We are pieces of an infinite puzzle

As a philosophical movement andIndividualism as we understand it today has its origins between the 17th and 18th centuries. with the advent of the Enlightenment, the birth of liberalism and thinkers like the English Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, David Hume, the Frenchman Montesquieu, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire). For the first time, ideas such as the rights and freedom of every human being were privileged and viewed as entities in their own right, beyond the collective or massive. According to this ideology, each individual is responsible for his decisions and actions, he has the right to make them and nothing can stop him from doing so, least of all the state. Away from the philosophical, individualism, which acquired a particular dynamic from the 19th century and increased in the 20th century, has become a model of life in our time and in the Western world, distorting the original idea, to the point that one can speak of a capitalism of the self, in which the ideas of freedom and rights consider only one’s own and forget those of others.

The slogan of this period could well have been taken from the classic poem by Luis de Góngora (1561-1627), which he repeated in every verse Let me be hot and make people laugh and suggested images like this: When in January I cover the mountains / with white snow, / let me fill the brazier / with acorns and chestnuts. That means as long as I float, may the world end. “From childhood, children grew up in individualistic societies Like us, they are encouraged to follow their passions, make their own decisions and express their identities. You are taught values ​​like Independence, ambition and personal responsibilitysays Tim Connolly, professor of religion and comparative philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania and author of Do comparative philosophya book in which he explores the worldview of different cultures.

As Connolly rightly points out, individualism as experienced today turns others into adversaries or competitors to be imposed upon or surpassed. Let us add this on our part if they are not considered as such simple obstacles that must be overcome. In this way we forget that humans, as social and sociable creatures, are not self-sufficient individuals. Luckily we are incomplete. Therefore, everyone has something that the other lacks and needs something from the other. We are parts of a whole, pieces of an infinite puzzle, and no one person is the whole or the complete puzzle. A loose piece has no value. On the other hand, the figure is not complete if this part is missing. What is certain is that the contribution of each individual to the whole is irreplaceable. The responsibility of each individual is therefore towards the whole, from the moment when there is no action or inaction without consequences.

In a short and detailed article entitled A cure for individualismConnolly points out that the belief that one should live in service to oneself and forget others, an attitude promoted by various theories of self-esteem, self-knowledge, self-leadership, etc., “ultimately leads us to diminish our potential by giving ourselves a narrow picture of who we are and what we could become.” Perhaps there is a cause there for a certain related epidemic: narcissism. The construction of a mirror that only reflects one’s own image, stripped of any surroundings. Connolly focuses on ideas from Confucius, the famous Chinese philosopher of the 6th century BC. BCwho urged us to remember that we are children of a family history and part of a community and that we must honor and respect this through our attitudes and thoughts. To be part of a human community, Confucius said, is to be held together by bonds of mutual consideration.