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Philosophy: Two Metaphors

Amit Phansalkar
There is a huge difference between loving philosophy and living philosophy. Many people settle for the former, and end up divorcing philosophy from life. But do they really love philosophy, then?
Philosophy, etymologically, means love of wisdom, yes just that! That's not what people think of when they hear the word philosophy. Most people shrug off any mention of the word. Why has the science of life, and art of living life got a horrible reputation? Has it got something to do with the way the philosophically inclined people are, or come across as?
Those who are into philosophy, whatever that means, there are two types of people―people who love philosophy, and people who live philosophy. Not that these two are exclusive, at least in principle, but somehow in reality, it seems like that. To elaborate a little, the first type loves reading philosophy, but just for the sake of it.
They think of philosophy as some sort of exercise for the mind, some conundrum―solving which is a reward in itself. This pursuit sometimes turns into a habit, and philosophy gets divorced from life, ironically. The second type of people, however, think of philosophy as another tool to live life effectively.
No one can teach you to live philosophy. That's for you to figure out, each on his own.
As we climb a mountain, our visions broaden; we see many things, many routes, whose existence we were unaware of; we see many connections that we could not have possibly made before.
As we climb higher, we want to get still higher. There are always other mountains, more difficult, more challenging. It definitely is an interesting metaphor. It explains the joys of learning philosophy.
As we reach higher, there are less and less people who have reached there. There are very few people who you can communicate with, and eventually you're all alone. Also, the risks of falling increase as one climbs higher and higher. There is less and less than you can draw from the experiences of others.