Member-only story
- Last night I got food poisoning and after briefly waking up to try and fail to go to work, I slept until 3pm, when I woke up with a splitting headache. I can barely type; can barely concentrate. But there is a lesson in this — there is no separation of mind and body; mind is a function of body. When the body gets sick, the mind gets sick along with it.
- I’m thinking about Nietzsche, who spent twenty years being ill; prone to migraines; sensitive to bright light. Nietzsche was — is — the great philosopher of health because he could actually appreciate what good health really meant. It’s almost incomprehensible that Nietzsche was as productive as he was, given that he was likely suffering from the symptoms of syphilis. It’s almost as if his headaches pressurized his thoughts, so that, in moments of relative clarity, they poured out.
- Fevers are like forest fires — I imagine they are a necessary part of the mind’s ecosystem.
- Do our bodies tell us when we’re pushing ourselves to far? Is food poisoning perhaps just the body’s way of shutting itself down; resting? I wonder.
- We have no respect for rest or sleep anymore — it is a nuisance; it puts a halt on productivity. Yet for the ancients, sleep was a gift, a god.
- I never take medication — and wouldn’t unless it were a true emergency. I’ve never understand the logic of shutting down the body’s natural recovery processes. Why are we so unwilling to experience discomfort?
- Learning to bear discomfort is integral to becoming a wise person.
