A tadpole that has so gaily waved its tail in the water must feel very sick when the tail begins to drop off ... The tail was its dearest, gayest, most active member ... but the little green frog in the grass is a new gem after all.
- D. H. Lawrence
As Nietzsche says, it’s a common error to suppose that a person of conviction is courageous because they stick to their guns, their ideas, beliefs and principles, no matter what. This might be a method of establishing a solid reputation and of being recognized as dependable, like a trusted tool, within a society dominated by slave morality, but it takes a certain plucky insouciance to lack conviction, adopt brief habits, and hold one’s views lightly.
That is to say, the brave individual is one who regularly sheds his ideals like a snake sheds its skin; not because he changes his mind - for what kills all that is old and redundant within us is not a victory of reason, rather, it’s a form of vital energy. We shed skins and negate our former selves because new life bubbles up inside us and produces new feelings and, indeed, in certain species, entirely new forms of being. If the caterpillar had conviction, it would never become a butterfly; if the tadpole insisted on continuity and self-preservation, it would never sprout little legs with which to leap into the future as frog.
Like Nietzsche, Lawrence fully understands the importance of this and develops the idea of change as a vital necessity in a late article entitled ‘The State of Funk’.
There is, he admits, a certain justification for fear when change is upon us; because change of any sort can be dangerous and involve an element of suffering. But - having conceded that change often brings pain and uncertainty - there’s still no excuse for what Lawrence calls funk. Rather, it’s the duty of men and women when confronted by new and problematic conditions to face up to things with a little courage and good humour; not retreat behind well-known and well-worn positions and make a blustering display of their moral certainties, or offer ready-made solutions:
"There is no ready-made solution. Ready-made solutions are almost the greatest danger of all. A change is a slow flux, which must happen bit by bit. ... You can’t drive it like a steam-engine. But all the time you can be alert and intelligent about it ... Patience, alertness, intelligence, and a human goodwill and fearlessness, that is what you want in a time of change. Not funk."
Lawrence goes on to argue that it is in our power to change, our capacity to adapt, and our readiness to admit and fulfil new needs that our best hope and greatest strength resides. To be firm is one thing. But to be secretly full of fear and of petrified opinion is something else; something that leads to bullying and, ultimately, has disastrous consequences.
In sum: change is inevitable - not merely because external conditions change, but because we change and change vitally as the years pass: "New feelings arise in us, old values depreciate ... Things we thought we wanted most intensely we realise we don’t care about. The things we built our lives upon crumble and disappear, and the process is painful."
Painful, but not tragic; for we can live without conviction - and perhaps even live more gaily.
Notes
Nietzsche, The Gay Science, trans. Walter Kaufmann, (Vintage Books, 1974), IV. 296, 307.
D. H. Lawrence, ‘The State of Funk’, Late Essays and Articles, ed. James T. Boulton, (Cambridge University Press, 2004), pp. 218-224. Lines quoted are on pp. 220 and 221.
