One of the things that has always puzzled me is people’s sense of value. It’s not necessarily the clearly delusional belief that there are objective values that have been put into the world by an unseen power, rather than being codes we have put into the world ourselves. What I’ve been wondering about is what and why we attach a level of worth to everything around us, and how some of it has been put highest on the undefinable scale of value, when I can’t see anything else but superficiality and a toxic order of priorities. Am I the only one who finds it ridiculous that we’ve developed a system in which we are so self-centred that we focus more on finding the right clothes than finding the right people to establish strong relationships with? Why are we conscious enough to be aware of the importance of love and relationships, but still prioritise materialism and our social status? Why do we choose to feel so much pride in our skin colour, gender and nationality, that we let it divide us? And last but not least, does it all really matter?
I don’t believe in an objective, determined set of values. I’ve rather come to the conclusion that people themselves determine the level of worth anything has in this world. Values are formed by nothing else but our beliefs, which consequently created a belief system that makes us think in similar ways with the aim to help us live together, or on the other side of the spectrum, help us fight against people that aren’t part of our belief system. If we pursue common goals, we’re automatically dependent on each other, which creates unity and a cycle of reciprocal support. This is, of course, in many ways beneficial to us, because this is what bonds us together and creates the kind of strong relationships that human beings so naturally crave for. Nevertheless, is a set of common values essential to developing this close bond with each other? Does a woman need to call herself a feminist in order to feel part of the exclusive club called womanhood? And does a black woman have to state that she feels proud to be black, in order to feel connected to black, and non-black people around her? Most importantly, how does this prevent women to feel connected to each other, as well as those of other genders or other distinctive characteristics?
There are different ways to measure value, and it is such an abstract and comprehensive concept, that we can find it in a variety of subjects and objects. Some see a lot of worth in feeling proud of their achievements and memories they’ve created: the value of experiences. Others see a sense of worth in their purchases they display in their homes and brand names they display on their bodies: the value of materialism and ownership. Then we’ve got cases where people feel proud of the people they’ve managed to seduce with their character, or other kind of abilities they see in themselves: the value of self-worth. All of these are distinctive examples of what we attach a level of worth to, and we all prioritise them differently.
I think the way we do exactly that, is by acknowledging, or in some cases just believing, how much they stimulate us. Why do we value the taste of food so much? Because it stimulates us. Why do we value sex and the feeling of being in love? Because it stimulates us. And why do we value the new clothes we wear and car we drive? Because the thought of it increasing our self-worth materialistically and physically stimulates us. Since levels of value come down to how we perceive the world and our subjective feelings and experiences, we apply value to what we think is beneficial to us. This means that, in short, values consist of a mixture of beliefs and emotions. For instance, the reason why we grieve more over the loss of a friend, than the loss of a chair, is because we’ve got emotions and experiences attached to our friend, which are deeper and more intense than the ones attached to our chair. Naturally, we feel sadder about being deprived of positive stimulations caused by our friend, than the limited amount of stimulation we received from our chair. It seems obvious that we value those kinds of intense stimulations more than the ones we get from non-autonomous objects, which is exactly why it confuses me how we’ve created a system that makes us believe in the value of materialism and social hierarchies, when we know exactly that it’s not what will give us maximum levels of stimulation.
Perhaps the prioritisation of everything around us, based on levels of worth, helps us to navigate in a world that’s fundamentally worthless, meaningless and full of contradictions. Unless you’ve found a sense of meaning and value in adapting to the rules of religions, or other sets of beliefs that make you devote your life to something that you feel is of greater significance, there is a good chance you’ve come to the conclusion that our existence is nothing but futile. We’re doomed to live through cycles of happiness and suffering, knowing very well that despite human’s fetish for meaning and purpose, we can’t do much else other than trying to suck every little drop out of the enjoyment consciousness can bring us. So far, we haven’t found anything that we know holds any objective significance or purpose, so aiming to reach the goal of fulfillment and contentment might be one of the few right, logical directions to follow.
The more I contemplate the status of value, the more I feel like I’m left with the question that seems to be one of the greatest contradictions of existence: Is there worth in value? Does it really matter? Should we adapt to the codes we’ve created because what matters to us makes us feel happy and fulfilled? Perhaps even more importantly, should we feel like what is defined as ‘valuable’ matters to us, although there is no determined, objective value attached to it, and its level of worth is determined by nothing else but our subjective feelings and opinions? The questions are endless and the right answers limited. In a world that we get to experience consciously, but not consciously enough to fully understand it, we can’t do anything else but trying to attempt to find alternative truths - and so they are, because at the end of the day, those truths are just a product of our perception, interpretation and bias, anyway. All I can assume, is that at least by having a set of values, we can live by following an almost logical direction in an otherwise irrational, contradictory and disorganised world, that we are (for no particular reason and without any value attached to it) a small part of.
