Sick Beliefs

[Erkos]

We all have been feed believes by our parents, society, etc. that we have thought true, but at some point we do have to challenge them. If then, a belief, after reflection upon it, has been abandoned and determined to be a "sick belief", should the positive traits be abandoned as well?

For instance, say a mother tells a child he can do anything he puts his mind to and he grows up believing that, but after some failures he realizes he CANNOT do anything he puts his mind to and abandons that belief. Can anything positive be extracted from what he once believed? Or is any attitude and trait from a sick belief to be abandoned?

 

[Abject]

What in the fuck.

Conceiving things above your previous threshold is the positive action, going to that next level of understanding is tantamount to old thought, we're on a whole new level.
If this 'perfect' understanding incorporates aspects from it-
I don't even know what you're asking.
You think a, it turns out to be b. You can't get to c without having shown b. You cannot exclude the contribution of a, and therefore trying to abandon it entirely is counterproductive.

Maybe you should look into Nihilism if you're keen on challenging your current state of awareness.

 

[panic in paradise]

Wisdom is gained living and learning for yourself through trial and error.

A parent will say to their child that anything is possible for them, so that they try and discover for themselves what is possible for them.

 

[HenryXVI]

It's really that peoples parents have no idea of how fast culture just sprinted the last 20 years, because their generation was supposed to be "the crazy one". This is probably the first time in history we've had 2 crazy generations without any serious wars to sober things up...

Pleading insanity is a fairly wholesome option, just keep saying you're crazy every time they try and convince you you can just survive by intelligence alone. Because... ya really need wisdom... and that's something you learn from people -- not genetics. Books are good too, but I went 10 years before anyone corrected my pronounciation of 'pineal'.

But, to stay on topic, what ballpark is the "sick belief" in. I've thought about rape alot when I was a kid, because I knew it would make everyone straighten-up about queer-baiting (using sex to get what you want)... ...But I had a precocious education in where the line was between fantasy and reality.

(it really pissed me off that girls half my size could walk all over me with the protection of the school community 100%... but if it was never violent, so using violence to fight back would have been stupid)

edit: I was surrounded by the pink berets from hop, so I just stopped washing in hopes that the queer-baiting would end... but then the thoughts of violence and rape started... it was phases of ugliness...

 

[fridgebuzz]

Beliefs are to be challenged or confirmed. If something isn't true it isn't there. I guess in a sick twisted sense you can salvage bits of a belief to conform with the leading edge perspective. You know you believe this to happen, and it doesn't, but part of it does, so the belief needs to be revised based on current experience.

 

[Druidus]

Believe nothing. Explore everything. Ideas are toys!

I don't believe in anything, entirely, because I can never "know" for sure. But it the toy (idea) I'm currently exploring (or have explored in the past) offers me benefits for my behaviours and thought patterns, then I will use the idea that way. If I find that the toy in question doesn't help, then I disregard it.

 

[kaleigh_k]

sick beliefs seems harsh for the example you use, i wonder if you mean unrealizable, and therefore sick by act of deceiving a child.
I had some huge core value beliefs smashed to smithereens a few years back and loosing a belief that was so important to me was like loosing the lighthouse in a storm. Pfftttt! Then, then the world was very dark and seemed so very cruel and pointless.
Although that whole period of about 5 years was depressive and filled with a series of hard realizations, it turned out to be about my personal evolution. I'm sure that my generally happy disposition helped me along in choosing to continue to try to enjoy life, in spite of the nasty little truths I was now in on. I've been known to say, I just wish you could un-learn some stuff!! But you can't, so you grow up instead.
Now, about telling kids things that aren't true, Santa's got to lead the pack... but then what about the magic of the holidays?! Someone always lives the fairytale, why shouldn't my kid not be the next Justin Bieber?
Ahh, philosophy...

 

[RobotRipping]

i think i get what OP means. I was raised and pushed into academics believing i could do anything and that i was somehow special. What i realized later was that many fucking kids thought they were special and that i was actually not special. This was actually a fucking shock to me once i hit the real world. I think that was a cruel belief to instill into me as a child. Looking back at my childhood i'm lucky i made it this far. I still feel the ramifications of this today, like i'm somehow different from others, giving me some sort of advantage, these ideas permeate my thoughts and influence my whole sense of self. So i get extremely arrogant, mixed with extreme insecure and no self esteem ... followed by self analysis and repeat.

so i'm not special, did i benefit from that lie? no it fucked me over badly and still does. Anything is possible? yeah actually barely anything is possible for most people. wish i would have just been told that from the start.

 

[Druidus]

i think i get what OP means. I was raised and pushed into academics believing i could do anything and that i was somehow special. What i realized later was that many fucking kids thought they were special and that i was actually not special. This was actually a fucking shock to me once i hit the real world. I think that was a cruel belief to instill into me as a child. Looking back at my childhood i'm lucky i made it this far. I still feel the ramifications of this today, like i'm somehow different from others, giving me some sort of advantage, these ideas permeate my thoughts and influence my whole sense of self. So i get extremely arrogant, mixed with extreme insecure and no self esteem ... followed by self analysis and repeat.

so i'm not special, did i benefit from that lie? no it fucked me over badly and still does. Anything is possible? yeah actually barely anything is possible for most people. wish i would have just been told that from the start.

I see what you mean. I know exactly what you went through, I think, though I didn't experience it.

 

[Jerry Atrick]

I remember how devastated I was when I got my parents to admit that Santa Claus wasn't real. By the time I grew older and realized that much of the other things they taught me were also bullshit, I had already grown cynical.

Recommended reading: The Social Construction of Reality by Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann.

We all have been feed believes by our parents, society, etc. that we have thought true, but at some point we do have to challenge
them.

The book directly and eloquently addresses the this ^ issue.

 

[Druidus]

I remember how devastated I was when I got my parents to admit that Santa Claus wasn't real. By the time I grew older and realized that much of the other things they taught me were also bullshit, I had already grown cynical.

Recommended reading: The Social Construction of Reality by Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann.



The book directly and eloquently addresses the this ^ issue.

Thanks, J. Atrick, for the book, I'll seek it out presently to see what elucidations it shall provide. It sounds interesting.