Personal growth literature and the timeless quality of human nature July 1, 2018
Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Concept of personal growth.Tags: Eric Hoffer, human nature, inspiration, life, personal development ideas, personal growth, philosophy, psychology, Reflections on the Human Condition, self-actualization, the individual, writing
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Sometimes when, through a period of time, we have delved into a lot of personal development and self-actualization materials, including very old commentary, it may seem that there is really nothing new in much of it.
And the reason is likely that individuals, the people such material is written about and directed to, do not change, even over countless centuries.
As Erich Hoffer writes:
“It is the individual only who is timeless. Societies, cultures, and civilizations, past and present, are often incomprehensible to outsiders, but the individual’s hungers, anxieties, dreams and preoccupations have remained unchanged through millennia…
“…If in some manner the voice of an individual reaches us from the remotest distance of time, it is a timeless voice speaking about ourselves.”
It is the individual, rather than any particular society as a whole that is “nearest to our understanding; so near that even the interval of millennia cannot weaken our feeling of kinship,” Hoffer observes. (1)
Historical examples are numerous: ancient philosophical texts, such as the writings of Roman and Greek philosophers, playwrights, and poets; centuries old religious tracts; wall paintings in the tombs of ancient Egypt.
(1) Eric Hoffer, Reflections on the Human Condition, Harper & Row, Publishers, New York, 1973
Dennis Mellersh
Personal growth: Would you like to be a perfect person? May 27, 2014
Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Concept of personal development.Tags: Eric Hoffer, human perfection, ideal conduct, personal development, personal growth, philosophy, Reflections on the Human Condition
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There is an old maxim that we might want to apply to our personal growth and development efforts.
Namely, “Be careful of what you wish for.”
Theoretically, the concept of personal growth or self-improvement implies that we are working towards a goal of ultimately achieving a perfect ideal human conduct for ourselves.
But what would becoming a perfect human being involve?
Would we really want our self-actualization work to result in perfection?
Or, in becoming perfect, would we lose something precious in the process?
Eric Hoffer has some interesting observations on this question:
“Nature attains perfection, but man never does. There is a perfect ant, a perfect bee, but man is perpetually unfinished…It is this incurable unfinishedness which sets man apart from other living things. For in the attempt to finish himself, man becomes a creator…The incurable unfinishedness keeps man perpetually immature, perpetually capable of learning and growing.”
“There is something unhuman about perfection…It is a paradox that, although the striving to mastery a skill is supremely human, the total mastery of a skill approaches the nonhuman. They who would make man perfect end up by dehumanizing him.” (1)
(1) Eric Hoffer, Reflections on the Human Condition
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