Forgiveness, Virtues, and...Simba?

1/22/11

Lets face it. You know what I ate. This time I had hot chocolate as well. A bit bitter though. We left today for Sunio. Our purpose was to go to the temple of Poseidon. With a two-hour ride ahead of us I typed. I forgot to charge my computer last night, so I cheated to save some battery. I just opened a word document and then turned my screen off. Spelling accuracy drops a little as I didn’t know exactly where I was in the word and sentence sometimes. There were times where I would light my screen back up just so I could see what I had written. I kept getting lost in thought. You would too if you kept going by the Ionian Sea and other interesting terrain.

We couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful day. It was all bright sun and blue sky. Of course there were some clouds, but they never covered the sun for long. The temple to Poseidon is located up on this tall cliff next to the sea. With the spectacular views of the water it made sense why the temple was built there. I admit that I took more pictures of the water than I did the temple. It had the beautiful teal color of glacial water. Reminded me of home a little bit.

When we were done taking pictures and going around the temple we all got back on the bus and went down to a beach bellow. After all it was the Mediterranean. We couldn’t just pass up this opportunity to get in the water. Most of the group went to the bathrooms to change into shorts or swimsuits behind this little restaurant. Several people sat down to eat instead. There is only one word when it comes to swimming in January. Cold. Ok I can give you another few like stupid, brave, and even ignorant. It was by no means dangerous, unless you consider that numbness is an onset of hypothermia. It took me a while to get in. I hate being cold but I love water. Getting my feet in I started to tense up. In high school I used to have to do ice baths for my calves as I would get shin splints. These actually would make me feel sick as I would create such a huge difference in body temperature between my upper body and my lower. I learned I either had to over stimulate myself with loud music or, something I discovered as a senior, get my head wet too so that the difference in temperature would be way lower. Here I did the old fashioned way. Freeze yourself bit by bit. I would wade in, go back towards shore, and then go back in a little more. After midlevel I dived in. Salty. I forgot how much salt there is in bodies of salt water - hence the name salt water. I didn’t take a mouthful or open my eyes, thank you slight intelligence, but I couldn’t help myself from licking my lips a lot. I imagine the Mediterranean is more fun when the weather is closer to 90 degrees and not sixty with a breeze. Getting out I just wanted to stand in the sun. My goal was to soak up enough sun to make up for the lack of it from December to March. Eventually a few clouds covered the sun so I went and changed.

On the ride I typed again. My battery said it would only last three hours. I made it last four and have an hour left over. I love my Mac. Best battery ever plus it runs on so little power.

In my last blog I said, “I can’t lie.” I like that expression but the truth is I like the truth and despise lying. Aristotle talks about how ethics are not innate, rather they are built by practice. If you make good moral decisions you will get pleasure out of life and happiness. By following good moral practices you become a moral being. By telling the truth, you become a more moral person and you become better at doing it. What I appreciate about truth is that it allows for making of good decisions. The truth can be painful, but knowing it allows you to do correct actions or precautions rather than blunder head long into something that creates bigger problems. I also like the truth because it supports other ethics. By knowing what the truth is about acting on your ethics you can create better outcomes and not be duped by morality. The morals of many people in the Nazi army were duped by their morality when they followed the moral of loyalty. They were loyal, but that loyalty blinded them. Had the truth been known and the question of “is this right” been asked to the group at large, I don’t think that they would’ve been duped. The truth a person is a person no matter what their race, religion, orientation, gender, or ethnicity could’ve gotten more people to act against the persecution of the Jews.

Back at the hotel most people ran once again for a gyro. At the top of the hotel the sun was wonderful. I shed my shirt and did a little reading. After finishing the Symposium I just sat in the sun and closed my eyes. Eventually the wind started to increase. I simply curled up on the wicker bench on my pad and started to doze. Eventually I turned back towards the sun again to warm my front. The wind eventually got me too cold to enjoy the sun. We were going to have class up on the roof so I ended wearing my polar fleece and down jacket as well.

Class was interesting. We finished the two Roth group summaries that were left. They were all on the Holocaust. The class conversation turned to forgiveness. There was a question Greg asked that I really wanted to write about. The problem was that I was writing down a different part of the conversation in my moleskin and lost the second question. Greg brought up how guilt is always tied to forgiveness. I don’t know if I was misunderstanding him, but I felt like he was saying that the point of forgiveness is to create guilt. I had issues with this because that ruins the point of forgiveness. Forgiveness is not done to create guilt but to release it. You can “forgive” someone to create guilt within them, but that does not really mean you forgave them as your actions were done out of spite – not true forgiveness. The word was used but not the nature of the word. We also talked about how forgiveness is a gift that we give. We don’t have to give it, but it is there to be acted on. Greg asked how forgiveness could be a gift if it had parameters. It isn’t a gift in that instance. I am not saying forgiveness is not a gift we can give, but rather that by placing parameters that require something of the offender is actually reconciliation. They are requirements that get the relationship back to where it was before the offense. The reason that forgiveness and reconciliation get mixed up, in my mind, is because they have the same result. When you forgive someone there is nothing being held against the other and one person doesn’t feel as if they have to do something to fix the relationship. Reconciliation is the same thing – only the offender has to earn it. In forgiveness, the fixed relationship is a gift where the offended lets go of the negative emotions aimed at the offender – allowing the negative feelings associated with the offended to drop from the offender. Balance is brought back either way. It is just a process of how. I feel that forgiveness with parameters for the offended though are acceptable. In order to truly forgive, with heart, soul, and mind, there needs to be a process of thought and release that the offended must go through. Sometimes it is quick and in some situations that process takes longer. Setting a parameter of time before this forgiveness can be considered helps maintain that the forgiveness is truthful. It is better to take years to reach a point where you can truly forgive someone than to make a hasty forgiveness that does not truly settle the issue inside a person, causing an eternity of negative feelings associated to one person.

After explaining one situation in which fake “forgiveness” can be used to create guilt and how it wasn’t forgiveness as the intent was wrong I wondered, is this how people master philosophy? We spew words in the hope of pulling the listeners that understand with us or to confuse the others so that they just pretend they understand and jump on the bandwagon with the few moments of clarity they had – or just because they trust the person? Creating a defense for an idea with the spoken word is much harder in one sense because you can’t always create an amazingly organized trail all the time that people can follow, especially when you get into complex ideas and have to make the trail as you go. The advantage is that most listeners can’t grasp the structure as well so the judging is a little lighter (unless the speaker is really bad). Socrates is amazing to me in this sense because, at least the way he was written, when he talks he leads people down paths of thoughts to reach good morals using logic. I feel like he knows the end point and skillfully creates all the dots to lead a person to the desired destination.

There was one point in the conversation where I saw several people nod at what Greg was saying – all I could think was are you listening to what he is saying? Cause if you were you should be shaking your head. What makes us suddenly change our mind and switch vantage points? Maybe I wasn’t yet convinced and didn’t get the one key point that made everyone else nod. Or maybe it was the just the “keep nodding and we can move on” tactic. Either way I feel like we are missing something – or I did.

Another question that was posed to us what “what are virtues?” For me virtues are positive qualities within a person that are generally held within respect by society as a whole. They are qualities that people reach for in their quest to become a better person. Now when asked the question of if there is a virtuous person I want to say no. Not because I don't believe that we can't have virtue, but when asked this question I feel like we are asked if there a completely virtuous person. I don't believe that there is, minus possibly Jesus Christ. That said I have seen people have virtuous qualities. Unconditional love, patience, and forgiveness. These qualities generally though are viewable only because of certain situations where they shine out. Because of this it is hard to see these virtues and they aren't always obvious all the time. Also we are human, and we are flawed. I find it interesting that all the Greek Gods were humanized by their lack of perfection.

I was actually quite entertained during class when someone started playing and singing “In the Jungle” off in the distance. Athens is a jungle in many ways. People going everywhere, animals roaming the streets, and graffiti that makes the buildings feel more like they are part of a dangerous forest than a civilized city. There are dogs everywhere in Athens. They run around, lounge in the sun, and they follow you everywhere until they reach the end of their territory.

We loved the first restaurant so much that we decided to come back to it again. I ordered lamb baked in clay pot. I didn’t enjoy picking around all the bones this time round but the buttered bread was good as usual. We did discover that the bread costs one euro per person – not per basket. I was glad that we demanded extra bread when the guy didn’t want to give it to us. Of course the restaurant loved us and brought us wine on the house. They really did appreciate our business considering we tipped well last time and that we have already come twice. The first time we spent nearly 500 Euro on all the amazing food. Not hard to see why they liked us. I wonder if they were trying to get us to come back again. I would go for more of that saganaki which I didn’t get this time.

We went down to the flea market but it was closed. Instead we got to see some of the more artful graffiti. I forgot to mention that I ended the previous night with gelato. That time I had a scope of pineapple and one of kiwi. Both were…I don’t know how to describe them really. I found myself caught in a position where I didn’t know if I really liked it or not. It was just so different from what I am use to with ice cream.

There have been two songs that I have heard over and over again in my room. Will will turn on the TV and flip through the channels everyday. Each time we end up at MTV. There are three songs that have played over and over. Playing God by Paramore, Animal by Neon Trees, and Grenade by Bruno Mars. Another video that caught my eye is Take That by The Flood. The reason this video stuck out is because it shows several great views of London from the water.

I just saw a great quote I thought I would share:

"The longer you wait for the future the shorter it will be."