/jp/ - Otaku Culture

To be honest QM was onto something when he mentioned that people who don't read a lot of stories feel like NPCs. I think that most people live with inertia carrying them forward and don't grow much from their day to day lives, it's just a cycle of time-consuming brainless media (most TV shows, repetitive multiplyayer games like the battle royales, soshage, etc) while doing menial labor at work. This process affords them little opportunity to grow as people and just in general develop an appreciation for the profound, to put it in a fairly pretentious way.

In A Song of Ice and Fire, GRRM has a line that goes like: "A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies, but the man who never reads lives only one." I think this is a very legitimate interpretation of how reading enriches an individual. You can't entirely absorb the life experience of another by reading their autobiography, of course, no more so than you can read a book on shooting and immediately have perfect accuracy. But you can absorb a lot, and in very meaningful ways.

For example, a classic book known to be enriching is Marcus Aurelius's Meditations, and here is a choice selection from it: "The soul becomes dyed with the colour of its thoughts. The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts." This is the kind of wisdom it can take a lifetime for some people to learn. Some people can spend their entire lives without realizing the extent to which their mindset can impact the quality of their lives. But if one reads the Meditations and ponders the thoughts within, they can skip 50 years of life experience and ahead and learn the wisdom sooner.

This is just one example of course, and not one which will be universally convincing, depending on what you the reader already know or value. But in books and stories there is a vast pool of wisdom waiting to be absorbed cup by cup. We who drink from its splendor grow with every day, while those who don't stew in the cycles of regret, never living for anything in particular.

In my opinion, the importance of reading stories and or philosophy can never be overstated. In the process of observing my surroundings I see people consistently making the same mistakes that I have read of in books and thus avoided. Even my parents feel like children with their infantile understanding of relationships and each other. My mother in particular resisted the virtues I extolled to her day after day, fighting to continue being ignorant and unhappy with my father, much like a petulant child locking themselves in their room after being scolded.

Which leads me to the one danger of consuming stories in excess. You will become a higher being than your fellow man. You won't struggle to emphathize with them, as you will be overflowiong with wisdom and compassion. But you will struggle to care, much like Dr. Manhahattan in the Watchmen struggles to remain invested in the lives of humans. "I am so tired of Earth. These people. I am tired of being caught in the tangle of their lives." His apathy defines the mood which so deeply affects me and other ascended beings. Which you see and understand all, when other people are but characters in a poorly written play, caring about them becomes a task arduous beyond understanding.

I would move mountains sooner than I would descend to become involved with relationship drama befitting of teens, for instance, a lesson my parents have taught me well. Ah, but for an opportunity to meet one as splendid as Helen of Troy! Ah, but to have my own Hector to compete in virtuous combat for her hand! Alas, not even in ascension can one escape the shackles of mediocrity on Earth. Our plight is the plight of King Radical in Dr. McNinja, but perhaps more cruel for the fact that our cage is of our own making. Had we only trusted Thomas Gray when he spoke that when ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise.

So yes, in the end, I understand Quizmaster. I believe that reading is important in all forms, that through consuming stories and absorbing the wisdom contained therein we grow better as human beings, while those who don't fester in pathetic inaction born from inertial living. To live is to know, for knowledge is power, and they are as weak as they are foolish. May we all live strong and happy lives, my friends. May we learn from our books and stories and philosophy. May we live with virtue and fulfillment. Esse quam videri, ad astra per aspera, faber est suae quisque fortunae.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jbnN0TstwY
Some top-tier listening practice here.

>>9138036
My question to you is what you have to work with, as far as ingredients, im a pussy and like fruity beverages.