The Camel, The Lion, and The Child

“Become who you are! Do what only you can do. Be the master and sculptor of yourself.” — Friedrich Nietzsche

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) saw three stages in a spiritual transformation towards a flourishing life, which he introduced in his now iconic work of philosophical fiction, Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883).

The Camel

The camel is a dutiful beast of burden. It is humble, virtuous, and willing to bear any difficulty to accomplish what is needed. We are all born as camels, and the vast majority of us stay there. We do what we’re told, and we don’t complain. 

Everything we have ever been told about how we should live has been tied to our backs. Social convention, taboo, status quo, and tradition all weigh us down. We must also battle with fear, love, truth, death, confusion, the search for knowledge, and numerous other aspects of human existence. 

As camels, we embrace these challenges in the name of duty and nobility. We meet life head-on. “What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger,” after all.

Camels can carry great weights and survive in the desert, but we are eventually taxed by this burden. We can’t handle tasks and conform to the rules and expectations of society forever. 

The weights we carry give us the illusion of a life that has pre-prescribed meaning. But when we adhere to them as the only way to do things, we deny ourselves of what we want to do. Thus, we need to shed these weights and stand up for our own purpose.

To do this, the camel enters what Nietzsche called “the loneliest desert.” It has sought out and invited the struggles that life has to offer. But in doing so, it has become alienated and “different” from the society that produced it; and now finds itself questioning everything it does.

In some ways, the desert is a place of existential crisis, where the camel considers whether or not any pre-prescribed meaning exists and gives it purpose.

When the camel discovers that universal truth and virtue may indeed not exist, it can either reject life as meaningless, or it can choose to embrace its own freedom and create its own meaning and virtue.

The Lion

It is when we recognise the burdens we carry that we transform into the lion. The lion is the assertion of self-confidence and self-determination that follows on from the “desert.”

It is to choose power and the control of one's life by rejecting the norms that we have taken for granted until now.

In Nietzsche’s words, “the spirit here becomes a lion; it wants to capture freedom and be master in its own desert.”

The lion is aware, but it still needs to gain the courage to slay the dragon Nietzsche called “Thou Shalt,” whose every scale contains something you must do (e.g., thou shalt not disrespect my elders). 

In essence, the dragon is Nietzsche’s image of societal norms and traditions.

The camel must reject this dragon of tradition and commands, but it cannot in its current, duty-loving form. Thus, it must become a lion, which symbolises concepts like courage, tenacity, disillusionment, and even rage.

Only in this state is the spirit able to deliver what Nietzsche called the “sacred ‘No.’”, which represents the rejection of external control and all traditional values. 

Everything imposed by other people, society, authorities, and all forms of propaganda must be denied with an empowered roar!

This does not mean that the lion believes all external virtues and values are evil or corrupt. It is simply the fact that they originate from an external authority that means they must be rejected.

As the lion, you are free. You do things or abide by them because you choose to, not because the dragon tells you to. You are contrarian and say no to everything people tell you to do. 

BUT, there is an issue here, as you cannot create new values of your own either.

As the things that once had meaning as a camel no longer have any obvious meaning, it is tempting to believe no meaning exists anywhere. Consequently, we can get stuck and become nihilistic*.

That’s where the third stage comes in.

The Child

Nietzsche thought a child-like spirit is vital to happiness, health, and well-being. “The child,” Nietzsche says, “is innocence and forgetting, a new beginning, a sport, a self-propelling wheel, a Sacred Yes”.

The child doesn’t know much about the world. It doesn’t care how others perceive it and it can come up with things that are totally original. The child doesn’t have the same structured rules and values that make adults behave in certain ways.

The child is joyful and can say yes to some things; it doesn’t have the weights on its back and is at play discovering things for the first time. With a beginner’s mind, we are inquisitive and life-affirming, and this is what Nietzsche thought we should strive for. 

The lion becomes a child when the individual ceases to affirm their values contrary to the law of “Thou Shalt”, and affirms them instead “for the sport of creation: the spirit now wills its own will,… its own world”.

In Nietzsche’s view, we should not be afraid of taking risks and being uncomfortable. Instead, we should take control to get the things we really want from life. 

We should live dangerously and get outside of our comfort zone. When making decisions, we should decide as if we have already lived once.

Life in this stage is a celebration of one’s powers—a sustained act of affirmation rather than a reactive struggle to overcome external forces.

The Overman

For Nietzsche, the best human beings are what he calls free spirits. An “Overman” is his hypothetical ideal to strive for after shedding the weights (the camel), slaying the dragon (the lion), and living like the child. But this is an ideal to strive for, not a destination at which we will likely ever arrive.

In Nietzsche’s view, an Overman is someone who has overcome themselves, human nature, and the bondage of the human condition. They are in a liberated state, expressing themselves fully, and harnessing control to improve their circumstances.

They are in a state of pure individuality and free play, uninhibited by societal influences. They will their own destiny and create their own values. They dance to the beat of their own drum!

Nietzsche believed we all have the power to look inside ourselves, recognise our inherent potential, and be the person we truly want to be. He thought life should be about achieving our higher goals and expressing ourselves fully.

But he also saw how people were terrified of this “self-overcoming” and their “higher selves,” as it is so demanding of us. It is simply easier to take the past of least resistance and stay beholden to the relics of culture that keep us enslaved.

Points for Reflection

• In which aspects of your life are you more of a camel, lion, or child?

• Is it time for you to take more control, to take more risks, and to embrace danger? To exert your will to power and go after life more fully? After all, it’s from the top of the mountain that we get the most beautiful view!

Listen to Episode 9 of Talk Doesn’t Cook Rice for a deeper discussion on Nietzsche’s ideas.

*Contrary to popular belief, Nietzsche was not a nihilist. Indeed, his whole body of work refuted nihilism and tried to make life as meaningful as possible.