The Philosophy of Existentialism

Jean-Paul Sartre was a famous French philosopher, novelist, playwrite, and critic. He was a leading existentialist, who dealt with the nature of human life and the structures of consciousness. John-Paul Sartre was a very short man and was only 5' 3' in height. He had a wondering eye and wore very thick glasses. He referred to himself as a ugly person. Jean-Paul Sartre was born in 1905 in Paris, France, and in 1988 he died. Sartre was 74 years old. In the 1960's Sartre was a household name in Europe and the United States, because of his choice of philosophy, called existentialism.

He was famous for his book 'Being and Nothingness' which caused his reputation to grow, not because people could understand his ideas, but because they couldn't. Extensialism was built around a number of key sights. One key sight is that things are weirder than we think. The world reveals itself much stranger and mysterious than we think, extremely unexpected, absurd, and frightening.

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Another key point is that we are free.

Moments are confusing and scary. Sartre brings these things to our attention. Life is a lot odder than we think, but it's also a outcome for richer possibilities. Things don't happen quite the way they are. In the way of fully realizing our freedom, which Sartre refers to this as 'angoisse' which means anguish. Everything is terrifyingly possible because nothing has anything pre-ordained, a God given purpose, and that humans are just making it up as they go along at a free to break their chains at any moment.

The third key point that Sartre developed was that we shouldn't live in bad faith. Sartre gave a term to the fact of living without taking freedom properly. We are in bad faith whenever we tell ourselves that things have to be a certain way and shut our eyes to other options. It's bad faith to insist that we have to do a particular work, or live with a specific person, or to make our home in a given place. The last key point John-Paul Sartre developed was that we're free to destroy Capitalism. The one factor that discourages people from experiencing themselves as free is money. Most of us will shut down a range of possible options moving abroad trying out a new career or even a partner by saying 'that's if I didn't have to worry about money'. This passivity because of money enraged Sartre, and he thought about Capitalism as a giant machine designed to create a feeling of neccessity which doesn't exist in reality. It makes us tell ourselves we have to work a certain number of hours, buy a particular product or service and so on. There is only denial of our freedom and refusal to take it seriously as we should. There is a possibility of living in other ways.

John-Paul Sartre had a life long interest in Marxism. Marxism is the theory to allow people to explore their freedom by decreasing their role played in their lives by material wants and needs. Sartre is inspiring because of his insistance that things don't have to be the way they are. He is greatly in belief of our unfulfilled potential as individuals. He urges us to accept the nature of existance and to create new habits, outlooks, and ideas. The acceptance that life doesn't have a pre ordained logic and is not wonderfully meaningful can be the source of immense relief and a person does not have to feel burdened by the belief of tradition. I agree and feel that we should not be resricted to the way we want to live life, or what we want to do in life. I believe we should be free to live the way we want and to do the things that we want to do in life. Yes, my life does relate to Sartre's entire way of thinking. I am a free thinker and so was Sartre.