tao of steve

several years ago i saw part of a film, it was late at night, i couldn't sleep went down for a drink and flipped the tv on. i watched only 15 or 20 minutes of some random film that was on, but i was hooked. having gone to a liberal arts college, i have a sweet spot in my heart for classic philosophy applied to practical things like relationships. it was late, and i was tired, but this film had all the elements i look for in a movie, quirky characters, great dialogue and well filmed scenery. the use of philosophy was just an added benefit. i kept thinking about the movie, but had no idea what it was called.

here is one of the quotes from the film, that grabbed me that night:

dex: doing stuff is overrated. like hitler. he did a lot. but don't we all wish he woulda just stayed home and gotten stoned?
syd: oh, i see. so you're only options are to get stoned or commit genocide?

come on, this is the stuff you say to your close friends, its a real conversation that could really happen. (the movie is semi-biographical so thats not a surprise).

it wasn’t until a year or so later that i figured out what the movie was called, and ordered a copy from amazon. i watched it, and then watched it again. i was a happily married man at the time, dating was the furthest thing from my mind, so watching dex go through life and dispense his wisdom was mostly a journey of humor with a “thank god that’s not me” thrown in.

times have changed, i am not married, i do think about relationships and dating in a different way now. the “tao of steve” takes on an entirely new feel and impact as i watch it. this is one of the things i like about art; the viewer brings themselves to the work. in this case, i am not sure if i think this is a good thing. watching the tao of steve today is much more like watching an extreme case of myself if i were not careful.

in the movie dex (donal logue) is a pot smoking, overweight, unashamed underachiever who went from being the star on his college campus to a kindergarten teacher who spends most of this time drinking with friends and playing frisbee golf.

the following is a good example of the person who dex is:

priest: dex, i find it hard to believe that someone of your, uh...
dex: moral turpitude?
priest: yeah, would ever consider being a priest.
dex: ya know, actually, i was accepted to divinity school.
priest: really? so what happened?
dex: it's like st. augustine said, ya know: "lord, give me chastity and virtue, but not just yet."


through out the film dex is trying to help a friend understand the road to happiness with woman, the one true path to ensure a steady stream of sex. the tao of steve. this is built on the manly, and detached, cool shown by steve mcqueen, steve austin (six million dollar man) and steve mcgarrett (hawaii five-o) which is backed by a buddist based philosophy, that requires one to release all desire.

the philosophy has three main rules:

1. eliminate your desires.
2. do something excellent in her presence, thereby proving your sexual worthiness.
3. retreat, for as heidegger said, "we pursue that which retreats from us".
   

this is further boiled down to:

be desireless, be excellent, be gone.

i am not going to spoil the movie for you; you really should see this film. if you are attracted intelligence and strong women, its great fun. that is if you can overcome a bit of the revulsion you feel towards dex as he talks, or acts, early in the film. its balanced by some of the sympathy you might feel later. dex is not a bad guy; he is simply a guy who has found an easy way to get though life and to feel satisfied. the difficulty is when he realizes there is more out there; this happens just as his history catches up with him.

how does this play into my life? what if i have been thinking that eliminating desire is a good thing? by leading the semi-hermit life style you can find that desire does nothing but cause you to come outside your box. desire can cause pain, or shall we say the desire for things you can not have can cause pain. worse might be the desire for a thing you can have, but don’t want, but that is another post i think.

dex is an idiot, a loveabe one, which is how he gets away with this in the first place. that's not an excuse for him, but if you can find a philosophy that tells you to be desireless and retreat, when you are feeling the need to do just that, it makes it simple to rationalize the actions. i guess this is is true of any moral system built to keep us from making choices that can bring us pain or regret. dex is a strange prophet, but who knows what other charismatic leaders were really like.

art and life do interact, you bring yourself into a work and see it though your own feelings. this is a great film, but it is not the same film it was that night i could not sleep.