[zemvpferreira]

A great speech but this is the first I hear it interpreted as an ode to monotony. I've always thought of it as an essay on the value of questioning our default way of thinking in the day-to-day, on the implicit biases we carry with us into the world and how they can trap us in loneliness.

Not ashamed to say I've cried more than once listening to it. It's a lifesaver.

[ethanbond]

The Pale King, his last novel (unfinished at the time of his death) is a really gorgeous elaboration on the same topics as This Is Water. It is not so much about rejecting the day to day monotony of the modern world, but rejecting the default reaction to the monotony of the modern world. We have complete control over our reaction, and almost none over the reality. One line I’ll paraphrase that sticks with me still: “In the modern world, if you can bear extreme boredom, there is literally nothing you can’t accomplish.”

The general theme is that regardless of the monotonous reality, there’s still plenty of beauty and intrigue to find within it if you look closely enough.

To make this point, The Pale King is about an IRS agent and it includes long, meditative descriptions of turning the pages of extremely long tax forms. I don’t know what philosophical ideas DFW ran into explicitly, i.e. whether he was reframing or actually deriving them, but he was absolutely rubbing up against what we now call mindfulness.

Edit to add one of my favorite scenes in literature ever, with no spoiler or even narrative substance: There's a scene where two characters are talking to one another and one party becomes so engrossed by the conversation that he begins to literally levitate out of his chair. I find this such a simple description of a truly profound experience (~~flow state).

[nemo44x]

It's a great way to approach life in general. There's many things we have to do that we don't want to. Chores, etc. Like cutting the lawn.

One approach can be to hate it and cut it super short and not take care of it and it slowly turns into a weed patch and something you resent even more. But you still have to get out there and cut it.

Another approach is to learn about cultivation and care and take pride in it and think of the benefits like exercise and having a lawn you take pride in. You also open up the option to learn a lot of things.

So now something that has to be done isn't something you dread because you were determined to find something good in it.

If you can't find any way to take this approach with something then you have to make it not exist (don't have a lawn) or outsource it (pay landscaping company to cut it).

[zemvpferreira]

Really good point, I might have misread the original commenter. Will pick up The Pale King this summer!