The Need for Philosophy

In a recent Living Buddhism interview with philosopher and author of 'Plato, not Prozac' Lou Marinoff, Mr. Marinoff explains his view.

Everybody has a philosophy of life, he says, but if you ask people what their philosophy of life is, most peolpe don't know. If they don't know what their own beliefs are, then they're blind. They're stumbling through life. The purpose of dialog, then, would be to remove the blindfold.

He says that all of us are going to experience things that are not pleasant. We know this, and yet the question remains, "What do you do with it?" Buddhism is so valuable because it teaches us to let go, to disown these harmful things. We don't have to act on our inpulses, we don't have to act on our anger. We can disown them.

But before we can disown them, we have to own them; sit and see where they come from and how to let them go, then you can disown them.

People need to have more opportunity to understrand how to deal with circumstances. Many teachings exist for handling success, but not many good teachings exist for handling failure.

Buddhism is different from other major religions by its compatibility with them all, whereas they're not compatible with each other. In Buddhism we find people who come from Christian, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim and other traditions. Buddhism is not contending against anything - it's embracing humanity.