36 vulnerable to being an object of an action . 129 Human beings , as persons , both act and are acted upon . Therefore , human persons carry within themselves a principle of utility , as subjects using and as objects being used .
John Paul II ’ s pontificate witnessed the defining of love as self-gift , a definition which neatly accords with the second meaning of use as in a source of delight ( as opposed to the devolved second meaning of use , which begins to see the human person as a means to pleasure ). Delight , according to the definition given in the Merriam-Webster dictionary ( specifically the archaic definition ), means “ the power to afford pleasure .” Is this definition not telling ? Delight is not pleasure ; delight gives rise to the possibility of giving and receiving pleasure , of feeling and experiencing pleasure . Delight , then , is a simpler reality of the human heart . The human person exists as an object in this world only , properly speaking , as gift to be given to another . We are meant to love , to give ourselves wholly and totally . In this sense , the intimacy of a belonging absolutely cannot be a possession , and a possession cannot be a belonging , in part because a belonging testifies to the totality of the human person , while a possession can be given away without the person having given away anything substantial of him or herself . There is no substantial vulnerability in the acquisition or gifting of a possession . A belonging , however , cannot be given without giving the whole person over to the other .
The act of possessing does not properly constitute a “ lived ” experience . “ The claim to possess ”, as Kohak explains , “ cannot grow out of a lived experience : it is …. a construct established by social convention to order the life of a world of artifacts .” 130 An artifact may be of use to a thing and its nature , but an artifact rarely – if even possible – participates in a thing ’ s nature . In regards to the person and his body , embodiment is not the experience of a possession , “ but of being at ease , at home with each other ”. 131 Unfortunately , the experiential and the ontological senses of being at ease – at home within ones ’ body – do not consistently mesh together for individual human persons . Some people appear to live in a state of great unease between their minds and their bodies . Transgender experiences and felt incongruence between the body and self afflict many people as a real form of suffering . These real cases , however , do not contradict Kohak ’ s argument concerning “ lived ” experience . It is critical to ask the question of whether or not transgender experiences fit the criteria for being an authentic “ lived ” experience .
The concept of lived experience is a very complex philosophical topic . This thesis cannot exhaust the topic , but will offer a few insights supportive for what lived experience can mean . First , lived experience ought not to be conflated with felt experience . These are rightly separate kinds of experience , because a feeling refers to a far more particular kind of encounter than the broader , more encompassing encounter of living . What I live through is the amalgamation of felt experiences . Second , two kinds of felt experience color lived experience , and these two kinds of experiences derive from a
129 Ibid , 24 . 130 Erazim Kohak , The Embers and the Stars : A Philosophical Inquiry into the Moral Sense of Nature ( Chicago : The
University of Chicago Press , 1984 ), 107 . 131 Ibid .