Living aloofly in ideals is self-deceit. Often times, these ideals are only things that are convenient to “think” about. “Think” in quotations because it’s not so much thinking as it is daydreaming. Where daydreaming is letting thoughts wander in and out of the mind, and thinking is purposefully directing cognition towards things fatiguing to concentrate on, and vetting those thoughts. When taking the daydream-like ponderings to be factual and correct, especially when paired with a weak intuition, everything becomes wrongfully simple. Because that’s what the brain seeks to do naturally, it equalizes tragedy and bliss. In other words, the world is too complex, and if the reigns are handed over to the subconscious to process it, it’ll make opaque the innumerable nuances which otherwise form our complex world. To these people, the world is as simple as they are.

Confucius was one such man. His mind was full of ideals, and to not detract too much from his character, his intuition was not completely off. He prescribed to China in his Analects essentially a blueprint for life. Social order, constructs, filial duty, etc. A formula that if followed will briskly take you through life! To his credit, what he’s done was an obvious answer to the problem posed by the social anarchy abound during the Warring States Period. An obvious answer, but a short-sighted one. Because of this circumstance, his simple poison courses through China’s veins today. Asian-Americans are sure to know, that icky unscrupulous, facade-full, superficial blah blah. I argue it’s all attributable to the compounding effect tradition and culture has, started by Confucius. Now, Confucius can’t exactly be held accountable as what’s happened is undoubtedly an unintended consequence and also his ideas only posthumously gained traction during a tumultuous time. Confucius was a good man with principle and some level of conviction, however, lofty in his thinking. Reading his story is sure to enlighten in some manners, but very likely to send others down paths of lofty reasoning, reasoning blunted by ideals. A garden mind.