Unhappy

 Let me quote from one of my favorite Agatha Christie novels: On Page 214 the author sets up one of her  characters to provide a portrait of the cunning, depraved, unsuspected killer: "Mrs. Humbleby said, 'Honoria Waynflete, is, I am sure, a very wicked woman! Oh, I see you don't believe me. No one believed Lavina Fullerton either. But we both felt it. She, I think, knew more than I did. Remember, Mr. Fitzwilliam, if a woman is not happy, she is capable of terrible things."

Honoria suffers from madness but was very, very able, and wanted a professional career and university education, but her family denied her the chance. She got engaged but she, decades before her killing spree, kills a innocent bird, and her horrified fiancee dumped her. Her family is old, nobility actually, yet she is poor and in straitened circumstances as an old maid. The nincompoop that dumped her has wildly successful career in business and is knighted while she dwindles and dwindles in the shadows. She was thwarted and wanted reprisal.

When a woman or people are deeply unhappy, they are capable of terrible things. Upon suffering, if  one indulges oneself, lies to oneself that one is a victim of fate without recourse, then, if one can justify evil deeds in the name of revenge against the cruel world, and one is willing to be as nihilistic as possible, then one can become a great criminal.

Jordan Peterson talks about evil people suffering, but not learning from their suffering, they indulge themselves and double-down and triple-down on being resentful and angry. They are now thoroughly unhappy and chock-full of self-loathing. This is when other people  had better look out.

In the blog entry from yesterday (The Tragic Sense of Life--12/6/21) I wrote about how a sense of tragedy about life and our place in it. Our reaction is critical: if we baby ourselves and whine about how unfair existence is, then we will remain bitter, wrathful and nihilistic, if we abandon all self-restraint, we will export our hatred onto the world in a mode of vengefulness, and depending on how willful we are about destroying everything, there may be no limit to how much butchery we can foster.

If one loves oneself and strive to be a moral godly person, then embracing suffering, setbacks and malevolence as just what one has encountered, but refuses to allow these blows to define one, then one can transcend suffering. One can find God, meaning, purpose and love, and one takes responsibility for how one's life will turn out as one loves, grows and pushes the self to maverize, and make the world a better place in God's name. Then one will have worked through the sadness in one's life through calm demeanor and self-discipline, taking tragedy and redirecting it teleologically to some noble or productive end. The evolved self will be a happy, wise self, no threat to bring harm to the self, or to anyone else.