#thecodes

Early on, I think it should be helpful to give myself some structure. I feel like I have barely any at all currently. For this reason, I feel I should develop a series of codes to help guide me. These should be well-thought-out as they will not be altered frequently and they will be enforced as rigidly as necessary.

One could think of this as a personal constitution. After all, I am at a stage in my life where I need to declare my independence or I will end up wallowing in a state of infancy like many people unfortunately do.

Since as long as I can remember, I have been unwilling to bow to the jurisdiction of other ethically systems, such as a religion, so I have subjected myself to the challenge of developing a unique ethical system. I haven’t been one to break rules, however, because I always feared the repercussions of breaking a rule, be it be a severe punishment or simply a disappointed look. I never felt a duty to uphold the rules. I simply saw them as a barrier from me getting what I want. Therefore, as I have gotten older and smarter, I have started feeling comfortable breaking more rules as I feel more confident I won’t get caught. This has led me to a dark place. I am doing things I should be doing because I can keep them a secret and I am numbed with an apathy that has grown over the years.

I am reminded of Nietzsche as I devise a plan for my codes. This was the challenge he wrote of in his work Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Nietzche has greatly influenced how I think about ethics. I may not agree with all his thoughts, but I appreciate how he thinks, and that may be reflected in this exercise. I may strike a balance in style between the precision and concision of a code of laws with a more verbose and poetic style like that of Nietzsche.