/lit/ - Literature

will this book ease the innate fear death or will it just make it worse

>>18571903
I spent a whole summer in a constant 24/7 panic attack after reading it. Then for 2 years afterwards I couldn't enjoy anything at all, whenever anything at all made me happy I immediately had thoughts of death and entered a state of dread. Now I'm just numb to everything, but at least not in a state of panic. I think my brain just built up some stronger defense mechanisms, but as a result I cannot enjoy things the way I used to.

>the structure exists
>slowly degenerates
>death
sad

>>18571939
Excellent. I also wish I never read.

>>18571939
alright well considering I’ve already got anxiety problems I’ll just try and forget this book ever existed

>>18571939
>>18571960
Will it help me to realize that I only have one live and need to make the most out of it?

>>18571968
I meant I wish I never started reading books in general.

>>18571968
>need
kek

>>18571630
>>18571939
It's unfalsifiable garbage. At the start he even says something along the lines of 'i can't prove this but take my word for it and then I'll explain how it seems true'

Freud thought the most fundamental sexual impulses drove everything, Nietzsche thought will to power, Becker thinks denial of death.

Basically, decide whichever fundamental aspect of life seems most interesting to you and then draw upon your rhetorical skills to explain in purely unfalsifiable terms why it's the case.

My hunch is that the reason people get so worked up about it is that it seems like it's really soberly looking life straight in the face and gives some simple 'grand theory of everything' of why you're miserable. That's why it spoke to my when I was younger at least.

If you have a grand theory of human nature and you start with 'i can't prove anything but it seems like...' well, it's easy to get sucked in because he writes really evocatively but it's worth remembering that's all it is.

At its very best it's close to good poetry at its worst it's just childish wankery. No, the whole of all life obviously isn't as simple and reducible that. There's no good reason to think it is. It's just a story.

>>18571630
Which is more damaging to your mental health, the book in the OP or conspiracy against the human race?

>>18571939
Same boat anon
This total lucidity of the Being is malignant and kill you many times every single day

>>18572014
Conspiracy is a self help book for pessimists but this book(last chapters mainly) is the total annihilation of any meaning whatsoever. It's the nihilism in purest form. If you will deeply study this book you will either become a Nietzschean or you will enter into a state of total paralysis like OP or you kill yourself.

>>18572014
I just recently finished Conspiracy and, to be terse, it is absolutely pernicious. I imagine it didn't help that I read it in an already bleak state of mind—I'm typically indifferent most days, lately less so and leaning more toward pessimism—but it isn't exactly leaving the forefront of my thoughts as readily as other books might.
I don't think it's a particularly great book, even amongst all its references chronicling the philosophy of pessimism throughout history, and it is overstated how it may 'ruin your life' as many of its proponents would have you believe, but if you're already of the predisposition to barely see a point to all of this, it certainly won't help you.
I only really engage with these kinds of things because my life is already a lost cause and, at this point, I'm just seeing how far it can be pushed.

>>18571939
The world presents itself to you in the way you attend to it. If you only see death, you will be dying inside. If you focus on love instead, you will not be miserable.

>>18572014
>conspiracy against the human race
it's a comedy book, especially if you read some of ligotti's personal anecdotes not contained in it. the man is pathetic and so is his drivel, but at least you can have a good laugh

>>18572135
>The world presents itself to you in the way you attend to it.
Grow the fuck up retard

Books like this make me realize how pussy atheists are. They’re always denouncing religion and saying there’s no point in life but they just end up following liberal morality and promoting scientism anyways. If you want a true atheist perspective of the world like this book then you realize how unbelievably horrifying existence is, which is why they avoid talking about this stuff and just become liberals.

>>18572369
World is still horrible and futile even with a God, go read your Bible and stop listening to the snake oil salesman in your Church you pathetic retard.

>>18572380
Not a Christian, also seethe because you know I’m right and atheism is too terrifying to fully live with. All you can do is cope and follow social norms (which atheists criticize religious people for doing anyways) or kill yourself

>>18572402
I am not an atheist but keep being retarded and keep generalizing a vast group of people that make you seethe.

>or kill yourself
Thank you for showing your religious generosity.

>>18571630
fuck this fucking book i wish i never read it now i try to find god but theres only death

>>18572959
Literally me

>>18571630
wouldn't reading and posting about books about the denial of death just be another form of denial or death? same with obsessing over death. obsessive thoughts about death and thinking you're blackpilled is merely another form of cope, and one that's far more pathetic than any other.

>>18571630
what do women know about intellectual curiosity thoughts and soul, women dont even have a soul

>>18572982
t. have not read the book

>>18571630

The real value of this book is that it thoroughly explains the seemingly confusing nature of the modern day extreme leftists which have become so common in popular discourse from top to bottom
Simply put you won't see them the same way after reading it

>>18573007
of course not. I don't read cringe best selling pop psychology just because teenage doomers love it.

>>18572982
>>18573048
>those who actually confront the denial of death are themselves coping, whereas I who refuse to engage the topic and chalk it up to "teenage doomers", am not coping at all
nice reverse psychology you're playing on yourself kek

>>18571939
>I spent a whole summer in a constant 24/7 panic attack after reading it. Then for 2 years afterwards I couldn't enjoy anything at all, whenever anything at all made me happy I immediately had thoughts of death and entered a state of dread. Now I'm just numb to everything, but at least not in a state of panic. I think my brain just built up some stronger defense mechanisms, but as a result I cannot enjoy things the way I used to.
THIS.

DO

NOT

READ

>>18573048
>best selling pop psychology
Hahahahha

>>18571903
The book very clearly and forcefully offers a solution in the form of identification with the universal. I recommend following it up with The Perennial Philosophy.
Everyone on this board acts like this book is the ultimate black pill bit it's really a white pill disguised as a black pill.

>>18573038
You're a retard for viewing it through a political lens. It explains the situation of everyone.

>>18573103
Pessimism is one of the Perennial Truths. All of you read cowards blatantly ignore this line of thought.

>>18571939
If it makes you feel better whoever wrote this book will be reborn as a cockroach one million times before being permitted to take a higher form again.

>>18573094
I will add more detail.
After finishing the book I was basically paralyzed in my bed, I could not leave the bed for days, just stared at the ceiling all day. I went days without eating. Just gripped by paralyzing dread, day in and day out. Had my parents not found me and suggested a summer vacation trip, I probably would have wasted away and died then and there.
I am naturally anxious and prone to downward-mental-spirals. Maybe if you're very cheerful/optimistic and not fazed by anything you won't get completely destroyed by this book.

>>18573125
>will be reborn as a cockroach one million times
Is this suppose to be a bad thing? At least the cockroaches doesn't have to bear the weight of consciousness.

>>18573104

Well that's not really the point
Sure you can apply it to everyone but you also don't need to because they're not so hard to understand otherwise and it just isn't that helpful
Like a previous anon said it's unfalsifiable which really means that it is best applied to things that are difficult to understand or make sense of otherwise and in the modern day that's just where it fits in

>>18573153
Shut the up redditor and take your political filth somewhere else

>>18573165

so you cope by rejecting and ignoring everything political and imagining everyone you don't agree with is from Reddit
I see

>>18571999
>Nietzsche thought will to power,
philosophylet here
which of his works cover this?
what are some good beginner nietzsch books?

>>18573223
If you want to specifically read about his will to power, it's probably best reading some secondary sources, especially because you say you're a philosophylet, and because it's scattered all throughout his books.

>>18571630
is this the one where the author thinks that there are people out there who have been born with finned hands or something

>>18571630
This is the book that BTFOs all nu-atheists
Seriously, this book is THE perfect demonstration of how futile, horrifying and abhorrent a materialistic life is; Nu-atheists can't cope with the implications of their own philosophy so they hide in lofty ideals of "objective morality" in marxism and hedonism

>>18573151
wtf is wrong with you?

>>18571630
refuted by plato

>>18573123
It is, and there's good books on it, The Trouble With Being Born for one, but Denial of Death is absolutely not one of those books. It is not pessimistic, it aligns itself with Kierkegaard.

>>18572014
>>18571939
What the fuck? To me it was very inspiring, made me a go getter.
Any of you care to explain why it hit you so hard?

>>18573151
What exactly did the book say that caused this effect

Any reason to read this over Worm at the Core?