This Is Water

Choosing what to think

I thought this was excellent. I like Wallace’s writing, and this very short commencement speech makes a surprisingly substantial point. It is not simply about learning how to think, or being told what to think. It is about choosing what to think rather than accepting the default.

Experience is intrinsically self-centred: everything reaches me from my own perspective. That makes it easy to treat my own stress and needs as central, with everyone else an obstacle. Changing that interpretation takes effort. The choice is not a one-off insight but an ongoing struggle.

What we worship

Wallace argues that everyone worships something, including atheists. Wealth, beauty and possessions can become default objects of worship without a conscious decision. They offer no obvious point of satisfaction: there can always be more money, or someone more beautiful. These standards can make us miserable rather than fulfilled.

I read his argument for religion here less as a theological proof than as a comparison between objects of worship: if we are going to organise our lives around something, God may be less destructive than some of those defaults. What interests me most is still the act of choosing rather than drifting into it.

An audience demonstrating the point

The recorded audience makes the speech especially interesting. It is easy to nod along when Wallace describes the stressed person who sees everyone else as in the way. But when he turns to the liberal response—resenting huge SUVs and their inconsiderate drivers—the audience cheers at precisely the outlook he is presenting as another example of default thinking.

That reaction is striking. Agreement with a familiar political sentiment can replace listening to the argument being made. In a way, the audience demonstrates the very problem the speech is trying to make visible.