Philosophers Series · Part 3 of 12
Nietzsche: Become Who You Are – and Who Will Manage Your Legacy?
Friedrich Nietzsche asked one of the most radical questions in philosophy. And his own fate shows how vulnerable the things we leave behind are. Part 3 of our Philosophers Series.
Eternal recurrence
In “The Gay Science” (1882), Nietzsche describes a demon who comes to you one night and says: this life, as you are living it now, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more. Every pain, every joy, every thought will return, in the same order.
Would you curse the demon? Or would you answer that you have never heard anything more divine?
The question is a test. Live in such a way that you could want this life again. Nietzsche called the attitude behind it “amor fati”, the love of one’s fate.
How one becomes what one is
In 1888, shortly before his mental collapse, Nietzsche wrote “Ecce Homo”, a kind of self-portrait subtitled “How One Becomes What One Is”. He was convinced that his time had not yet come. Some, he wrote, are born posthumously.
What happened next
In early 1889, Nietzsche collapsed. Until his death in 1900 he was no longer able to work. His sister, Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche, took control of his estate. She founded the Nietzsche Archive, assembled the book “The Will to Power” from his notes and promoted a nationalist, antisemitic image of her brother – even though he had sharply rejected antisemitism. Later she sought closeness to the Nazis.
Only the critical edition by Giorgio Colli and Mazzino Montinari, published from 1967 onwards, made Nietzsche’s texts accessible again as he had written them.
The logical conclusion
Nietzsche leaves us two lessons.
The first: live so that you can say yes. To do that, you have to know what you actually want. Regular, honest reflection is how you get there.
The second: don’t leave your legacy to chance or to whoever happens to have access. Record what you think in your own words. And decide for yourself who may read it, and when. Otherwise others will tell your story – perhaps one you would never have told.
Three questions to think further
- Would you want to live your current life again exactly as it is?
- What about you is often misunderstood by others?
- Whom would you trust with your records – and whom definitely not?