So then to specialness itself. In virtue of what are you special? When you adopt the stance, usually there is something factual that seems to confirm it.
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Replying to @Meaningness @reasonisfun
For example, when I fall into it, there’s the fact that I am exceptionally smart. Or it could be that you are beautiful, rich, popular, famous, well-born, etc. If you find yourself mentally reviewing the evidence for one such, you know that you’re doing the stance.
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Replying to @Meaningness @reasonisfun
Perhaps for some that’s sufficient, for a while; but everyone knows those factors are transient, mostly a matter of luck, and anyway are external to your core self, rather than being about who you, uniquely, actually are.
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Replying to @Meaningness @reasonisfun
Being rich or whatever doesn’t make you feel special in the way that matters. Your core self is actually just the same as those of ordinary people. Ordinary people may treat you as special, which is nice, but you know you aren't, and feel fake. This is unsatisfactory.
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Replying to @Meaningness @reasonisfun
You may come to realize that no mundane facts, no matter how extreme, could actually make you special; they’re just contingent. What you need is transcendent, metaphysical specialness. You need to be Chosen by the Cosmic Plan.
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Replying to @Meaningness @reasonisfun
(I'm working through the logic of this to make it clear; my guess is most people don't reason it out so explicitly. Instead they are likely to inherit the stance of specialness from parents or pick it up from works of fiction (where it's extremely common as fantasy fulfillment).)
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Replying to @Meaningness @reasonisfun
The problem here is that there is no Cosmic Plan, which makes it difficult for you to figure out exactly what it means for it to have Chosen you. One common way to try to make this work is to decide you have been given a special Mission:https://meaningness.com/purpose
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Replying to @Meaningness @reasonisfun
Another approach is to heighten your uniqueness by exaggerating eccentricities and character quirks and attributing Special Meaningfulness to them. Both these approaches are harmful, although they can motivate genuine & valuable accomplishments too.
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Replying to @Meaningness @reasonisfun
You can't create a Cosmic Plan, because you are human, material, and about two meters in your largest dimension, and the Cosmos is divine, metaphysical, and about 10^16 meters in its physical emanation. Unfortunately, it won't accept your Plan. Partly because it doesn't exist.
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Replying to @Meaningness @reasonisfun
You can create a plan for yourself, or for yourself and other people. That's a merely ordinary thing to do, though. It doesn't make you special, no matter how ambitious it is. Also, reality mostly doesn't cooperate with plans.
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When you realize trying to convince yourself that you are special doesn’t work, there’s several directions you can go. One is to try to be ordinary, which is also a bad idea.
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Replying to @Meaningness @reasonisfun
Better is to try to be “noble,” which means dropping the whole question of personal value and life-role, losing interest in the meaning of Me, and doing what you can to be useful for other people, for their sake, rather than for what it proves about Me.
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Replying to @Meaningness
Why is doing things for others not also a kind of personal? What makes Others different in kind from Me?
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