Contrarian
Yo!
I have found this word, contrarian, thru one of the books that I am now reading….This book, Lila, An Inquiry into Morals, written by Robert M. Pirsig, is the story of a philosopher-narrator, Phaedrus, who lives aboard his sailboat and writes books about the different people he meets and their philosophy of life…and his response to them.
Along the way he picks up a most unlikely-traveling companion, a woman named Lila who in her desperate hostility and struggle with an ’oncoming madness’ threatens to disrupt his life.
He describes Lila as…”what you would call a “contrarian”.
Phaedrus goes on to say that a contrarian is someone who’s always doing everything the wrong way, just out of pure willfulness, it would seem.
They savagely attack every kind of moral pattern they can find….as though they’re trying to destroy morality as a kind of revenge.
He explained that there is more to contrarians than just their individual moral ‘wrongness’.
It seems to be common to many cultures.
The Cheyenne Indian Tribe had a whole society of contrarians to assimilate this strange phenomenon within their social fabric.
Cheyenne contrarians rode their horses sitting backward, entered teepees backward, and had a whole list of things they performed in a ‘contrary way’…..
In the Cheyenne tribe, members seemed to enter the contrary society when they felt a great wrong, a great injustice, had been done to them and it was felt that this was a way of expressing that injustice.
Brujo in Zuni was a contrarian.
The “Bohemians” of the Victorian era were contrarians.
So, to some extent, were the Hippies of the sixties.
Looking up the English word, contrary, in my dictionary, it says:
…CONTRARY…opposed in nature, order, direction: altogether different, inclined to oppose or disagree stubbornly; or
A habitual disinclination to accept orders, advice, etc….unreasonable obstinacy in deviating from what is considered right or acceptable; persons who are impatient under restraint or discipline and hence are hard to control or keep in order;
Do you know anyone who fits this description?
Do we see even perhaps….a tad…..of this contrarian nature in ourselves from time to time?
It is more clearly seen in others….stands out more in others….and is repulsive when we see it in our family, friends or work place….and ….of all things….OUR CHURCH!
What about our own selves….
I am not speaking of a ‘rebel’…..but a ‘contrary’ personality trait which expresses itself, obstinately and stubbornly as being diabolically different…..from the ’accepted norm’….AT ANY COST!
Think the Cheyenne Indians had the right idea…..
Publicly declare…”Beware…..I am a contrarian”….
Wonder if a contrarian knows how to ENJOY…The Good Life!
I have found this word, contrarian, thru one of the books that I am now reading….This book, Lila, An Inquiry into Morals, written by Robert M. Pirsig, is the story of a philosopher-narrator, Phaedrus, who lives aboard his sailboat and writes books about the different people he meets and their philosophy of life…and his response to them.
Along the way he picks up a most unlikely-traveling companion, a woman named Lila who in her desperate hostility and struggle with an ’oncoming madness’ threatens to disrupt his life.
He describes Lila as…”what you would call a “contrarian”.
Phaedrus goes on to say that a contrarian is someone who’s always doing everything the wrong way, just out of pure willfulness, it would seem.
They savagely attack every kind of moral pattern they can find….as though they’re trying to destroy morality as a kind of revenge.
He explained that there is more to contrarians than just their individual moral ‘wrongness’.
It seems to be common to many cultures.
The Cheyenne Indian Tribe had a whole society of contrarians to assimilate this strange phenomenon within their social fabric.
Cheyenne contrarians rode their horses sitting backward, entered teepees backward, and had a whole list of things they performed in a ‘contrary way’…..
In the Cheyenne tribe, members seemed to enter the contrary society when they felt a great wrong, a great injustice, had been done to them and it was felt that this was a way of expressing that injustice.
Brujo in Zuni was a contrarian.
The “Bohemians” of the Victorian era were contrarians.
So, to some extent, were the Hippies of the sixties.
Looking up the English word, contrary, in my dictionary, it says:
…CONTRARY…opposed in nature, order, direction: altogether different, inclined to oppose or disagree stubbornly; or
A habitual disinclination to accept orders, advice, etc….unreasonable obstinacy in deviating from what is considered right or acceptable; persons who are impatient under restraint or discipline and hence are hard to control or keep in order;
Do you know anyone who fits this description?
Do we see even perhaps….a tad…..of this contrarian nature in ourselves from time to time?
It is more clearly seen in others….stands out more in others….and is repulsive when we see it in our family, friends or work place….and ….of all things….OUR CHURCH!
What about our own selves….
I am not speaking of a ‘rebel’…..but a ‘contrary’ personality trait which expresses itself, obstinately and stubbornly as being diabolically different…..from the ’accepted norm’….AT ANY COST!
Think the Cheyenne Indians had the right idea…..
Publicly declare…”Beware…..I am a contrarian”….
Wonder if a contrarian knows how to ENJOY…The Good Life!
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