My own (mis-?)understandings and (mis-?)interpretations of the Epicurean texts differ from Cicero’s, Porphyrius’s and others’ (mis-?)understandings and (mis-?)interpretations

I agree with  almost all of Norman Wentworth DeWitt’s interpretations of the Epicurean texts (in his “Epicurus and His Philosophy”) and Martha Nussbaum’s interpretations of Epicurean psychological procedures (in her “The Therapy of Desire” ). In some specific issues I accept the pertinent interpretation of one or the other expert’s,  like Vincent Cook, Tim O’Keefe, D.S. Hutchinson, Victor Kioulaphides, Steven Ikier, Robert Hanrott, Tom Merle and some others.

For this reason I cannot speak of “Epicureanism” as such.

For me the Epicurean texts are less a raw material for interpretation or explanation than a source of inspiration and practical roadmap for a stress-FREE, truly happy life together with like-minded friends, using all the resources of modern science I have access to, especially pedagogy, psycho-sociology, organizational development and project management. I will go into details in my book “…live stress-FREE and happily ever after“.

 Epicurean texts and some of their interpretations – like e.g. Michel Foucault’s interpretation of Epicurean “parrhesia” ( a special form of giving feedback, see  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parrhesia ), or Christoph Horn or Paul Rabbow’s or Pierre Hadot’s reconstructions and interpretations of Hellenistic philosophical exercises and practices, or the strong ecological interpretation of  Stephanie Mills’s  ”Epicurean Simplicity”  -serve as foundation and ingredients for my personal stress-FREEDOM guidance and are part of my reading of Epicurean stress-FREEDOM practice and stress-FREE lifestyle – as described in more detail in my  book under construction  “Epicurus reloaded”

For this reason it would be incorrect – and in my value scale: dishonest – to call my stress-FREEDOM guidance “Epicurean”. It is much more correct and modest to call it “mine”, i.e. “Galenian”, i.e. Galenios’s reading of Epicurus and of the world.

A whole new world towards FREEDOM opened its gates for Galenios’s wide opened eyes!

First I was offered in English Español Français 中文 Deutsch Português 日本語 Nederlands Italiano 한국어 to Bookmark this page or Make this your homepage and then to make another choice:

Stress/FreedomEas/ReedBusiness/ Opportunity/Money/Work From Home/Work At Home/Home Business

Of course I headed for no less than freedom.

I was assured to get: What you need, when you need it again in English Español Français 中文 Deutsch Português 日本語 Nederlands Italiano 한국어 again asked politely to Bookmark this page Make this your homepage .

And then at final last the paths towards freedom were revealed:

• Hama freedom Günstig/Hama Freedom nur € 99. Technik zum Top-Preis!
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So the way of Galenios’s defreezing and serving up Epicurus’s teaching-food for stress-FREEDOM seekers seems to be too long and weary compared to the popular shortcut: buy more things.

Epicurus had a totally different stance and the Beatles propagated the Epicurean attitude:

“Buy, buy, says the sign in the shopwindow /Why, why, says the junk in the yard.”

If you are more of a watcher than a reader, take a look at Alain de Botton’s presenting Epicurus’s way to Happiness in youtube:

Part 1 9:59 minutes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20LTTRQcZ8c

Part 2/ 9:51 minutes:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sz1ItMUafgY&feature=related

Part 3/ 4:08 minutes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCyIohPjVs8&feature=related

Others were given – by themselves or by others – different names for different reasons. The list of the most known cases would be too long to cite here. The list of authors’ pseudonyms alone has today 11,621 entries http://www.trussel.com/books/pseudo.htm

Even a comparatively undereducated person like myself can remember some famous names their owners were not born with, like Plato, Voltaire, Mark Twain, Lewis Carroll – or, in another context, Caesar, Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Hitler.

Artists, clowns, writers, monks, religious and political leaders often used two or more names, kings and popes in Europe had regnal names. In Japan the era in which an emperor reigns is given the name that emperor will have after he dies!

Sometimes people move from one language community into another one and some of them change their names because in the new language their old name might sound funny. This is probably the reason why the German forefathers of one of my favorite authors had modified the original Funnegut to the less funny Vonnegut.

There are many reasons people change their names: to protect yourself (“illegal” freedom-fighters), to accommodate their audience (artists and other people who want to deliver a message in a definite language environment), out of tradition (kings and popes), to mark a new chapter in their spiritual development (monks), etc.

I chose myself almost a dozen of them over the last forty years depending whom I wanted to say what and where: in a Hungarian language weekly for the youth, in a Romanian language amateur theater group, as a translator of Japanese literature for Hungarian readers, reporting for Radio Free Europe, authoring and publishing a book for a specific German clientele. My original family name sounded even more outlandish than Günther Nakszynski (=Klaus Kinski) or Józef Teodor Nałęcz Konrad Korzeniowski (= Joseph Conrad) in every language. Very few people could pronounce it and even less spell it. Therefore I was given early on about a dozen nicknames by the people I worked or lived with: my classmates, my friends, my co-workers, my customers, the kids I used to teach in schools, the people I trained or coached.

Did this affect my identity? I have never felt so. It helped my audience concentrate on the message instead of fighting with my name. Some people have such a strong message or care so little about this aspect that they do not bother about making any adaptations, like fellow-Hungarian Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, or they just shave the accents, like Nicolas Sarkozy (in correct Hungarian Sárközy)

What’s in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;

• - or stink just as horrid – after decayed

In my endeavor to guide people towards happiness through stress-FREEDOM I have chosen as messenger-name, or nom de guerre in my war against unhappiness, stress and ignorance, or program name, the Greek word “Galenios” because it means “calm, unruffled”, referring mostly to the state of the waves of the sea.