Smoke Signals

Q: Dear Simone, give me advice on going through a break up?

A: In the subsequent days after a breakup, simple things become physically and mentally demanding. Eating, sleeping, even summoning the motivation to face each day becomes extremely difficult. It’s okay to experience that emotional pain and take a couple of “mental health days.” Prioritize yourself and take care of all those feelings you’re having. 

If you should see your ex, like at school or work, this can make things even more challenging. Seeing them appear happier than you can make you feel like you never meant that much to them, but if they’re depressed, you might feel liable and blame yourself for how they’re feeling. The most important thing to keep in mind is that you don’t really know how they’re feeling: you both are probably putting on a facade. You’re probably both feeling different things and trying to superficially show that you’re fine. How they act in public and around their friends is certainly not how they’re feeling behind closed doors. 

If you stop focusing on what they’re doing, you’ll start to free yourself from the shackles of a broken relationship and give yourself the space to cope with your feelings. Nobody’s breakup is exactly alike; if you keep running from your thoughts, you will struggle to accept the separation. Allow yourself the space to feel anger, bitterness, loss, melancholy, and apathy in the aftermath of your split.  

I personally believe that the most important thing to do in the aftermath of a breakup is to learn from what happened, and make peace with that person. If that means making peace with yourself or going up and talking to them, do what is best so that you can move on. Forgiveness of that person will also free you from any guilt or weight you are carrying around. If you don’t feel comfortable talking to that person for any reason, write them a letter– even if you never send it– and this will also lift you from all the weight you might be transporting around. 

Q: Dear Simone, according to some (I emphasize the word some) interpretations of chaos theory the universe is deterministic. That is to say, with a perfect understanding of the starting conditions of the universe you could fully predict everything that will occur. Do you think this means we lack free will? Would we even be able to tell? Does it even matter? -pseudonym that is hopefully less pretentious than some of the others I’ve seen on here.

A: Between science and decades of philosophy, there are plenty of reasons to question the existence of free will. At first, the thought of a deterministic universe is pretty scary, and it may make you feel like there is no point in life. Luckily, though, this is almost definitely not the case.

Free will itself is a bit of a strange concept. To posit that you have free will is to suggest that you have a special faculty, or trait, that allows you to make a decision completely unaffected by external factors. This isn’t likely. Every time you make a choice, the reasons you have to make it, and what choice you actually do make, is related to things like your environment, culture, age, and plenty of other external determiners that you cannot control.

Even internally, decisions can be affected by internal factors beyond conscious control. At the bottom of it all, when you make a voluntary decision, you do it because you want to. Can you control what you want? If you were looking at a red shirt and a blue shirt, and you want to purchase the blue, can you really, genuinely, decide to stop wanting it and want the red one instead? This principle is best summarized in the words of German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, “Man can do what he wills, but he cannot will what he wills.”

These ideas seem to suggest that one likely has no meaningful control over their actions separate from determining factors. While the implications of this view are many, what they do not mean is that you cannot make your own choices or that there is no purpose to continuing on. If free will as an idea is based on this fallacy of humans having a special, supernatural quality to separate themselves from the universe, then leaving the mistaken belief does not actually change the world around you, you simply must re-evaluate it. You can’t bend the world to fit your unique will, but you still have it. You, the person, body and mind, different in personality, experience, and general existence from all other people, are an agent in your own choices.

Myriad factors go into a decision being made, and just because decisions are influenced by many out-of-control factors does not mean that you stop being an influence. Because of this, because you, the unique individual, are a determining factor in your decisions, means that your choices are always unique to you. In this way, you are free. You can do what you want, that is in your power as an agent. All you lose in abandoning free will is the superpower to exert that will that you never really had.

Q: Dear Simone, how do I succeed in school? My parents expect way too much of me, even when I’m making straight A’s. Any Advice? Your pal Mortimer

A: If you are currently making good grades in school, it sounds like you are already succeeding. What I would suggest is to look beyond that pressure from your parents and own your grades fully, yourself. As long as you are on top of your grades, which it appears that you are, just know that you’re already successful and don’t need to base your self worth on the opinions of others.  

A way to work around your parents being directly involved in your grades is to take dual enrollment. Not only will your parents be proud of you for taking more rigorous classes, but you will be fully in charge of your academics.  You are the only person who can directly communicate with your professors and access your gradebooks.  Keep working hard, and eventually, people will notice.