How Sacrifice Leads to Success: A Deep Dive

Introduction :

When we look at sacrificial rituals, especially those involving burnt offerings and similar practices, they often seem archaic and distant from our modern sensibilities, making them hard to understand. However, these rituals were acted out by people who were trying to conceptualize and unpack, what they meant, what sacrifice meant.

As we act out a lot of things we don't understand because we're much more complex than we can represent so we're always acting out things we don't understand.

But the word Sacrifice is made from the Latin word Sacrificium which literally means to make sacred, which means to make an action pure. Normally when we talk about sacrificing we feel like we are talking about a loss. But in reality, sacrifice is about giving up a valuable thing to get something more valuable than that. That’s what, these sacrificial rituals are trying to convey.

It’s significance and modern day:

As the saying goes, 'To gain something, you must be willing to sacrifice.' This highlights the importance of giving up something valuable to achieve something even greater. If you want to attain something meaningful in life, you often have to let go of something else in return. And To prove to yourself and the universe that what you want to get, you are serious about it. But In the modern world, there is very little talk of sacrifices and But sacrifices has been mentioned many times in the history of every culture. But Nowadays, very few people knows the significance behind the rituals or sacrifices. Now, if we want to become wise and want to live life in the best possible way then we have to see these rituals from a psychological point of view and we have to understand their deeper meaning hidden under their surface .

Sacrifice and human:

First of all, notice that sacrificing is a human quality. Just because this thing is connected with our ability to think about our future and plan for it . No other animal can see time like us so that they can invite difficulties in their present to make their future better. What these rituals are trying to say and what we believe is that future is something that can be improved and also that we can stop our pleasures for now and we will get its result at a time and place that doesn't even exist yet.

Origin and background:

So, as for the people of past, for whom this concept is newly discovered. They first acted it out, then represented in ritual. Those would be the rituals of sacrifice. Then laid out in story, then turned into a psychological phenomena so that now we're capable of making sacrifices in abstraction. To conceptualize a future that we want, to let go of the things that are stopping us from moving forward and to free ourselves from the chains of our original preconceptions. And that's laid out in these old stories as the optimal pathway of being.

us being aware of concept of sacrifice is , maybe a consequence of our expanded intelligence and is that, we're actually aware of the future and we actually treat the future as if it's something that you can bargain with. Now partly it's because the future is other people and they remember your reputation, they remember your past actions and if you do someone a favor then, That favor is in some sense stored up in the future so you could think about the future as a place of judgment about your moral actions .

And it's not that far from that to Imagining a God who's keeping track of that or who even is that.

It is embedded in stories:

This idea of sacrifice has emerge in many stories, one example of these of type of story is the story of Cain and Abel. So, there's this concept in the story of Cain and Abel that emphasizes the necessity of making sacrifices to stay in favor with God. If we consider this idea practically, rather than metaphysically, we can see it as an early human realization about the importance of the future. This represents a unique and profound discovery in human history.

How we do it:

Human capacity to plan and foresee possible future, is what that, grant us ability to make proper sacrifices. And as philosopher of science named Karl Popper said, the purpose of thinking is to let your thoughts die instead of you. It's a brilliant notion. And so what this idea is trying to say is, You can conjure up a variety of potential representations of yourself in the future. You can lay out how those future representations of yourself are likely to prevail or fail. You can cull (slaughter) the potential use in the future that will fail, and then you can embody the ones that will succeed.

By doing so, You can skillfully create a picture of your current state while recognizing, due to your unnecessary suffering, which aspects of your troubled life need to be let go so you can move forward into a better future.

And Every human being deep inside knows that, that there is a lot of strength in this, We have been taught the importance of sacrifice since childhood. We are told that if we study now, then we will get good marks and a good job, and If we work hard in the job, then we will get promotion and our name will be in the society which will make our life more comfortable and our future generations. Well, Of course, we had fun in the midst of all this, but our sacrifices should always be some what greater than our fun. Otherwise, this equation would not work and we would get average results .

This exact notion can also be said like, Whenever you think of sacrificing, then you ask yourself. Do you want to die a painful death in the future? or do you want to die a little daily in a manageable amount? so that your future is better than your present. Any sensible person will choose latter option.

What and how to sacrifice:

But here comes one more important question that what should we sacrifice and how will we get the best outcome by sacrificing? The answer is simple and you know that, Sacrifice what is most valuable to you and what is right to sacrifice.

You have to make those sacrifices that others are not doing. Maybe this sacrifice is for you to give up a big part of your youth for your goals, Where your friends are having fun outside and roaming around. and You will be focused on your work inside. And you will have to keep this level of commitment until you start seeing solid results .

This is how sacrifice looks like. But sometimes, we get attached to a lot of things or start loving them. And it is true that sometimes the things that are stopping us from moving forward are those things that we should not be attached to. You can even directly observe this thing in your life that, if your progress has slowed down or stopped, then surely There's a high probability that you have some idea or some mode of action or some habit That you're so in love with that. You won't let go of it. even though it is directly or indirectly harming you.

what a sacrifice means is that , you give up something of value in the present so that you can improve the future and that's no different from what we call discipline. It's exactly the same thing. It's just that concretely acted out version of that.

And while you work and sacrifice for to maintain your discipline. The most important thing to keep in mind is the question, “What is it that you're aiming at with that work and that sacrifice?”.

What is it that you're trying to do when you're trying to improve the future? We believe that the future can be improved. We believe that it can be improved as a consequence of our sacrificial work. And so once again, what are the limitations? What are the necessary limits to that? I wouldn’t say we don't know. I would say as well that, that's actually something that the stories is trying desperately to articulate, and to figure it out . and by doing so, We conjured up this remarkable idea. that The future exists.

We can see it even though it's only potential. We can adjust our behavior in the present in order to maximize our probability of success in the future. How best to do that? Well, the idea is something like, don't hesitate to offer the ultimate sacrifice. If you want the future to turn out ultimately well. Now obviously, in stories that idea is clothed in metaphysical speculation and religious imagery, but it still remains an intensely practical issue. What is it that you could contract for, let's say, if you were willing to give up everything about you that's weak and unworthy? The proper sacrificial attitude produces a psychological state, and then a social state that's a manifestation of that attitude, that decreases the probability that the world will careen into hell, and increases the probability that people will live high quality, meaningful, private lives in a society that's balanced and capable of supporting that.

and what if you don’t do that. And I believe everyone knows that. I believe that they know it implicitly, even if they don't allow themselves to know it explicitly. If they violate that idea, then they violate themselves, if they do that long enough , they will be granted a punishment that is too great to bear.

“There's no comfort, you just choose your burden” - line from loki season 2.