Transcendentalist

1. In Nature it talks about how you need to get away from everything and sit with your own thoughts in nature. It's a way to be at peace so that no other human being can influence you or distract you. It's just you, your thoughts, God, and nature. One part stood out to me the most. It said, "But every night come out these envoys of beauty, and light the universe with their admonishing smile." To me the greatest time of peace is at night. With the dark sky, lit up by the moon and stars. It brings me to nature and lets me connect if only for a moment. Self-Reliance is about just that, relying on oneself. It tells you to go with what you feel, trust your conscious regardless where it leads you. The sentence that stood out most to me was, "To be great is to be misunderstood.." It's saying that if you were to be normal and follow the crowd, then you would be accepted and it would be easy for people to understand you. But if you were to be great, and go with what your mind tells you, then you will be misunderstood. In the first paragraph of Resistance to Civil Government it is obvious to notice that the character does not agree with government. The sentence, "...which also I believe--'That government is best which governs not at all';" makes it clear that he does not agree with government. He feels that it holds people back from their true potential and that man could do so much more without the government restricting them.



2. Nature is a great form of Transcendentalist. They believed that God spoke to everyone in their minds. Nature is about getting away from everything else and connecting with nature. Since God created nature it would also connect you to him. The first line of the text states, "To go into solitude, a man needs to retire as much from his chamber as from society. For Transcendentalist, solitude could mean speaking to God. In order to do that they would need to get away from their own worries and problems as well as others, and focus on their own thoughts and what God says to them. Self-relevance also relates to Transcendentalist. The sentence, "Speak what you think now in hard words, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict everything you said today-" Transcendentalist believed you should go with your conscious. If you followed what your mind told you, which was God speaking to you, you could never go wrong. This sentence is saying just that. Go with what your mind tells you regardless what it may be. Transcendentalist, like Resistance to Civil Government, did not agree with the government. They felt that if everyone did what their mind told them, which was directed by God, they would be just fine. The sentence, "The character inherent in the American people has done all that has been accomplished; and it would have done somewhat more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way." This relates to Transcendentalist because they believe that their minds will lead them to whatever needs to be done, but the government will forbid them to go with that.



3. In the video, Alone in the Wilderness, a man sets out with himself into the wilderness for a year. Just the title alone relates me to Transcendentalists. Nature was something created by God. To go out into the wilderness by yourself would be a way to connect with God with no other distractions. The man states, "What was I capable of that I didn't know yet?" This shows that he wants to go out by himself, with nothing to rely on but his own mind and conscious. This is exactly what Transcendentalist believed one should do.



The man uses what he knows and what his mind tells him to build his own house in just the right place out in the woods. When talking about the wood on his cabin hanging off and how he needed to cut them shorter he says, "..you can't rush it."He knows not to rush anything, to make it look right and hold up well, you have to do everything at just the right time. Again, he is listening to himself, he has no one there to guide him along on what to do. Only his conscious.

Since Transcendentalist believed that God spoke to people through nature and a persons intuition this video can relate to that. This man survives int he nature alone by using nothing but his intuition and what he knows.