In honor of yesterday being Ayn Rand’s birthday and the wonderful holiday of Randsday which is based on it, I thought I would offer a short piece paying tribute to and honoring her way of view the world.
Though I cannot claim to be an expert in the finer points of her philosophy, Objectivism, and will not try to explain it in detail here (though it is tellingly simple), I just wanted to bring notice to the root of her worldview—of the philosophy she spent a lifetime formulating. The root can be divided into two simple ideas, like two sides of the same coin, namely, that the world and the reality of that world exist objectively outside of our minds and imaginations, and that man’s mind is his only tool to survive and thrive within that reality.
And as his only tool, there is no higher authority for each individual than their own mind. Now this last point, like the reality in which we live, is objectively true. No matter your circumstances you ultimately succeed or fail, thrive or decline, live or die, based on how effectively you can use your mind to manipulate the world around you, i.e. based on the choices that you make every day.
What unites the principal characters of her two greatest novels, characters like Howard Roark, Steven Mallory, Mike Donnigan, Dagny Taggart, Hank Rearden, Francisco d’Anconia, Eddie Willers, John Galt, and others, is that accept and trust their own minds as their highest authority. At the end of the day they answer to no one but themselves. They follow their own minds and judgement to the point of being obsessive about it. They are heroic.
But their heroism is not merely because they make their own choices, indeed Peter Keating and James Taggart and everyone else are also ultimately making their own decisions at the end of the day. What is remarkable about these protagonists, however, is that they recognize the source of their decisions and accept the consequences thereof as their making alone. In other words, they recognize and accept reality. They see their minds for the tool that it is and realize that to survive, to be successful, to be human, means to foster that tool, trust in it above all else, and know that they bear all responsibility for what results.
This is opposed to the characters of the novels who constantly seek to have their choices made for them (though this does not negate the fact that in the end they are still the sole owner of their choice), to push off their responsibility onto others, become utterly dependent on the opinions of others, and jealously and insecurely scorn those characters who accept reality, all the while not understanding why they themselves cannot.
Ayn Rand’s greatest gift and legacy left behind is the idea that you are sacred, that your happiness is the purpose of your life. She recognized that true human happiness is not a fleeting feeling, rather that it is born through responsibility, challenge, and success. She pointed out that the free use of your mind and the freedom to act on your own judgement is the only way to truly be human and that such behavior is, in fact, the moral way to live.
Recognize this fact. Recognize the power of your own mind. Live by it. Consciously be sure that everything you do, every action you take is because YOU have deemed it the most appropriate course. Heed advice, consider the law, but at the end of the day know that the only way to truly be happy is to know that every decision you make is because you weighed the options, you considered the consequences, and you put in the effort. To follow anything blindly, especially if it is against your own judgement, is to give up your humanity. Use your mind to achieve what you want and never recognize a power higher than yourself. Be a Hank, a Dagny, or a Howard.