The Good Life Today: A Collaborative Engagement between Daoism and Hartmut Rosa

Hartmut Rosa’s research has been extremely influential in promoting the view that modernity and late modernity are characterized by “speeding up,” or structural “dynamic stabilization.” More recently, Rosa has turned to describing the existential effects of living in late modernity, and the particular view of the good life it encourages. Late modernity began with the promise to make the world more available, attainable, and accessible. Unfortunately, however, the high-level instrumentalization that characterizes these changes led to feelings of alienation. Rosa’s solution is to develop a philosophical method for fostering what he calls “resonance.” In this article, I will introduce the Daoist notions of the “mechanical heart-mind,” “self-so,” “nonaction,” “knowing satisfaction,” and “rambling” as potential complements to Rosa’s concept of resonance. I argue that they can serve to bolster Rosa’s view and provide a more active way to conceive of the good life through engagement with our social and natural environments.