{"id":1590,"date":"2020-09-26T22:01:29","date_gmt":"2020-09-26T22:01:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/?page_id=1590"},"modified":"2025-12-02T00:02:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T00:02:12","slug":"lla1","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/live-like-an-existentialist-week\/lla1\/","title":{"rendered":"Day 1 – LIFE IN PARENTHESES"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Day 1:<\/b>
Life in Parentheses<\/b><\/h5>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Live Like an Existentialist<\/b><\/p>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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Background<\/b><\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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\u201cExistentialist conversion should rather be compared to Husserlian reduction: let man put his will to be \u2018in parentheses\u2019 and he will thereby be brought to the consciousness of his true condition.\u201d<\/p>

\u00a0– Simone de Beauvoir,\u00a0The Ethics of Ambiguity<\/em>, Part I<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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The phenomenological method lies at the core of the existentialist theory of good living. Edmund Husserl famously inaugurated this method with his slogan: \u201cTo the things themselves!\u201d Phenomenology tries to describe the way we experience things\u2014the appearance things have for us. These descriptions are, ideally mutually intelligible\u2013\u2013others should hear them and recognize their own experiences in them\u2013\u2013and deep rather than shallow\u2013\u2013they should move beyond immediate impressions towards the architectures, patterns, and conditions that help produce those impressions. Beauvoir follows Husserl in suggesting that the method of phenomenology looks like putting one\u2019s experience \u201cin parentheses\u201d: that is, taking \u201cthe way things appear\u201d as a data set and then, rather than trying to get under that appearance to \u201cthe way things are\u201d, trying to simply understand that parenthesed experience on its own terms.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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Today's Exercise<\/b><\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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Today, you\u2019ll try your hand at the phenomenological method. At three separate points today and immediately after or during a particular experience, find a quiet space to write for ten minutes (preferably on paper but screens will do). Spend that time simply trying to do one thing: describe the experience that just occurred. After three or four minutes, you might feel as though there\u2019s nothing left to describe. Return to the descriptions you already gave and put them \u201cin parentheses\u201d: what deeper appearances, aspects, or characters hide below your initial shallow descriptions? Why did you use those words to describe, and are they in fact the right ones? What patterns or generalities of experience can you begin to glean from these descriptions? <\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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Once you’ve completed the assigned exercise for today, click here<\/a> to access the prompt for tonight\u2019s reflection<\/strong> and to submit your 1-2 paragraph journal entry.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBack to Live Like an Existentialist Week<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Day 1:Life in Parentheses Live Like an Existentialist Background \u201cExistentialist conversion should rather be compared to Husserlian reduction: let man put his will to be \u2018in parentheses\u2019 and he will thereby be brought to the consciousness of his true condition.\u201d \u00a0– Simone de Beauvoir,\u00a0The Ethics of Ambiguity, Part I The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"parent":1105,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1590","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1590","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1590"}],"version-history":[{"count":62,"href":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1590\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7770,"href":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1590\/revisions\/7770"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1105"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingagoodlife.com\/fall2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}