And just what crazy half-illuminated Afterlife are you from! The Great Promise of Unlimited Progress—the promise of domination of nature, of material abundance, of the greatest happiness for the greatest number, and of unimpeded personal freedom—has sustained the hopes and faith of the generations since the beginning of the industrial age. To be sure, our civilization began when the human race started taking active control of nature; but that taking control remained until the advent of the industrial age. Within industrial progress, from the substitution of mechanical and then nuclear energy for animal and human energy to the substitution of the computer for the human mind, we could feel that we were on our way to unlimited production and, hence, unlimited consumption; that technique made us omnipotent; that science made us omniscient. We were on our way to becoming gods, supreme beings who could create a second World, using the natural World only as building blocks for our new creation. Men and women experienced a new sense of freedom; they became masters of their own lives: feudal chains had been broken and one could do what one wished, free of every shackle. Or so people felt. And even though this was true only for the upper and middle classes, their achievement could lead others to the faith that eventually the new freedom could be extended to all members of society, provided industrialization kept up its pace. #RandolphHarris 1 of 9

The achievement of wealth and comfort for all was supposed to result in unrestricted happiness for all. The trinity of unlimited production, absolute freedom, and unrestricted happiness formed the nucleus of a new religion, Progress, and a new Earthly City of Progress was to replace the City of God. It is not at all astonishing that this new religion provided its believers with energy, vitality, and hope. The grandeur of the Great Promise, the marvelous material and intellectual achievement of the industrial age, must be visualized in order to understand the trauma that realization of its failure is producing today. For the industrial age has indeed failed to fulfill its Great Promise, and ever growing numbers of people are becoming aware that: unrestricted satisfaction of all desires is not conducive to well-being, nor is it the way to happiness or even maximum pleasure. The dream of being independent masters of our lives ended when we began awakening to the fat that we have all become cogs in the bureaucratic machine, with our thoughts, feelings, and tastes manipulated by government and industry and the mass communications that they control. Economic progress has remained restricted to the rich nations, and the gap between rich and poor nations has ever widened. Technical progress itself has created ecological dangers and the dangers of nuclear war, either or both of which may put an end to al civilization and possibly to all life. #RandolphHarris 2 of 9

If we consider separately the technical and the social aspects of the work situation, we find that many types of work would be attractive as far as the technical aspect is concerned, provided the social aspects were satisfactory; on the other hand, there are types of work where the technical aspects can by its very nature not be interesting, and yet where the social aspect of the work situation could make it meaningful and attractive.  Starting with the discussion of the first instance, we find that there are many people who would, for example, take keen pleasure in being a locomotive engineer. However, although railroad engineering is one of the highest paid and most respected positions in the working class, with the average salary of nearly $88,680.00, it is, nevertheless, not the fulfillment of the ambition of those who are looking for stability because of the increasing threat to fossil fuels. No doubt, many a business executive would find more pleasure in being a railroad engineer than in their own work if the social and political context of the career were different. Let us take another example: that of the waiter in a restaurant. This job could be an exceedingly attractive one for many people, provided in social and political prestige and political context were different. With mandatory pay increases and mandated healthy insurance, this could affect how much people eat out and tip, so it could decrease the amount people take home in tips. #RandolphHarris 3 of 9

Being a waiter permits of constant interpersonal intercourse, and to people who like food, it gives pleasure to advise others about it, to serve it pleasantly, and so on. Many a person would find much more pleasure in working as a waiter than in sitting in one’s office over meaningless figures and scripts were it not for low appreciation socially of what services are being provided and the income insecurity of this job. Again, many others would love the job of a cab driver, as in New York City they can make $90,766.00 a year, were it not for its negative social and economic aspects now that ride sharing is more readily available and trendy. It is often said that there are certain types of work which nobody would want to perform unless it was part of their family heritage or unless they were forced to do so because of economic necessity due to the health and safety risks involved; the work of a miner is often given as an example. Generally, oil and gas and mining; construction; manufacturing; and wholesale trade, transportation, warehousing and waste handling are fairly high paid careers. Compensation in these sectors average $58,000.00 a year; in oil and gas, pay tops $100,000.00. However, considering the diversity of people, and of their conscious and unconscious fantasies, it seems that there would be a considerable number of people for whom working within the Earth, and extracting its riches would have a great attraction were it not for the social, political, and financial disadvantages of this work. #RandolphHarris 4 of 9

When you take into consideration that you are risking your life and healthy and there is growing instability in the field, due to the political climate, one is being asked to potentially give up a lot. There is hardly any kind of work which would not attract certain types of personalities, provided it were freed from the negative aspects, socially, politically, and economically. However, even granted that the foregoing considerations are correct, it is undoubtedly true that much of the highly routinized work which is required by mechanized industry cannot in itself be a source of pleasure or satisfaction. Here again the differentiation between the technical and the social aspects of the work proves to be important. While the technical aspects may indeed by uninteresting, the total work situation may offer a good deal of satisfaction. Here is another example which serve to illustrate this point. Let us compare a housewife or househusband who takes care of the house and does the cooking, with a housekeeper who is paid for doing exactly the same work. Both for the housewife or househusband and the housekeeper, the work in its technical aspects is the same, and it is not particularly interesting. Yet it will have an entirely different meaning and satisfaction for the two, provided we think of a woman or a man with a happy relationship to their partner and children, and of an average housekeeper, who has no sentimental attachment to his or her employer. To the former, the work will not be drudgery, while to the latter it will be exactly that, and the only reason for doing it is that one needs the money paid for it. #RandolphHarris 5 of 9

The reason for this difference is perception between the housekeeper and the housewife or househusband is obvious: while the work is the same in its technical aspects, the work situation is entirely different. For the housewife or househusband, it is part of one’s total relationship to one’s partner and children, and in this sense one’s work is meaningful. The housekeeper does not participate in the satisfaction of this social aspect of the work. An error does not become a mistake until you refuse to correct it.  Clearly we can see that learning and comprehension is a process that can be accomplished through instruction, it can also be brought about through other methods. How important is learning? It occurs all the time, whether we are aware of it or not. In addition to physiological and maturational development, it is the process through which we change and become the people that we are. The first step in overcoming problems is to understand their causes. What has been happening in our Western World that individuals and nations should be buffeted about by so much confusion and bewilderment? To dare to face the situation, we have to become superhuman, but the superhuman with the superhuman power has not risen to the level of superhuman reason. To the degree which one’s power grows one becomes more and more a poor mortal. #RandolphHarris 6 of 9

It must shake up our conscience that we become all the more inhuman the more we grow into superhumans. The values and goals of Western society are in a state of transition. What, specifically, are the values that we have lost? One of the two central beliefs in the modern period since the Renaissance has been in the value of individual competition. The conviction was that the more a mortal worked to further one’s own economic self-interest and to become wealthy, the more one would contribute to the material progress of the community. This famous laissez-faire theory in economics worked well for several centuries. It was true through the early and growing stages of modern industrialism and capitalism that for you or me to strive to become rich by increasing our trade or building a bigger factory would eventually mean the production of more material goods for the community. The pursuit of competitive enterprise was a magnificent and courageous idea in its heyday. However, in modern times considerable changes have occurred. In our preset day of giant business and monopoly capitalism how many people can become successful as individual competitors? There are very few groups left who, like doctors and psychotherapists and some farmers, still have the luxury of being their own economic bosses—and even they are subject to the rise and fall of prices and the fluctuating market like everyone else. #RandolphHarris 7 of 9

The vast majority of working people and capitalists alike, professional people or business people, must fit into broad groups such as labor unions or big industries or university systems, or they would not survive economically at all. We have been taught to strive to get ahead of the next mortal, but actually today one’s success depends much more on how well one learns to work with one’s fellow workers. I have just read that even the individual crook cannot make out very well on one’s own these days: one has to join a racket! Looking at the fake news media and how they now collaborate with private and even government institutions, we can see it is true. We do not mean that something is wrong with individual effort and initiative as such. Indeed, the chief argument is that unique powers and initiative of each individual must be rediscovered, and used as a basis for work which contributes to the good of the community, rather than melted down in the collectivist pot of conformity. Scientific and other advances have made us much more closely interdependent in our nation as well as in our World, and individualism must become a different thing from each person for oneself and the devil take the hindmost. If you or I had a farm to carve out of the frontier forest two centuries ago, or possessed a little capital with which to start a new business last century, the philosophy of each person for oneself would have brought out the best in us and resulted in the best for the community. #RandolphHarris 8 of 9

This brings us to the relation between the soul and the special problem of modern Western mortals, namely, the tendency to get absorbed in the herd, lost in das Mann. The soul is an anonymity. The impersonal soul makes us all anonymous—nature draws no distinction between me and any illiterate peasant who also is its tool in its relentless drive toward self-increase, who copulates and begets offspring to perpetuate the race, and who can experience rage to keep oneself alive long enough to serve as nature’s procreator. Speaking psychoanalytically, this is the soul in the form of the is. In our bourgeois, industrialized society, mortal’s most effective way of evading the soul is by losing oneself in the herd. Right now God is breathing on your dreams. He is going to multiply what you have. He will multiply your talent, your resources, and your creativity. This is not the time to shrink back in fear. This is the time to move forward in faith. Get up every morning knowing you are anointed. You are equipped. You are empowered. You have everything you need to fulfill your destiny. However many blessings we expect from God, his infinite liberality will always exceed all our wishes and our thoughts. God is always trying to give good things to us, but our hands are too full to receive them. I want to know God’s thoughts. The rest are details. #RandolphHarris 9 of 9