 bus, or the after-work hours of talking to a friend, or sipping a Coke Zero while watching the sun set at the World’s Fair Marina in Flushing. The rest of my days—work—seem like ephemera. It is the off-days, the in-between things that really matter. But the log of the everyday gets to me. Isn’t that what modernists call the “rat race,” epitomized in comedy form with Dolly Parton, Lily Tomlin, and Jane Fonda in Nine to Five?

Me in my room in New York City in My 40s

On Being “Over the Hill”

No one has pity on you any longer when you’re over the hill—especially if you’re employed, salaried, and confine yourself to the creative profession or some other form of non-manual labor. “Be happy. Suck it up. You could have it worse.”

But I still think—now that I am an adult, I dream of becoming a kid.

Final Thoughts

Turning forty-something—and inching toward 45—feels like standing on a precipice. It’s a moment filled with fear, excitement, and the relentless drive to keep going. Nietzsche’s philosophy of amor fati resonates deeply: Embrace all that life offers, the joys and the hardships alike, while acknowledging our finite nature. Yes, it’s scary. Yes, it’s lonely at times. But this is the space where growth, meaning, and genuine contentment can flourish. And, perhaps, it’s also where the childlike wonder hidden inside us can reemerge, guiding us to rediscover the spark we once knew in youth.

Postscript

Thank you for reading, my dear readers of Stones of Erasmus. May this reflection inspire you to keep dreaming, keep questioning, and keep embracing all that comes along the path of growing older—and, indeed, growing up. If you are a newbie to my blog, drop a follow. If you are someone who has been with me a long time—let me know. If you are a teacher, and want my resources, go to my humanities-based store on TpT.

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Students Are Off for Summer But Teachers Are Busy Working (Am I Right?)

Dear Followers, Teachers, Lovers, Learners, and Philosophy Sprinkles Makers! Summertime Means Busy-time for Educators (Am I Right?)

Bird's Eyeview Selfie in the Backyard

During the Summer students go on vacation, but teachers do not. How many of you are taking an extra class, learning a new skill to keep you sharp for next year, or taking on a Summer side job? I am in school so I can add to my certification! So — yeah, there is a lot of activity going on for school teachers in the Summer (even though naysayers will scoff — "Oh, teachers get two months off for Summer!".

Summer Freebie: To show you my appreciation here are two FREE quote posters to share in a Language Arts or Humanities classroom. The first is "live life to the fullest" inspirational poster from Auntie Mame and the other is more of a muse — a quote poster from Terry Pratchett's novel The Hogfather.

I am holding a sale this week on TpT to show off some new products in my Stones of Erasmus TpT store. Here's a preview of some new resources I just created:

• Philosophy in the Classroom 16 Half-sheet "Freedom" Task Card Set: Engage high schoolers with topics ranging from extrinsic and intrinsic freedoms, positive and negative liberty, and conversation starters on fighting for the right to be free (relevant for today, for sure).

• A Serial Killer and a Hypocritical Grandmother: Conduct a short story discussion with High School students on Flannery O'Connor's explosive short fiction "A Good Man is Hard to Find"

• A Demon and a Madman: Illustrate a Philosophy Thought Experiment with Nietzsche's "The Greatest Weight" and "The Madman" in a 2-resource bundle that will get high school students thinking about the meaning of life and their conception of God.

• For Younger Adolescents: I created a new Mythology Resource exploring the ancient trickster hero Sisyphus who tricks Death and pays the price.

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Philosophy in the Classroom: Friedrich Nietzsche's Concept of "Eternal Recurrence" Paired with Groundhog Day — the 90s Movie Starring Bill Murray

Get this lesson
and other lessons
from my TpT store.

In this post, I re-package a previous post I did on Nietzsche's concept of eternal recurrence and turn it into a meaningful High School English lesson for Ninth and Tenth graders.

The demon on your chest — would you curse the demon or embrace your fate?      

      A while ago, I posted a passage from Friedrich Nietzsche's book The Gay Science on my website. I was really struck by a section of the book I call "The Allegory of the Demon." It's a thought experiment and Nietzsche has his reader think about how does one live out their life? How would you live your life differently? What if you had to repeat your life over and over again without change? Would you "gnash your teeth" or would you embrace it? 

      I thought the passage was dense enough and short enough, to elicit a response in my Ninth and Tenth grade English classes. So, I created a lesson to think about Nietzsche along with a classic 1990s movie — Groundhog Day. None of my students had heard of the movie, and their knowledge of Nietzsche was slim — but we dug into the reading and I was pleasantly surprised by how much critical thinking we were able to do with such a small passage from World Literature. So. I put together the lesson on Teachers Pay Teachers. Here is the outline of the lesson:

Philosophy in the Classroom Lesson Plan: Nietzsche and Bill Murray in Groundhog Day 

What is the meaning of life? You and your students are sure to come up with many answers to this question. Get your students engaged in philosophical inquiry by presenting them with Friedrich Nietzsche's concept of "eternal recurrence," paired with clips from the movie Groundhog Day (1993) starring Billy Murray and Andie McDowell.

This resource includes the following features:

Essential Question: What is the meaning of Life?

Supporting Questions: How does Friedrich Nietzsche provide a possible answer to this question. / How can I apply abstract ideas to everyday life?

This resource includes the following features:

The text of the story is included in this resource.

• Teacher's notes on using this resource
• 7 reading comprehension questions
• 1 Entrance Ticket
• 1 Movie View Guide
• 1 Writing Prompt
• 3 Editable Google Slides handouts
• Further Reading List (To go deeper into the topic with your students)

Suggested Uses:

1. Ninth or Tenth Grade High School English Curriculum
2. World History Course on the History of Ideas
3. Introduction to Philosophy Course
4. Literature Course
5. Ethics Course
6. Introduction to Philosophy Course
7. Student Advisory Course
8. A Lesson on the "Meaning of Life"

Suggested Classroom Time: 3 Hours + Independent Worktime for Students' writing

See a companion lesson "Plato's Allegory of the Cave in Plain Language" - on searching for truth in a crazy world.

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19 Sayings: From Nietzsche Thinking Intensely (Quotable Nietzsche)

In this post, I select 19 quotable sayings from Friedrich Nietzsche.

Nietzsche Thinking Intensely (image: Flickr/SPDP)

I read "23 Signs You're Secretly an Introvert" in the Huffington Post, and #5 on the list "You've been called 'too intense'" caught my attention. It was accompanied by a nifty drawing of Nietzsche surrounded by a spray of his most quotable quotes in hard-to-read scribble-scratch. I like Nietzsche, so I copied out the quotes, which took some time because the handwriting is atrocious, with the appropriate citations. Nietzsche is very quotable, which is why in Germany, they revere him like the English revere Shakespeare. If anyone knows who created the Nietzsche graphic, let me know.

"It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what others say in a whole book."
Twilight of the Idols, Or, How to Philosophize with a Hammer, "Skirmishes of an Untimely Man," Aphorism 51, (1888)

"Is life not a thousand times too short to bore ourselves?"
Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 227, (1886)

"Faith: not wanting to know what is true."
The Antichrist, Aphorism 52, (1895)

"In every real man a child is hidden that wants to play.”
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, "On Little Old and Young Women," (1883)

"In music the passions enjoy themselves."
Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 106, (1886)

"Idleness is the parent of psychology."
Twilight of the Idols, Or, How to Philosophize with a Hammer, "Apothegms and Darts," Aphorism 1, (1888)

"All credibility, all good conscience, all evidence of truth, come only from the senses."
Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 134, (1886)

"It is always consoling to think of suicide: in that way one gets through many a bad night."
Beyond Good and Evil. ch. 4, Aphorism 157, (1886)

"Madness is rare in individuals, but in groups, parties, nations and ages it is the rule."
Beyond Good and Evil, "Apothegms and Interludes," Aphorism 156, (1886)

"One should die proudly when it is no longer possible to live proudly."
Twilight of the Idols, Or, How to Philosophize with a Hammer, "Skirmishes in War with the Age," Aphorism 36, (1888)

"Plato was a bore."*
*I am unable to find the exact source for this quote. Plenty of sources cite Nietzsche, but none refer to a text.*

"I love those who don't know how to live for today."*
*Again, plenty of sources cite Nietzsche but without giving credit to a text. I did find in Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883) a slightly similar quote: "I love those that know not how to live except as downgoers, for they are the overgoers."

"For art to exist, for any sort of aesthetic activity to exist, a certain physiological precondition is indispensable: intoxication."
Twilight of the Idols, Or, How to Philosophize with a Hammer, "Roving Expeditions of an Inopportune Philosopher," Aphorism 8, (1888)

"Art is the proper task of life."
The Will to Power, "The Will to Power as Art," Section IV, (1901)

"I cannot believe in a God who wants to be praised at all times."
This quote seems to be a paraphrase of an idea from Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883)

"Fear is the mother of  all morality." 
Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 201, (1886)

"Before the effect believes in different causes than one does after the effect."
The Gay Science, "Cause and Effect," Aphorism 217, (1882)

"If you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you."
Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 146 (1886).

"Is man one of God's blunders? Is God one of man's blunders?"
Twilight of the Idols Or, How to Philosophize with a Hammer, "Maxims and Arrows," Aphorism 7, (1888)

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Friedrich Nietzsche on the Abyss

"Beyond Good and Evil", Aphorism 146 (1886).

Decided to rewatch Abyss, the 1989 sci-fi water drama based on a Michael Crichton novel of the same name, and was pleasantly surprised to see it begins with an apt quote from Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil. I don't remember that tidbit when I saw it over twenty years ago. Despite the usual Hollywood spectacle hijinks one expects from studio blockbusters, I have always remembered this movie as not just rather impressive with the special effects (for its time) but also a visually poetic film and one of the better close-encounter-with-the-third-kind kind of movie (of course not to beat Close Encounters of the Third Kind).

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Are Philosophers Inspired by the Figure of the Child?

In this post, I discuss one of my favorite topics: how have thinkers, writers, and philosophers been inspired by the figure of the child?

I am stuck on this topic of the child as a figure of philosophical thought or inspiration. The question writ large is this: how can the child be both a muse and tabula rasa? In other words, how can the child be a figure of inspiration, yet at the same time, not capable of the label philosopher? The philosopher, artist, thinker, writer, goes to the child for their inspiration, but the paradox is this: the child is seldom seen as a locus of philosophical import. How can it be both? Both muse and empty of content? We call the child innocence but what we mean is empty, according to Kincaid. And i agree. The label of innocence creates a bind. A problem. Innocence maintains the status of muse but creates a problem by which the child is only able to miraculously appear through nostalgia and leaves whence she came. William Blake trumpets the child as a muse. Blake writes of a poet/piper in the introductory verse of the Songs of Innocence who is visited by a child on a cloud who commands him to write: "Piper sit thee down and write / In a book that all may read." Is the child merely an apparition for the romantic poet? Notice it is the poet and not the lofty nude boy cherub who puts words onto paper. How can it be that the child inspires the poet to write but is bereft of his own song?

I can name three famous instances where a child appears in the margins of the history of philosophy. In Plato’s Meno, Socrates employs a slave child to demonstrate to Meno that learning is recollection. Meno assures Socrates that the boy has no previous knowledge of geometry. The question is if the child has no prior knowledge of geometry can she still learn it? Socrates asks the slave boy questions. He does not supply him with answers as if his mind were an empty vessel. Socrates is notorious for asserting that we come upon the quest for knowledge at an instance of nothing. We know nothing. Nothing is a starting point. Just by the guidance of a question, the slave boy is able to come up with the solution to the problem of halving a square. Plato does not indicate the child's age. I would guess he is no older than sixteen. No younger than seven. Is it a coincidence that Socrates uses him as an example? To use a child to illustrate a philosophical point suggests something about the status of a child. In this case a slave child. To be a slave and a child at the time of Socrates was to be afforded little political privilege. Neither the child or the slave were properly thought of as citizens of the state. Philosophy is adult business. Citizen business. So to demonstrate the boy's ability to know, to recollect knowledge, as a priori to learning itself, is to present the child as exemplar, but still leaves us to question the concept of child as philosopher.

Nietzsche famously invokes the figure child in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, in tandem with the lion and the camel, as the third stage in the metamorphosis of philosophical progress.

Augustine in the Confessions opens a random selection of sacred scripture whereby he is inspired by Saint Paul’s words to put on the person of Christ and rid himself of wanton desires. When the child enters the scene of philosophical history she becomes an example, as we can see in Socrates’s use of the boy, or as metaphor for something “new” and “fresh” as in Nietzsche. Or simply inspiration as in Augustine’s anecdotal story of his conversion.

For the most part children are excluded from the annals of Western Philosophy in the main along with discussions of sex, the body, and anything related to our finitude. Philosophers in the main have traditionally been more fond of loftier topics such as mind, reason, and clear and distinct ideas. Children are far from such sophisticated concepts being as they are undeveloped intellectually. While we can grant the child her own special status as philosopher — who has not heard a child ask why? — it is still fairly common to assume philosophy is meant for grown-ups. The long-standing view of children is that they are extensions of adults. Thomas Hobbes excludes the child as having the status of person in the Leviathan. Along with madmen and fools, the child is a brute beast, with no claim to the law or sovereignty. For Hobbes, the child is not a person. According to Phillip Aries, the concept of the child as independent from an adult only recently became adopted in the West in the nineteenth century. For centuries children were seen as diminutive versions of adults. Homunculi. The great modern revelation, it is said, is that children embody a consciousness that is temporally defined and authentic to childhood itself. How far have we come from Hobbes? But how uneasy it is for us to ask the child muse to speak her own voice. Children grow up. They become adults. And it is usually adults who provide the child's voice. The word "infant" means "without voice." The Romantic view of childhood, as seen in the Blake poems, and also with Rousseau, privileged the child as possessing a unique access to experience that becomes lost after the emergence of puberty. What Freud would later call the stage of latency, the period after infancy leading up to adolescence, becomes a period in the development of the human person infused with a new sense of interest and curiosity. Jean-Jacques Rousseau breaks the silence and places the figure of the child front and center, but he too retains a nostalgia for something lost. We vacillate, I conjecture, from positing the child as an empty slate to embodying all truths, but in each event, we are foreclosed to the child qua child.

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Philosophy Thought Experiment: Nietzsche's Allegory of the Demon

Friedrich Nietzsche's most famous articulation of eternal recurrence of the same is imagined as a thought experiment.
The question Nietzsche poses is, ‘Would you live this life over again under the same conditions?’
After reading the quote, think of Bill Murray in the movie Groundhog Day and the allegory makes more sense.

 

Here is an excerpt from the text:

The greatest weight.— What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you into your loneliest loneliness and say to you: "This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more; and there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy and every thought and sigh and everything unutterably small or great in your life will have to return to you, all in the same succession and sequence - even this spider and this moonlight between the trees, and even this moment and I myself. The eternal hourglass of existence is turned upside down again and again, and you with it, speck of dust!"

Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus?... Or how well disposed would you have to become to yourself and to life to crave nothing more fervently than this ultimate eternal confirmation and seal?

- Friedrich Nietzsche

The Gay Science, s.341

translated by Walter Kaufmann

Source: Nietzsche, Friedrich W, and Walter Kaufmann. The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs. New York: Random House, 1974. Print.

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image source: fractal ontology

Quotation: Nietzsche's The Gay Science

We philosophers are not free to divide body from soul as the people do; we are even less free to divide soul from spirit. We are not thinking frogs, nor objectifying and registering mechanisms with their innards removed: constantly, we have to give birth to our thoughts out of our pain and, like mothers, endow them with all we have of blood, heart, fire, pleasure, passion, agony, conscience, fate, and catastrophe. Life - that means for us constantly transforming all that we are into light and flame - also everything that wounds us; we simply can do no other (Nietzsche 1974 34-35).

Nietzsche, Friedrich W, and Walter Kaufmann. The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs. New York: Vintage Books.

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What does Nietzsche Mean by God is Dead (and why German Romanticism is not Cool, Dude)

Kid: Dude, Nietzsche is cool.

Nietzsche: No, I'm not.

Kid: Dude, that's not cool.

Nietzsche: Hey, kid, watch out what you say about my will-to-power.

Kid: Uhhhh. OK.

Nietzsche: Damn kids.

    That's how the conversation would go. Is Nietzsche cool? Well, if you call a highly sophisticated philologist with a penchant for Ancient Greek Philosophy cool, then I guess Nietzsche is cool.

Is Nietzsche Misunderstood?

Nietzsche is highly misunderstood. I read Nietzsche's The Gay Science (no, not that "gay," but gay in the old-fashioned way meaning "happy") for the first time in a philosophy seminar back in my college days. We read the Walter Kaufmann translation (the one I still refer to). I remember at the start of the seminar one guy who was especially excited to be reading Nietzsche as if he were to embark upon an expedition in cow tipping while on acid. "Dude, Nietzsche is all about 'God is Dead.' I totally dig that, man." The guy wanted us all to know he was a nihilist: he cut his forearms for show and he wore stark black; which was OK with me, considering black was a decent choice of color to absorb heat in the Winter.

    The professor, who was a very quiet man, a little intimidating, and spoke in a low, almost condescending tone interrupted the guy. "Don't think you understand Nietzsche without reading him. Reading Nietzsche is not cool."

Nietzsche and Teen Angst

Dwayne (Paul Dano) reads Thus Spoke Zarathustra

    The professor did not like associating Nietzsche with teen angst, or smoking a doobie and talking about how much life sucks. Like in the quirky indie comedy, Little Miss Sunshine. Sporting a tee-shirt that says, "Jesus Was Wrong," a teenage boy takes a vow of silence as a tribute to his favorite philosopher, Mr. Nietzsche. Personally, if a disaffected adolescent is going to pout and rebel, he should read Schopenhauer before he reads Nietzsche. Just saying. Nietzsche is rosy in comparison...

The Madman

   It is true that Nietzsche mentions "God is dead" bit in the Gay Science. The book is written as a series of witty, short anecdotal chapters, with an appendix of verse at the end. "The God is dead" piece is paragraph 125, "The Mad Man." The story is simple. A man races through the streets of a city in broad daylight carrying a torch, proclaiming "I seek God! I seek God!" The atheists - "the many who do not believe in God" - stand around and laugh at the madman. "Is he lost?" they ask. The madman gets right up in the faces of the atheists and asks them, "Whither is god?" The atheist continues to laugh but the madman continues, "piercing them "with his glances." The madman makes a claim that the reason God is dead is that we've killed him. "I shall tell you. We have killed him--you and I. All of us are his murderers." The madman goes on for a few paragraphs about how we killed God.