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just started to really get into existentialism...


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Definitely read the Stranger, like JR said...ever since I read that book and had some lectures on existentialism back at Temple U, I've always found it pretty fascinating.

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are there any great life changing books on the subject that you guys could tell me about?

Why are you interested in changing your life?

Books are an entertaining but weak source for that.

Being engaged in doing something can be life changing.

You could take up the venerable practices of Yoga or Zen Buddhism, or aren't they shiny enough?

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Why are you interested in changing your life?

Books are an entertaining but weak source for that.

Being engaged in doing something can be life changing.

You could take up the venerable practices of Yoga or Zen Buddhism, or aren't they shiny enough?

 

:lol: You do realize that you're talking to MDP

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Why are you interested in changing your life?

Books are an entertaining but weak source for that.

Being engaged in doing something can be life changing.

You could take up the venerable practices of Yoga or Zen Buddhism, or aren't they shiny enough?

 

If the seed of an idea plants itself firmly, it can change your life. I believe that.

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Why are you interested in changing your life?

Books are an entertaining but weak source for that.

Being engaged in doing something can be life changing.

You could take up the venerable practices of Yoga or Zen Buddhism, or aren't they shiny enough?

 

i know... and my phil professor practices some type of eastern discipline... cant remember. i have heard from two of my teachers about a couple books( forget which) that did make them take a whole new perspective... even have a personal existential crisis...

 

not to debate, but i do think ideas can be life-changing, just as much as a physical experience... but i get what youre saying dude

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Love "The Stranger" by Camus, simply because of how fascinating it is, and how it so purely existentialist.

 

I am also a big Soren Kiekegaard fan. I buy into Christian existentionalism. But I find his stuff hard to read--I mostly cheat and read secondary sources on Kierkegaard.

 

yeah, thats the one! im going to get that!

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I think the Christian existentialist-personalist thinkers have more insight than Sartre and Camus. The French existentialists are still worth reading, though. Kierkegaard is insightful, but difficult and one has to work through what he is doing with assumed characters as authors, indirect communication, etc. I recommend the following:

 

Nicholai Berdyaev, The Meaning of the Creative Act, The Destiny of Man

Gabriel Marcel, Being and Having, Man Against Mass Society

Christos Yannaras, Post-Modern Metaphysics, Relational Ontology

 

The Greek fellow at the end is more a fellow traveler than a straight existentialist, but he's interesting and is working through a similar metaphysical stance.

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