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Many are born, but few ever truly live — so says José Ingenieros, and this lecture from Academy of Ideas takes his challenge seriously. It maps a practical path out of conformity: choose a guiding ideal, find a mentor worth imitating, learn to admire what is best, and labor with real discipline. Natural talent is never enough; genius is earned in endless effort. From Newton to van Gogh to King, the greats were all possessed by an ideal — and that spark, not applause, is what turns a drifted life into a deliberately shaped one.
Full Video Transcript
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Many are born, few live. Men without personality are innumerable and vegetate, molded by their environment, like melted wax.
In the early 20th century, the Argentinian philosopher, physician, and essayist José
Ingenieros wrote a book titled The Mediocre Man.
In it he explores what distinguishes the mediocre masses from those who strive after bold ideals
and in the process accomplish remarkable feats.
In this video we examine the wisdom contained in this book, focusing on how we can use it
to help us escape from a mediocre existence.
Individually considered, writes Ingenieros, mediocrity can be defined as the absence of
personal characteristics that permit distinguishing the individual in its society.
Mediocre men and women are hyper-conformists.
Such individuals do not think for themselves but passively adopt the popular attitudes,
opinions, and beliefs of their society.
The characteristic and unequivocal sign of mediocrity, explains Ingenieros, is his deference
for the opinion of others, never speaks, always repeats, judges men as he hears them judge.
The mediocre individual also lacks moral intelligence. His or her judgments of good
and bad are not reached through introspection and critical thought, but through imitation of
those in their family, peer group, and society at large. Or as Ingenieros writes,
the mediocre man is a shadow projected by society. He is, essentially, imitative and
is perfectly adapted to live with the herd, reflecting the routines, prejudices, and dogmatisms
acknowledged as useful for the domesticity. His characteristic is to imitate those who surround
him, to think with others’ head and be incapable of forming their own ideals. But while most people,
at most times, are mediocre conformists, in any given society there exist a relatively small
number of people who reject the path of conformity and go their own way in life. Some of these people
accomplish great feats, cultivate great personalities, and live fulfilling and meaningful
lives, while other non-conformists drift without a purpose. What distinguishes the former from the
latter, according to Ingenieros, is that they are guided by an ideal. Looking at the great figures
of history reveals the power of ideals. For example, Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, and Charles Darwin
were driven by the ideal of truth. They desired to understand the laws that govern the workings
of nature. Others like Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and Vincent van Gogh were driven by the
ideal of beauty, trying to capture it in their works of art. Sri Aurobindo, Saint Monica, and
William Blake were guided by religious, spiritual, or mystical ideals and strove to connect to the
divine ground of all being. While individuals like Benjamin Franklin or Martin Luther King Jr. were
driven by the ideal of justice, they desired to rid the world of moral corruption. Relatively few
in the modern day are passionately possessed by an ideal. Instead, conformity narrows our focus
to the attainment of social validation, wealth, status, or fame. Furthermore, most people are
more concerned with attaining these things in the quickest and easiest way possible than with the
process that leads to their attainment. But living in this manner locks us into a mediocre existence
and paves the way for a morally corrupt life. If we wish to escape mediocrity, we should seek out
an ideal to guide us through life. Ideals, writes Ingenieros, are a vector towards that which is
best, becoming anticipations of the future. There are countless ideals we can choose,
but if our goal is to cultivate a great life and a great personality, we should adopt an ideal that
is subsumed under one of three main categories, the good, the true, or the beautiful. For example,
adopting the ideal of striving to return freedom to an unfree world would be subsumed in the
category of the good. Dedicating one’s life to scientific or technological advancement would be
in the category of the true. Spending one’s life writing works of fiction or creating music would
be an ideal in the category of the beautiful, while spiritual or religious aims can typically
be placed in multiple of these categories. But as Ingenieros writes,
Without ideals, human betterment would be impossible. They have and always will be there.
They palpitate behind all magnificent human endeavors.
The imagination ignites them, surpassing experience and anticipating its results.
That is the law of human progress and evolution.
Events receive life and heat from the ideals,
without whose influence they would be inert and centuries would be muted.
Events are departure points.
Ideals are beacons of light that illuminate the path ahead.
If we discover an ideal that we are passionate about,
We must guard it like treasure and be sure not to let its spark die, for as Ingenieros warned,
cold human rubbish. You only live for that particle of fantasy that lifts you beyond reality.
In addition to discovering an ideal, to escape a mediocre existence it is important to seek out a
mentor, for much of our character is sculpted through the process of imitation, or as Theodore
Adorno wrote, the human is indissolubly linked with imitation. A human being only becomes human
at all by imitating other human beings. Unless we have good role models to emulate, our default
tendency will be to imitate the masses of mediocre men and women. There are countless historical
examples of the power of a mentor. Perhaps the most famous is from ancient Greece where Socrates
acted as a mentor to Plato, who was a mentor for Aristotle, who in turn was a mentor to Alexander
the Great. More recent examples include Michelangelo acting as a mentor for Raphael,
Joseph Haydn for Mozart and Beethoven, and Sigmund Freud for Carl Jung.
In a society pervaded by mediocrity, finding a good mentor can prove difficult.
But we don’t need to know someone personally for them to serve this purpose.
We can turn to the great figures of history and through a study of their works
and a reading of their biographies, learn what made them tick and what drove them,
and use this knowledge to shape our own life.
And as Ian McGilchrist writes,
Imitation gives rise, paradoxically as it may seem, to individuality.
That is precisely because the process is not mechanical reproduction,
but an imaginative inhabiting of the other,
which is always different because of its intersubjective betweenness.
In addition to using those who excel in a similar field as role models,
we should also look to them as sources of inspiration.
Those who do not admire the best cannot improve, explains Ingenieros.
The one who sees defects and not beauty, blames and not merits, discordances and not harmonies,
dies in a low level where he vegetates with the illusion of being a critic.
Those who do not know how to admire do not have a future and are incapable of rising
towards an ideal perfection.
The greats of our generation, individuals in other words, who currently exceed us in
accomplishments, can also help us realize our potential by sparking our competitive
spirit.
Michelangelo is a famous example of this process in action.
In 1496, at the age of 21, Michelangelo went to Rome where he carved the Bacchus and Pieta,
which are now looked upon as two of the greatest sculptures ever created.
In 1501, he returned to his hometown of Florence, but to little fanfare.
Few knew or cared of his recent accomplishments,
and most of the admiration in the Florence art scene was directed toward his older rival, Leonardo da Vinci.
The fame and adulation that da Vinci received, and Michelangelo lacked, fed his competitive spirit, and as William Wallace writes in Michelangelo, the artist, the man, and his times,
Out of the limelight, but determined to outdo his more famous rival, Michelangelo began working on a large but unpromising block of marble.
This block of marble was to become the sculpture of David, one of the greatest works of art ever created, and a work that placed Michelangelo in the same echelon as da Vinci.
Michelangelo’s David is even more impressive when one looks at the challenges he faced in creating it.
Or as Wallace writes,
The block, so large it was called the Giant, had been quarried more than 40 years previously.
Marble is best carved when it is fresh from the quarries.
With age and exposure to the elements it becomes increasingly intractable.
At least three sculptors had taken chisels to the block, each one making it more difficult for his successor.
Already thin, the block grew thinner, more weathered, more resistant.
He labored mightily for three years to realize his masterpiece.
Michelangelo’s relentless commitment to his ideal, to the creation of beauty,
highlights another important characteristic of history’s great figures.
Such individuals work extremely hard.
They may be blessed with natural talents, but natural talents alone do not create a genius.
Rather, focus, dedication, and discipline are necessary to see the full flowering of
one’s potential.
Or as Ingenieros writes,
The great geniuses know that the natural gifts are not transmuted into talent or ingenious
without effort, which is the measure of their merit.
They know that each step towards the glory has cost work and vigils, deep meditations
and endless trials.
Even if we don’t possess the natural talents of a Michelangelo, most of us only scratch
the surface of our potential and waste the majority of whatever talents we do possess
by chasing shallow ends. Instead of spending hour after hour owning our skills and striving
toward bold ideals, as the greats of history do, most of us work at jobs we hate and spend
the rest of our time distracting ourselves from the emptiness of our life. But over time
ignoring the call of our higher self manifests as anxiety and depression and results in regret
for a life not lived. To avoid this outcome, we don’t need to scale the heights of glory
reached by history’s greatest figures. We just need to emulate their approach in order to discover
the heights of our own true potential. And who is it who calls me? asked Nietzsche’s Zarathustra.
But you know that, replied the soothsayer violently. Why do you conceal yourself?
It is the higher man that cries for you. We have built up a library of over 100
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