How Do You Live A Free and Authentic Life?

A discussion of the ladder of existence in Simone de Beauvoir’s philosophy

According to Aristotle, leading a fulfilling, virtuous life involves community activity and the assurance that others too have the opportunity to pursue what he calls the “complete good.” The complete good involves striving for excellence or developing one’s talents and capacities.

In line with this argument, French existentialist philosopher Simone de Beauvoir in her seminal Ethics of Ambiguity describes the existence of a personality type she calls “the adventurer.” Adventurers feels free and do whatever they want in order to obtain fortune, leisure, and enjoyment. However, they confuse external availability with real freedom.

“Favourable circumstances are enough to transform the adventurer into a dictator. He carries the seed of one within him, since he regards mankind as indifferent matter destined to support the game of his existence.”

The fault of the adventurer is to believe that one can do something for oneself without others — and even against others. As the above quote shows, the “threat” that the adventurer poses is indifference to humankind, using others for personal gain.

In de Beauvoir’s existentialist philosophy, like Sartre’s and Kierkegaard’s, human development toward authenticity and true freedom is described as a progression through a range of stages (from the least free to the most): the first phase being the sub-human, which is an apathetic stage of existence defined by choosing nothing and by herd-behavior; the sub-human submerges in the facticity of existence, de Beauvoir states. The sub-human is defined by the daily routines, tasks, and the “should do’s” of the society within which they live, essentially depriving life of meaning.

The sub-human is busy with life duties. They might be very successful in this regard, but lack passion or desire leading to apathy.

The second phase of existence in de Beauvoir’s philosophy is called the serious human. The serious human is a little bit freer than the sub-human, but still enslaved. The serious human escapes the anguish of freedom by falling into a state of preoccupation, of doing what “one is supposed to do”. They are defined by social position and are thus vulnerable to changes and external uncontrollable events — which leads to worry; they are constantly upset by the uncontrollable course of events.

I find it noticeable that de Beauvoir underlines worrying as one of the serious human’s (limiting) characteristics. Worrying is in many ways a meaningless, yet immensely common, activity. When one worries, one can only pretend to be unfree in an “it is out of my hands, and there is nothing I can do” kind of way. Of course, we cannot control everything that happens around us, but living freely involves letting go of worries and ensuring that our happiness isn’t dependent on this or that happening or not happening (or of this or that person thinking this or that about us).

Freedom involves accepting that sometimes everything works out as we hoped for and planned, and that sometimes it doesn’t, and, as a result, that external events are not a threat to our happiness or freedom.

Further up the “ladder of existence” we will find the nihilist. When serious humans realises that they are unable to control the surrounding world they decide to be nothing, to reject everything, and henceforth become nihilists.

Nihilists forget, however, that they are condemned to freedom, as Sartre puts it, and therefore, responsible for making choices and creating meaning. All the nihilist does is say no: to relationships (they are empty), to activities (they are meaningless), to interaction with the surrounding world (it is hollow), and to all given values (they are unimportant).

But freedom and authenticity require saying yes.

The nihilist has understood the ambiguity of human existence and is disillusioned, though right in thinking that the world possesses no justification, and that humans are nothing as de Beauvoir puts it. But they forget that it is up to oneself to justify the world and to make existence valid.

In order to be free and to lead an authentic life, one must engage in the world.

A step further up the ladder toward freedom and authenticity, we will find the aforementioned adventurer.

The adventurer is actually close to being truly free. Adventurers throw themselves into life and choose action for its own sake — and consequently don’t do this or that because of cultural, societal assumptions, or “should do’s.” But they care only for personal freedom and self-indulgent projects, and thus embodies a selfish and potentially tyrannical attitude.

Meaning has to come from within, and the adventurer knows this and acts accordingly, throwing himself into ventures and escapades and doing as pleases — living life to its fullest, one could say. But, as a part hereof other people are treated like instruments that must be destroyed if they are in the way.

“His fault is believing that one can do something for oneself without others and even against them”

The next existentialist stage toward authenticity and freedom is the passionate human. De Beauvoir describes the characteristics of the passionate human by stating that they are the antithesis to the adventurer. Whereas the adventurer has no objective (indulging in indifferent escapades to feel alive), the passionate human has an object of passion.

But, the problem with the passionate human is that they tend to isolate and set the object of passion over everything else. In this sense, they are similar to the serious human — prone to becoming fanatical — however, the passionate human differs in the sense that they are truly passionate, not just a crowd follower like the serious human. Though, only the object of passion has any meaning; everything else appears insignificant.

So, just like the adventurer, the passionate human will oppress, take advantage of, and treat others as they please — even as objects if this will benefit the mission. Only passion truly matters to them. They are selfish with time and effort, and, due to this, the passionate human is alienated from others with the conviction that they do not need anyone.

But, when you isolate yourself you lose yourself, according to de Beauvoir. There is no freedom in isolation nor in trapping oneself in the name of total truth. The object for one’s passion only holds freedom when shared—when opened up to others rather than when convulsively possessed.

“If a man prefers the land he has discovered to the possession of this land, a painting or a statue to their material presence, it is insofar as they appear to him as possibilities open to other men.”

Passion is an important part of an authentic life— but, as this quote states, true freedom lies in opening up your “thing”—whatever you are passionate about—to others. True passion is not founded in capitalistic greediness, but rather in a genuine desire to engage, explore, understand, share, and cultivate something.

No existence can be validly fulfilled if it is limited to itself. The freedom of others must be respected, and in order to live freely — and keep oneself from living in bad faith — one should go as far as to even help others to free themselves, or at least make sure that the freedom of others is not limited or compromised. We must respect others as means in themselves. If for no other reason, then it being a condition of our own freedom.

True freedom is, according to de Beauvoir, moral freedom. As an existentialist she believes that we are all condemned to be free, but moral freedom requires actively choosing freedom, and hence the acceptance of total human freedom as well as the moral obligation and anxiety that comes with it.

It is frightening to be totally free: it means that everything we do is our own responsibility, and that when making a choice, even the choice of doing nothing, we are making a choice and setting standards for how one should act in a given situation. But we cannot use the anxiety of freedom as an excuse for our active participation in or our passive acceptance of the exploitation of others, and we cannot excuse our unethical actions with ignorance, nor with the statement that whoever we are oppressing for our own benefit does not have a better alternative. If we do so, we are not truly free.

Oppression has nothing to do with freedom nor with living authentically. If our sense of freedom is interlinked with the oppression of others, we are not free. Living freely and authentically means ensuring the freedom and opportunities for others as well as yourself.

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