The Spirit of the Age

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.            - Arthur Schopenhauer

Understanding other people comes as second nature to us. Our interpersonal evaluative abilities have been trained, augmented, and refined by the simple daily act of living with others in a society. We use this ability everyday. In seconds, or even fractions of a second, we can gauge another person's intentions and motivations to a greater or lesser degree. Call it street smarts, intuition, sixth sense, experience, or simply evolution, we are somehow "programmed" to quickly see strengths and deficiencies in others. But evaluating ourselves... here is where we run into problems. Why do traits and behaviors in others seem so well-defined, so visibly sharp, so exposed, while self-evaluation can oftentimes be likened to a journey through a shapeless nebula?

I'd like to invite you to watch this documentary, if you haven't already. It was suggested by one of this blog's readers (thank you Marc) and I found it fascinating. There may be parts you agree or disagree with more than others, but its doubtless value lies in provoking introspection, not simply of yourself, but of your place in society and in the world. If you mostly see the negatives, give yourself the opportunity to practice optimism and look for the bright side. Look for the positive. Look for what's good. It's long, but I wouldn't post it if I didn't think it was worth our time. Get some popcorn and make it a movie night!

As you may know, I began a journey of introspection not too long ago, galvanized by the severe lack of introspection promoted, or at least tolerated, by society. This movie provides answers to many deep-rooted questions and concerns unearthed by my introspection. Maybe it can answer some of yours too. Enjoy.

The Social Sacrifice Hypothesis

Empathy takes time, and efficiency is for things, not people.

Our capitalistic culture has induced a deterioration in our ability to develop meaningful relationships with ourselves and others. This may be capitalism's worst consequence. Uncrossable moral chasms stand between our impoverished relationships and the higher moral and emotional needs that distinguish our humanity. We sacrifice empathy, honesty, patience, morality, and compassion for personal success. These moral chasms can be felt. Even if you are a citizen of the United States (the country with the most visible symptoms) and conditioned to emotionally-bankrupt social bonds, you can feel the chasms too, intuitively. I know you can, but you have to reach deep in order to do so. Come explore with me.

The American Dream... let's start here
We may take it for granted, but America has always been a truly unique and magical place for human beings to reside in. It still is. The intoxicating allure of America has been romantically contained in the dream of the poor immigrant who arrives on U.S. shores and single-handedly elevates the socioeconomic status of he and his family in only one generation. Until the U.S. hit full economic stride in the 20th century, a dream like this had never existed anywhere on our small blue planet. No matter how bad you wanted to succeed, your economic success always depended on the influence of others - namely government, society, church, and family. America then had a beautiful dream that boldly shifted that dependency - from them to you. The dream's internal engine - capitalism and market culture - promises that if you want it bad enough, if you work hard enough, and if you sacrifice deeply enough, you will flourish. It all depends on you, big boy. No one else. Not no mo'.

Though it has a "righteous ring" to it, depending solely on yourself is not an easy proposition. In fact, it's fucking hard. If things get screwy, guess who swallows the blame - you, baby, all you. That's scary. Before, we were members of a tribe, a group, a community, or at least a closely-knit family that shared the burden of life's successes and catastrophes with us. We were not alone then. But this "sharing" element has essentially vanished from our heavily individualistic society. The drastic paradigm shift to an over-reliance on yourself and an under-reliance on others spawned three critical and interconnected social phenomena that have distanced us from each other:

• Habituated solitude
• Aggrandizement of the ego
• Erosion of interpersonal trust

Alone in the Crowd

We live in an increasingly hostile social environment. Why hostile? Because we are alone under tremendous amounts of social pressure to succeed. By permeating every corner of our society, market culture has elevated the priority of success above all else, including our bonds with those closest to us. By accepting that we don't need to depend on others for success, we grow more insular and more habituated to pursuing our own self-interests - alone. We enjoy the BMW 5-series, 50-inch plasma, Bose home theater system, state-of-the-art kitchen, imported Italian leather living room set, heated indoor swimming pool, and the Prada designer sweater for the hairless chihuahua... by ourselves... and maybe with the chihuahua. But we are essentially alone in the crowd. Not physically, but yes emotionally, psychologically, and spiritually. The greater concern is that we are habituated to this profound solitude. It is now considered normal to be completely closed to others. And what's the most natural way of coping with this lonely and hostile environment? Toughen up, sissy.

The feminist movement is a visible example of habituated solitude through toughening. In the noble pursuit of equal opportunity, equal respect, and equal voice in society, feminism has suffered a severe distortion. Like a train without brakes, the movement overcompensated for inequality, rocketing past its intended destination, and hardened women primarily against men and secondarily against love. "I'm a strong, tough, independent woman who has never needed to depend on a man for anything" is a statement commonly uttered with pride.. but commonly uttered alone. Many emotional and psychological barriers are raised by women in efforts to protect an exaggerated and, for the most part, misunderstood desire for individualism. By fiercely defending this need, women are alienating themselves from men. Watch Jerry Maguire for an example of this. But neither women nor men are to blame for we have all been trained by our culture to expertly alienate others. The "battle of the sexes" is simply another exercise in alienation through superiority. And there are many to choose from.

Who Needs 'Please' when we've got Guns? 

We are superior to others. This simple oxymoron psychologically strengthens us to deal with a cannibalistic social world, where everyone is out for themselves. It prepares us for personal success in the market culture. But if we believe we are superior to others, then our esteem for them naturally erodes. Why bother ourselves with "little people", or those who have seemingly little to offer us? When everyone adopts this perspective however, we all become "little people" to each other. Welcome to hobbit land, Frodo. It is then OK to compete without limits, it is OK to adopt a self-centered worldview, it is OK to win at the expense of others, it is even OK to win at the expense of yourself - as long as you win.

The focus is on my success after all.

My dreams, my goals, my reputation, my achievements, my social identity, my feelings, and my convenience have trumped the interpersonal virtues of empathy, compassion, patience, and tolerance. Sue my family for emotional distress? Sure, I'm hurt and they had it coming anyway. Badmouth my best friend at work to get closer to that promotion? Hey, business is business baby. Now take marriage, perhaps the most profound, complex, and fulfilling of all human social bonds in the western world, but also sometimes the most tedious, time-consuming, and inconvenient as well. We have the highest divorce rate in the world partly due to the inconvenience of marriage. Our lack of empathy, coupled with a ravenous hunger for instant gratification and immediate results, devours the slightest inconvenience as if it were a quadruple quarter-pounder with extra cheese. The point is, we get stuffed on experiences, sicken of them shortly after, and then bounce without second thoughts. The market culture has trained our minds for this - to tire quickly. Besides, who has time to savor, appreciate, digest, and cherish with so many other harvests to reap, so many channels to surf, so many restaurants to try, so much information to access, and so much technology to purchase? On a side note, anyone know when the Ipad 2 is coming out?

Empathy is just really inconvenient sometimes...

• New Yorkers step over a dying man
• Teenage boys go on school killing spree in a display of power
• Young girls starve themselves for beauty
• Hospitals refuse care to the uninsured; price is put on fingers

When Mistrust Comes In, Love Goes Out
Relationships are not business transactions. But in the words of Thomas Jefferson, "the merchant has no homeland" anymore. Thanks to market culture, the merchant is now free to practice business anywhere he pleases... at work, on the street, overseas, in his home, in your home, and even in love. Our relationships have become tit-for-tat negotiations, you give me this, I give you that. In his book "Linchpin," Seth Godin argues that a few hundred years ago, members of the same tribe did favors for each other without expectations of reciprocity. Business (a reciprocal transaction) was done solely with strangers, in this case, members of outlying tribes. By treating all of our relationships like business, we have turned everyone into strangers, even those closest to us. This has spawned a virulent lack of trust that now underlies all of our interpersonal interactions. Pick up the hitchhiker at Midtown? Careful, you know that poor people have homicidal tendencies. Let 8 year old Michelle play outside by herself? Not with all those sexual predators on the loose. Share a taxi cab ride with a stranger and split the cost? Well, you get the picture, few people would agree to this. Let's return to the realm of marriage for the final example:

Will you sign a prenuptial agreement with the one person you decide to spend the rest of your life with? 

Will you sign it with the person that makes you "whole"? The one you will love and care for in sickness and in health? Through the good times and the bad? Are these words just fluff? Placeholders? Do they mean anything? Are they just unrealistic for our times? Or just too idealistic? Perhaps the simple answer is: we don't trust them and they don't trust us. Ask yourself if that's normal. Ask yourself if that's right. We place so much value on interpersonal trust but let our sky castles crumble in the face of truth. In forcing ourselves to depend on ourselves, we forgot how to depend on others and how to allow others to depend on us. This phenomenon is festering in all of our relationships. You can't trust strangers, you can't trust friends, you can't trust family, you can't even trust your partner, and they can't trust you either. But hey, it's not all bad, at least they can't touch our bling. Yea!

Salvation or Starvation
Have you ever given up your seat on the subway to an older person, helped a stranger shovel the snow on his driveway, or given your coworker a gift without expectations? When you show even a little genuine empathy to others, you will see their eyes twinkle. That twinkle is not solely a sign of gratitude. It's a sign of rough times. A sign of starvation. We are emotionally and spiritually starved for empathy, kindness, authenticity, and a reconnection with our true selves. To continue starving, we should just keep doing what we're doing. Succeed more, acquire more, and win more at the expense of others and ourselves. I have a strong feeling however, that this road does not lead to happiness as we supposed.

Salvation, on the other hand, requires a raising of national consciousness to cultivate empathy and compassion in every single individual. Only when we step into the shoes of the other person can we even begin to understand the problem. Tenderness and kindness must also be reassociated with strength and virtue instead of weakness and despair. The obstacle? All of this goes against our nature. But then again, most great feats accomplished by our fellow men and women have gone against predictable human nature. Just ask Shakespeare, Gandhi, Benjamin Franklin, Jesus, Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Theresa,  the Buddha...

Empathy is not a faucet that turns on and off, it's an ability that must be trained. Begin at home. Begin with loved ones. Then practice, practice, practice. It may be the greatest gift you ever give yourself and others.

Further Reading

• Rich, Free, & Miserable 
• Humanity on a Tightrope
• Culture of Narcissism
• The Lonely Crowd
• Revolutionary Road
• Generation Me
• The Overspent American

An Internal Inferno

I would like to share the following link and article with you, dear readers, while I finish an extensive sociological post for the blog. 

The link leads to a fast, free, and easy meditative exercise. Try to observe your urges!  
http://www.donothingfor2minutes.com/

The article is Sam Harris' answer to the 2011 Edge World Question: "What scientific concept would improve everybody's cognitive toolkit?" It's an eloquently written piece on meditation by a neuroscientist.

Enjoy.
____________________________________

SAM HARRIS
Neuroscientist; Chairman, Project Reason; Author, The Moral Landscape

We are Lost in Thought

I invite you to pay attention to anything — the sight of this text, the sensation of breathing, the feeling of your body resting against your chair — for a mere sixty seconds without getting distracted by discursive thought. It sounds simple enough: Just pay attention. The truth, however, is that you will find the task impossible. If the lives of your children depended on it, you could not focus on anything — even the feeling of a knife at your throat — for more than a few seconds, before your awareness would be submerged again by the flow of thought. This forced plunge into unreality is a problem. In fact, it is the problem from which every other problem in human life appears to be made.

I am by no means denying the importance of thinking. Linguistic thought is indispensable to us. It is the basis for planning, explicit learning, moral reasoning, and many other capacities that make us human. Thinking is the substance of every social relationship and cultural institution we have. It is also the foundation of science. But our habitual identification with the flow of thought — that is, our failure to recognize thoughts as thoughts, as transient appearances in consciousness — is a primary source of human suffering and confusion.

Our relationship to our own thinking is strange to the point of paradox, in fact. When we see a person walking down the street talking to himself, we generally assume that he is mentally ill. But we all talk to ourselves continuously — we just have the good sense to keep our mouths shut. Our lives in the present can scarcely be glimpsed through the veil of our discursivity: We tell ourselves what just happened, what almost happened, what should have happened, and what might yet happen. We ceaselessly reiterate our hopes and fears about the future. Rather than simply exist as ourselves, we seem to presume a relationship with ourselves. It's as though we are having a conversation with an imaginary friend possessed of infinite patience. Who are we talking to?

While most of us go through life feeling that we are the thinker of our thoughts and the experiencer of our experience, from the perspective of science we know that this is a distorted view. There is no discrete self or ego lurking like a minotaur in the labyrinth of the brain. There is no region of cortex or pathway of neural processing that occupies a privileged position with respect to our personhood. There is no unchanging "center of narrative gravity" (to use Daniel Dennett's phrase). In subjective terms, however, there seems to be one — to most of us, most of the time.

Our contemplative traditions (Hindu, Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Jewish, etc.) also suggest, to varying degrees and with greater or lesser precision, that we live in the grip of a cognitive illusion. But the alternative to our captivity is almost always viewed through the lens of religious dogma. A Christian will recite the Lord's Prayer continuously over a weekend, experience a profound sense of clarity and peace, and judge this mental state to be fully corroborative of the doctrine of Christianity; A Hindu will spend an evening singing devotional songs to Krishna, feel suddenly free of his conventional sense of self, and conclude that his chosen deity has showered him with grace; a Sufi will spend hours whirling in circles, pierce the veil of thought for a time, and believe that he has established a direct connection to Allah.

The universality of these phenomena refutes the sectarian claims of any one religion. And, given that contemplatives generally present their experiences of self-transcendence as inseparable from their associated theology, mythology, and metaphysics, it is no surprise that scientists and nonbelievers tend to view their reports as the product of disordered minds, or as exaggerated accounts of far more common mental states — like scientific awe, aesthetic enjoyment, artistic inspiration, etc.

Our religions are clearly false, even if certain classically religious experiences are worth having. If we want to actually understand the mind, and overcome some of the most dangerous and enduring sources of conflict in our world, we must begin thinking about the full spectrum of human experience in the context of science.

But we must first realize that we are lost in thought.

Link: http://www.edge.org/q2011/q11_12.html#harriss

Our Time in the Sun

Life is short, but it's also wide.

Now, in the midst of a career change, I've had no choice but to tackle the next question without flinching: How should I choose to live my life? Should my aim be on altruism? Should I focus on prestige? How about adventure? Or acquiring knowledge? What about making a lot of money? What about purchasing a house? Should I just unfurl my sails and let the winds take me as they please? Or should I postpone simple pleasures and lay foundations for a family instead? There doesn't seem to be a definite answer, but one thing sure is clear: school didn't prepare me for this shit.

In the confusion, I look to others around me - how did they decide? Computer programmers, logistics coordinators, bartenders, account executives, theater actors, public accountants, investment bankers, medical malpractice lawyers, audio visual technicians, automobile mechanics, mobile phone salesmen, etc. They chose, but did they place these career decisions against the greater backdrop of life itself when choosing? Or did they (and I) base their decisions on much less profound considerations? I think so.

We choose as if we will live forever.

Here is the meat of my point: If this life is our only shot at existence; if after death there is nothing; if there will never be anything again for you and for me; if this is our only time in the sun, then, shouldn't we give a little more thought to the question of how we should spend our lives? Imagine a hypothetical situation: You die and you are told that you have 24 hours to reflect on your life (albeit in perhaps a gaseous, ethereal form). You are also told that once the 24 hours are up, you're done: your consciousness is erased. Forever. So while you're there floating and torturing yourself for the next 24 hours, would you think of better ways you could have spent your life? Would regret rear its ugly head? Of course it would. For example: "Damn, I knew I should have said 'yes' to that threesome at 22." We'd be a pretty pissed off bunch of gasses for our last 24 hours. Well, gather 'round, my dear fleeting gasses, and contemplate the following 2 cheery excerpts on the topic:

You live as if you were destined to live forever, no thought of your frailty ever enters your head, of how much time has already gone by you take no heed. You squander time as if you drew from a full and abundant supply, though all the while that day which you bestow on some person or thing is perhaps your last. You have all the fears of mortals and all the desires of immortals. You will hear many men saying: "After my fiftieth year I shall retire into leisure, my sixtieth year shall release me from public duties." And what guarantee, pray, have you that your life will last as long?

But when at last some infirmity has reminded [old men] of their mortality, in what terror do they die, feeling that they are being dragged out of life, and not merely leaving it. They cry out that they have been fools, because they have not really lived, and that they will live henceforth in leisure if only they escape from this illness; then at last they reflect how uselessly they have striven for things which they did not enjoy, and how all their toil has gone for nothing.

- Seneca, On the Shortness of Life

If we were absolutely certain that there was no afterlife and that what awaits us after death is the same as what we experienced before life (i.e. nothing) would we lead our lives differently today? Would we choose our careers differently? Or would we just say "fuck it," avoid futile contemplation of this behemothic issue, sidestep it altogether, and become discount mattress salesmen? At least we'd have "employee of the month" awards to look forward to.

My refusal to avoid sidestepping this question has led me to the intriguing field of positive psychology: the scientific study of happiness, human flourishing, and the search for meaning. This is what I've been spending a considerable amount of time researching these days. After all, can you think of a more significant matter of concern than the maximization of happiness, or better yet, the study of how to best appreciate our brief time in the spotlight of existence? The premise of this new branch of psychology is that certain "things" (i.e. emotions, activities, pursuits, ideas, institutions) provide us with more lasting happiness than other "things." So essentially, we can scientifically prove where, or from what, we procure the most lasting happiness. We can scientifically suggest what is most worth pursuing in this life. Perhaps positive psychology can then provide a few solid answers to this post's opening question. I'm looking, I'm looking...

There is no right or wrong here. I'm just as ignorant as we all are on this issue. This is just something I believe is worth contemplating for you and for me. And if you're a discount mattress salesman, drop me a line with your contact info - I'm in the market. Good luck.

The Need to Argue

One fire cannot put out another fire. You must use water.

As I had hoped, my experience in Thailand has indeed changed my perspective on various aspects of human nature. How could it not? People who are subjected to intense life experiences (i.e. surviving cancer, death of a direct family member, etc.) often report a drastic refocusing of their life priorities and behavioral changes in their interpersonal relationships. Petty concerns are consciously acknowledged for being what they are - petty - and appreciation for the most important aspects of one's life increases. I've been a long-time believer that, in our society, we are conditioned to overvalue too many things that not only hold little significance on our happiness, but also hijack our focus from the truly important things in life. One of these overvalued phenomena is the need to argue.

Brad Pitt accurately described the importance of arguing when filming The Curious Case of Benjamin Button:

"Angie and I do not fight anymore. What occurred to me on this film, and also with the passing of her mother [Marcheline Bertrand in 2007], is that there's going to come a time when I'm not going to get to be with this person anymore. And so, if we have a flare-up, it evaporates now. I don't want to waste time being angry at someone I love."

Negative aspects of arguing:

• Increases your vulnerability to negative emotions - anger, fear, insecurity, jealousy, etc.
• Increases stress and tension in the initiator AND the receiver.
• Makes your mind more prone to arguing in the future (habituation).
• It's simply an illusory need.
  
  
  My natural reaction to someone initiating an argument with me is to argue harder. I want to win, damnit. I need to win. My ego needs this shit. Sometimes even simply getting louder gives you an edge. Some people pride themselves on their arguing skills. There are books on how to argue and win. But even though it's human nature to argue, it's counter-intuitive and animalistic to think of "winning" conflicts against people we love. Aren't we on the same team? Is there another way to be understood besides arguing? There is, but it's extremely difficult - don't argue. I'm not being sarcastic. 

Let it go. Do not follow the tension. Do not follow the anger. Simply observe it in the other person. Observe the tension building in yourself. See the emotion for what it is, and nothing more. It's just tension. Don't give in. If you do, all you will be doing is fanning the flames instead of putting the fire out. And fire is an unruly playtoy. These words are so simple to say, so simple to grasp, so simple to advocate, but putting these ideas into practice is a lesson in humility and, very often, futility, because it goes against our nature.

-Our brains have evolved for success and survival, not for happiness-

All of this sounds unrealistic, I know. Especially because arguing sometimes gives rise to powerful lessons and stronger relational bonds. I'm not oblivious. But I am realizing that those same lessons can be learned, and those relationships can be equally (or more greatly) strengthened through more positive means. Means that don't expose you or others to the destructive risks of arguing.

Bottom line: Serious arguments (with strong tones, insults, attacks, defenses, etc.) are always a surrender to negative emotions. Some arguments do teach valuable lessons, but these lessons and other benefits are more effectively acquired with a combination of compassion and a tight grip on the other emotions.

I Resolve

Your mind is not a single, unified, entity. It is a committee.

We think we are in control of our behaviors. But what happens if you've sworn off smoking and a single stressful moment "pushes you" to buy the next last pack? Or if you are following a strict diet, but the waiter places a slice of warm chocolate cake with pecans and a side of cool vanilla ice cream (or whatever dessert you like) on the table in front of you? What about when you decide to work out every single day for the next 3 months? Or when you decide to become more optimistic? Or when you decide to remain forever faithful to your partner? How about when you decide to become a less angry person? Why do we all know that lasting commitment to most of our conscious and rational decisions is so difficult? Are you really in control of your decisions? If not, then who, or what, is?

Well, whatever it is, it usually fucks up our New Year's resolutions. Sometimes even before we even get a chance to start them.

Our minds are in conflict. The young and relatively weak rational part of our brain (prefrontal cortex) allows us to announce the types of decisions mentioned above. But the following-through becomes subject to a heated debate... inside your brain... with an older, stronger, more developed, but much more primitive part.

"I have to work out... but I'm so tired."
"I know I quit smoking... but I'm so stressed."
"I can't do this, I'm married... but no one will ever find out..."
"I have to put the condom on... but it feels so good..."
"I love him... but he really crossed the line this time..."
"I love psychology/dancing/filmmaking... but business is so much safer..."

We (our rational parts) attempt to exert control over a much more powerful entity that, for the most part, doesn't really care what we initially decide. We are the rider on top of an elephant. When the beast is calm, the rider remains in control, but when desire, fear, or any other emotion sets in... are you (the rider) any match for a 20,000 pound elephant? The elephant wants you to be angry. It wants you to be fearful. It wants you to act on every desire. It wants you to eat that chocolate cake. And it is very powerful. The only way to prevail is, not to force the elephant to listen to the rider - you are no match for it - but to slowly, gradually, and calmly train it to obey.

To develop self-control, it must be trained. To develop commitment, it must be trained. To develop emotional regulation, it must be trained. Little by little over an extended period of time. We seldom acknowledge how utterly difficult it is to change our behavior and to change our minds. We become resolute in our decisions only through habit, only through developing patterns, only through repeated practice. Deciding to produce a fast and permanent change in our behavior, as with a New Year's resolution, is as unrealistic as walking up to a wild elephant in the Serengeti, commanding him to bend over, allowing you to climb on his back, and expecting to be given a pleasant ride to the nearest visitor center.

We can be successful in changing our behaviors and psychology helps us pinpoint the best way of doing so. I wish you all the best with your resolutions.