Existentialism and Dating

At first glance, nothing immediately seems to connect the business of dating with the European philosophical movement of Existentialism. However, on closer inspection, the thoughts of Existential philosophers contain a number of insights that serve to illuminate aspects of the dating world. Sign up to our new newsletter and get 10% off your first online order of a book, product or class: https://bit.ly/2LayJ9F For gifts and more from The School of Life, visit our online shop: https://bit.ly/2TsNR7K Our website has classes, articles and products to help you think and grow: https://bit.ly/2S5XEPL 2KgB0Bf FURTHER READING You can read more on this and other subjects on our blog, here: https://bit.ly/2QXvPZu “Dating brings us close to a particular strand of philosophy that, the rest of the time, might not seem particularly relevant to our lives: existentialism. One of the movement’s major proponents – Jean-Paul Sartre – developed a set of ideas that help explain, and give dignity to, the anxiety, excitement and at points vertigo we may experience as we go through the dating ritual. A key concept of Existentialism is expressed in Sartre’s somewhat obscure but useful phrase: “Being precedes essence”. What Sartre meant by ‘being’ are the bits of our life that we are free to choose for ourselves: how we live, what job we do, how we conceive of what happens to us. And by ‘essence’, he refers to things that lie outside our command: our biological nature, the flow of history, the position of the stars…” MORE SCHOOL OF LIFE Visit us in person at our London HQ: https://bit.ly/2Bih65X Watch more films on RELATIONSHIPS in our playlist: http://bit.ly/TSOLrelationships You can submit translations and transcripts on all of our videos here: https://www.youtube.com/timedtext_cs_panel?c=UC7IcJI8PUf5Z3zKxnZvTBog&tab=2 Find out how more here: https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/6054623?hl=en-GB SOCIAL MEDIA Feel free to follow us at the links below: 2KgB0Bf Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theschooloflifelondon/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheSchoolOfLife Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theschooloflifelondon/ CREDITS Produced in collaboration with: Andrew Lees https://www.damnfinemedia.co.uk/ #TheSchoolOfLife #Existentialism #JeanPaulSartre