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Perhaps the Kingdom of Heaven has Changed when the Summer Folded Her Miracle?
There are a number of ways in which a person can be helped to cultivate a set of values that represent the fullest expression of who one is and which are fairly workable within the limits of the society in which one lives. There are motives that are universal to each member of the species of Homo Sapiens. At the core level are the physiological motives, those tensions created by tissue needs—hunger, thirst, elimination, air, and so on. Few humans and animals ignore them. After these are put into proper perspective, into a relatively regulated process, humans are motivated by needs for safety, for love and belongingness, for esteem and ego-identity, and for self-actualization. The self-actualizing person, our model of mental and emotion health, is a person who recognizes first of all one’s terrestrial nature as well as one’s divine nature. One is a person whose value system is based on this recognition of one’s many-sided nature. An individual appreciates one’s natures, one tries to gear one’s life to the optimum meeting of all his or her needs, the individual recognizes these needs in others and one tries to create a World in which he or she and all others can meet their needs. The contemporary social character seems to touch upon the deepest level of the modern personality; it is the most appropriate if one is concerned with the interaction between the contemporary socioeconomic structure of the average individual. #RandolphHarris 1 of 19
There is also a level of alienation, which is one of the fundamental economic features of Capitalism, the process of quantification and abstraction. The modern business person not only deals with millions of dollars, but also with millions of customers, thousands of stockholders, and thousands of workers and employees; all these people become so many pieces in a gigantic machine which must be controlled, whose effects must be calculated; each mortal eventually can be expressed as an abstract entity, as a figure, and on this basis economic occurrences are calculated, trends are predicted, decisions are made. Today, when only about 40 percent of our working population is self-employed, the rest for somebody else, and a mortal’s life is dependent on someone who pays one a wage or a salary. However, we should say something, instead of someone, because a worker is hired and fired by an institution, the managers of which are impersonal parts of the enterprise, rather than people in personal contact with the mortals they employ. Let us not forget another fact: in pre-capitalistic society, exchange was to a large extent one of the goods and services; today, all work is rewarded with money. The close fabric of economic relations is regulated by money, the abstract expression of work—that is to say, we receive different quantities of the same for different qualities; and we give money for what we receive—again exchanging only different qualities. #RandolphHarris 2 of 19
Practically nobody, with the exception of the farm population, could live for even a few days without receiving and spending money, which stands for the abstract quality of concrete work. In the modern industrial enterprise, when it comes to the division of labor, the worker is not in touch with the is not in touch with the whole product at any point, unlike in the past when there was more vertical integration. Now days, the worker is engaged in the performance of one specialized function, and while he or she might shift in the course of time from one function to another, one is still not related to the concrete product as a whole. The worker develops a specialized function, and the tendency is such, that the function of the modern industrial worker can be defined as working in a machine like fashion in activities for which machine work has not yet been devised or which would be costlier than human work. The only person who is in touch with the whole product is the manager, but to he or she the product is an abstraction, whose essence is exchange value, while the worker, for whom it is concrete, never works on it as a whole. #RandolphHarris 3 of 19
Undoubtedly without quantification and abstraction modern mass production would be unthinkable. However, in a society in which economic activities have become the main preoccupation of mortals, this process of quantification and abstractification has transcended the realm of economic production, and spread to the attitude of mortals to things, to people, and to oneself. We are starting to relate to ourselves as objects: one can relate to oneself to it in its full concreteness, then the object appears with all its specific qualities, and there is no other object which is identical with it. And one can relate oneself to the object in abstract ways, that is, emphasizing only those qualities which it has in common with all other objects of the same genus, and this accentuating some and ignoring other qualities. The full and productive relatedness to an object comprises this polarity of perceiving it in its uniqueness, and at the same time in its generality; in its concreteness, and at the same time in its abstractness. In Western culture this polarity has given way to an almost exclusive reference to the abstract qualities of things and people, and to a neglect of relating oneself to their concreteness and uniqueness. We are supposed to have an efficient perception of reality and a comfortable relationship with it so we can detect what is real and authentic and gravitate toward it. #RandolphHarris 4 of 19
However, many people are now dividing reality and unreality into mutually exclusive compartments. They no longer know and appreciate the facts of existence because they are minimizing the importance of imagination, fantasy, dreaming, and fiction. Instead of forming abstract concepts where it is necessary and useful, everything, including ourselves, is being abstractified; the concrete reality of people and things to which we can relate with the reality of our own person, is replaced by abstractions, by ghosts that embody different quantities, but not different qualities. It is quite customary to talk about a three-million-dollar house, a hundred-thousand-dollar car, a fifteen-thousand-dollar watch, and this not only from the standpoint of the manufacturer or the consumer in the process of buying it, but as the essential point in the description. When one speaks of the three-million-dollar house, one is not primarily concerned with its usefulness or beauty, that is, with its concrete qualities, but one speaks of it as a commodity, the main quality of which is its exchange value, expressed in a quantity, that of money. This does not mean, of course, that one is not concerned also with the usefulness or beauty of the house, but it does mean that its concrete (use) value is secondary to its abstract (exchange) value in the way the object is experiences. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19
The famous line by Gertrude Stein “a rose is a rose is a rose,” is a protest against this abstract form of experience; for most people a rose is just not a rose, but a flower in a certain price range, to be bought on certain social occasions; even the most beautiful flower, provided it is a wild one, costing nothing, is not experienced in its beauty, compared to that of the rose, because it has no exchange value. In other words, things are experienced as commodities, as embodiments of exchange value, not only while we are buying or selling, but in our attitude toward them when the economic transaction is finished. A thing, even after it has been bought, never quite loses its quality as a commodity in this sense; it is expendable, always retaining its exchange value quality. A good illustration of this attitude is to be found in the behavior displayed by a homeowner, Justin. During one of the first days after they had moved into a new house they just had built for them, he got a call from a real estate agent, saying that some people were interested in buying that particular house and wanted to look at it. Although he knew that it was most unlikely that the family would want to sell their new home a few days after they had moved in, he could not resist the temptation to know whether the value of the house had risen since they had bought it. #RandolphHarris 6 of 19
Justin spent one or two valuable hours showing the real estate agent around the house. He writes: “Very interested in fact we can get an offer for more than we have invested into this house. Nice coincidence that offer comes before we moved all our furniture in. All agree it will be good for our family’s morale to learn that the house will sell for a good deal more than we spent to have it built. Let us see what happens.” In spite of all the pride and pleasure in the new house, it had still retained its quality as a commodity, as something exchangeable, and to which no full sense of possession or use had been attached yet because it had not been lived in. The same attitude is obvious in the relationship of people to the cars they buy; the car never becomes fully a thing to which one is attached, for many people, but retains its quality as a commodity to be exchanged in a successful bargain; thus, cars are sold after a year or two, long before their use value is exhausted or even considerably diminished. This abstraction takes place even with regard to phenomena which are not commodities sold on the market, like a flood disaster; the newspaper will headline a flood, speaking of a “million-dollar catastrophe,” emphasizing the abstract quantitative element rather than the concrete aspects of human suffering. #RandolphHarris 7 of 19
However, the abstactifying and quantifying attitude goes far beyond the realm of things. People are also experienced as the embodiment of a quantitative exchange of value. To speak of a man as being “worth one hundred and fifty million dollars,” is to speak of him not any more as a concrete human person, but as an abstraction, whose essence can be expressed in a figure. It is an expression of the same attitude when a newspaper headlines an obituary with the words “Rifle Heiress Dies.” Actually a woman has died, a woman with certain human qualities, with hopes and frustrations, wit a husband and children. It is true that she manufactures guns, or rather, that she owned and managed a corporation in which workers served machines manufacturing guns; but if it is said that a “Rifle Heiress Dies,” the richness and concreteness of a human life is expressed in the abstract formula of economic function. The same abstractifying approach can be seen in expressions like “Mr. Ford produced so many automobiles,” or this or that general “conquered a fortress”; or if a person has a house built for oneself, he or she says, “I built a house.” Concretely speaking, Mr. Ford did not manufacture the automobiles; he directed automobile production which was executed by thousands of workers. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19
The general never conquered the fortress; he was sitting in his headquarters, issuing orders, and his soldiers did the conquering. The man did not build the house; he paid the money to an architect who made the plans and to contractors who did the building. All this is not said to minimize the significance of the managing and directing operations, but in order to indicate that in this way of experiencing things, sight of what goes on concretely is lost, and an abstract view is taken in which one function, that of making plans, giving orders, or financing an activity, is identified with the whole concrete process of production, or of fighting, or of building, as the case may be. The same process of abstractification takes place in all other spheres. A Newspaper recently printed a news item under the heading: “B.Sc. + PhD. = $3 million.” The information under this somewhat baffling heading was that statistical data showed that a student of engineering who had acquired his Doctor’s degree will earn, in a lifetime, $3 million more than a person who has only the degree of Bachelor of Sciences. As far as this is a fact it is an interesting socioeconomic datum, worth reporting. #RandolphHarris 9 of 19
The economic equation is mentioned because the way of expressing the fact as an equation between a scientific degree and a certain amount of dollars is indicative of the abstractifying and quantifying thinking in which knowledge is experienced as the embodiment of a certain exchange value on the personality market. It is to the same point when a political report in a news magazine states that the President Trump administration feels it has so much “capital of confidence” that it can risk some unpopular measures, because it can afford to lose some of the confidence capital. Here again, a human quality like confidence is expressed in its abstract form, as if it were a money investment to be dealt with in terms of a market speculation. How drastically commercial categories have entered even religious thinking is show in the following passage by Bishop Sheen, in an article on the birth of Christ. “Our reason tells us that if anyone of the claimants (for the role of God’s son) came from God, the least that God could do to support His Representative’s claim would be to preannounce His coming. Automobile manufacturers tell us when to expect a new model,” so writes the author. Or even more drastically, Billy Graham, the evangelists declared, “I am selling the greatest product in the World; why should not it be promoted as well as soap?” #RandolphHarris 10 of 19
The process of abstractification, however, has still deeper roots and manifestations than the ones described so far, roots which go back to the very beginning of the modern era; to the dissolution of any concrete frame of reference in the process of life. In a primitive society, the World is identical with the tribe. The tribe is in the center of the Universe, as it were; everything outside is shadowy and has no independent existence. In the medieval World, the Universe was much wider; it was seen with the Earth as the center and mortals as the purpose of Creation. Everything had its fixed place, just as everybody had one’s fixed position in feudal society. With the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, new vistas opened up. The Earth lost its central place, and became one of the satellites of the Sun; new continents were found, new sea lanes discovered; the static social system was more and more loosened up; everything and everybody was moving. Yet, until the end of the nineteenth century, nature and society had not lost their concreteness and definiteness. Mortal’s natural and social World was still manageable, still has definite contours. However, with the progress in scientific thought, technical discoveries and the dissolution of all traditional bonds, this definiteness and concreteness is in the process of being lost. #RandolphHarris 11 of 19
Whether we think of our new cosmological picture, or of theoretical physics, or of atonal music, or abstract art—the concreteness and definiteness of our frame of reference is disappearing. We are not any more the center of the Universe, we are not any more the purpose of Creation, we are not any more the masters of a manageable and recognizable World—we are a speck of dust, we are a nothing, somewhere in space—without any kind of concrete relatedness to anything. We speak of millions of people being killed, of one third or more of our population being wiped out if a third World War should occur; we speak of trillions of dollars piling up as a national debt, of thousands of lights years as interplanetary distances, of interspace travel, of artificial satellites. Tens of thousands work in one enterprise, hundreds of thousands live in hundreds of cities. The dimension with which we deal are figures and abstractions; they are far beyond the boundaries which would permit of any kind of concrete experience. There is no frame of reference left in which is manageable, observable, which is adapted to human dimensions. While our eyes and ears receive impressions only in humanly manageable proportions, our concept of the World has lost just that quality; it does not any longer correspond to our human dimensions. #RandolphHarris 12 of 19
This is especially significant in connection with the development of modern means of destruction. In modern war, one individual can cause the destruction of hundreds of thousands of men, women, children, and animals. One could do so by pushing a button; one may not feel the emotional impact of what one is doing, since one does not know how they people whom one kills; it is almost as if one act of pushing the button or pulling the plug and their death had no real connection. The same person would probably be incapable of even cursing, not to speak of killing, a helpless person. In the latter case, the concrete situation arouses in one a conscience reaction common to all normal people; in the former, there is no such reactions, because the act and one’s object are alienated from the doer, one’s action is not that individual’s any more, but has, so to speak, a life and a responsibility of its own. Science, business, politics, have lost all foundations and proportions which make sense humanly. We live in figures and abstractions; since nothing is concrete, nothing is real. Everything is possible, factually and morally. Science fiction is not different from science fact, nightmares and dreams from the events of next year. Mortals have been thrown out from any definite place whence one can overlook and manage one’s life and the life of society. #RandolphHarris 13 of 19
Mortals are driven faster and faster by the forces which originally were created by them. In this wild whirl mortals thinks, figures, busy with abstractions, ore and more remote from concrete life. People used to have the ability to accept themselves, other people, and nature as they are. They did not experience extended morbid psychological guilt, anxiety, shame, anger, or chagrin. The emotions were there as they were in most people, but extreme degrees and prolongation are becoming more common. Many people are replacing their humanity with idolatry of money. Some of these people no longer enjoy eating, they think a shake, pill, or tea can adequality nourish them. Virtual intimate encounters are replacing passionate relationships. Pills and coffee and other substance are meant to replace sleep. Machines, computers, and robots are replacing workers. Physical activity is being replaced by virtual reality and medical procedures for weight loss are increasingly common. Many people are also more defensive than they should be. They are particularly disgusted by bodily functions, as they do not see them as normal and natural. They are car more about what other people might say about them and no longer seem to behave spontaneously and naturally. #RandolpHarris 14 of 19
The Existentialist point of view is being lost. Existentialism is a philosophical movement stressing individual existence and holding that mortals are totally free and responsible for their acts. The existence of mortals in their World is being put into brackets. Mortals become pure consciousness, a naked epistemological subject; the World (including mortal’s psychosomatic being) becomes an object of scientific inquiry and technical management. Mortals in their existential predicament disappear. It is, therefore, quite adequate that behind the sum lies the problem of the nature of this sum which is more than consciousness—namely existence in time and space and under the conditions of finitude and estrangement. The Existentialist point of view deals with confrontation of human sin and divine forgiveness. However, much like during the Middle Ages, some people, in this technological era are so removed from spirituality that they believe in the doctrines of justification and predestination. As children of God, we are supposed to stress the unconditional character of the divine judgment and the free character of God’s forgiveness. We are also supposed to be suspicious of any analysis of human existence, that weaken the divine-human relationship. #RandolphHarris 15 of 19
Reasonable management of oneself and one’s World are part of what is required in the industrial and technological era. Existence is resolved into essence. The World is reasonable as it is. Existence is a necessary expression of essence. History is the manifestation of essential being under the conditions of existence. Its course can be understood and justified. A courage which conquers the negativities of the individual life is possible for those who participate in the universal process in which the absolute mind actualizes itself. The anxieties of fate, guilt, and doubt are overcome by means of an elevation through the different degrees of meanings toward the highest, the philosophical intuition of the universal process itself. We must unite the courage to be as a part (especially of a nation) wit the courage to be as oneself (especially as a thinker) in a courage which transcends both and has a mystical background. History is not a place where the individual can reach happiness. Either the individual must elevate oneself above the universal process to the situation of the intuiting philosopher or the existential problem of the individual is not solved. Self-actualizing, authentic people often act on impulse, on the basis of wanting to. Doing something because it feels good is not quite the same as infantile gratification-seeking or compulsive behavior. #RandolphHarris 16 of 19
Self-actualizers experience each moment as precious and valuable, as something to be enjoyed merely because it exists. They don the cloak of conformity voluntarily and with good grace because certain conforming behaviors may be important to people who are important to and loved by these self-actualizing people, not because they care whether people will talk if they do not. Their ethics tend to be humanistic; that is, they value human life, human experience, and they define good and evil in terms of what benefits and what detracts from human happiness. “Make room for us in your hearts. We have wronged no one, we have corrupted no one, we have exploited no one. I do not say this to condemn you; I have said before that you have such a place in our hearts that we would live or die with you. I have great confidence in you; I take great pride in you. I am greatly encouraged; in all our troubles my joy knows no bounds,” reports 2 Corinthians 7.2. It is important to remain problem-centered rather than self-centered. Self-actualizing people focus their energies and attention on things outside themselves, although the opposite may seem to be the case. #RandolphHarris 17 of 19
We are not mean to be seen as God’s perfect, bright-shining examples, but to been seen as the everyday essence of ordinary life exhibiting the miracle of God’s grace. People who are driven by their id are usually so hung-up on holding together a slipping sense of self-worth that one has not the time or energy for anybody else’s problems expect insofar as other people and their problems can help define one’s sense of self. Self-actualizing people have such a healthy self-appreciation and self-respect that they have time and energy to deal sincerely and genuinely with matters outside themselves. They are usually engaged in the larger issues of human experience, appear to have a goal or mission in life, and work on large-scale problems like poverty, bigotry, hostility, warfare, ecology, and so on. These individuals are Being-Motivated (or Growth-Motivated), as opposed to being Deficiency-Motivated. They express their fullness rather than attempt to fill voids. They have a sense of detachment. Self-actualizers like their own company and often enjoy privacy. Solicitude does not disturb or panic them. They can easily transcend the petty demands of environment, yet remain completely part of the World and its people. They are autonomous. B-Motivation enables these individuals to strike out on their own and to live their own lives. #RandolphHarris 18 of 19
D-Motivators are busy making up for deficiencies, compensating, or engaging in futile competition. Self-actualizing people need other people, but retain the right to make important decisions autonomously. When they seek out others for company, companionship, or advice, they tend to gravitate toward others with similar motivations. Your faith in Jesus Christ gives life enduring meaning. Remember, we are on a journey to exaltation. Sometimes we have experiences that yield more happiness than others, but it all has purpose with the Lord. We are a covenant people. If there is a distinguishing feature about self-actualizers it is that we make covenants. We need to be known as a covenant-keeping people as well. Making promises is easy, but to follow through and do what we have promised is another matter. We can remain true to our word by staying to the course, being constant and consistent. We are able to keep the faith and be faithful to the end despite success or failure, doubt or discouragement. The ability to draw near the Lord is another characteristic as it fulfills our hearts. We do whatever we promise to do with all out might—even when we might not feel like it. “And charity suffers long, and is kind, and does not envy, and is not puffed up, seeks not one’s own, is not easily provoked, thinks no evil, and rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices in truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.” reports Moroni 7.45 #RandolphHarris 19 of 19
Enlightened to a Larger Pain by the Contrast with the love–Was there Ever a Society where this Miracle Happened?
I went down to meet him. The evening was all aglow and full of the scent of the kitchens of the Quarter. I motioned for the guards to let him come back. He was in a frantic state. He was wearing the same three-piece white suit as yesterday, short now open, tie gone, and he was all rumpled and smudged with dirt and his hair was mussed. Drastic changes in industrial technique, economy, and social structures have occurred in Capitalism between the nineteenth and twenty first centuries. The changes in the character of mortals are no less drastic and fundamental. Capitalism in the United States of America is not only more powerful and more advanced than in Europe, it is also the model toward which European Capitalism is developing. It is such a model not because Europe is trying to imitate it, but because it is the most progressive form of Capitalism, freed from feudal remnants and shackles. The feudal heritage has, aside from its obvious negative qualities, many human traits which, compared with the attitude produced by pure Capitalism, are exceedingly attractive. European criticism of the United States of America is based essentially on the older human values of feudalism, inasmuch as they are alive in Europe. It is a criticism of the present in the name of a past which is rapidly disappearing in Europe itself. The difference between Europe and the United States of America in this respect is only the difference between an older and a newer phase of Capitalism, between Capitalism stilled blended with feudal remnants and a pure form of it. #RandolphHarris 1 of 15
The most obvious change from the nineteenth to the twenty first century is the increased use of steam engine, of the combustion motor, of electricity, the use of atomic energy, ethanol, and solar power. The development is characterized by the increasing replacement of manual work by machine work, and beyond that, of human intelligence by machine intelligence. While in 1850 mortals supplied 15 percent of the energy for work, animals 79 percent, and machines 6 percent, the ratio in 2019 is 3 percent, 1 percent and 96 percent respectively. In the twenty first century we find an increasing tendency to employ automatically regulated machines which have their own brains, and which bring about a fundamental change in the whole process of production. The technical change in the mode of production is caused by, and in its turn necessitates, an increasing concentration of capital. The decrease in number and importance of smaller firms is in direct proportion to the increase of big economic colossi. Currently, of the 2,400 independent American corporations covering most stock traded on the New York Stock Exchange, 30 companies control 47 percent of the assets of all the companies represented. Many of the largest nonbanking corporations control a vast majority of all the nonbanking corporate wealth. For instance, respectively 200 companies could control 300,000 smaller companies. #RandolphHarris 2 of 15
It must further be remembered that the influence of one of these huge companies extends far beyond the assets under its direct control. Smaller companies which sell to or buy from the larger companies are likely to be influenced by them to a vastly greater extent than by other smaller companies with which they might deal. In many cases the continued prosperity of the smaller company depends on the favor of the larger and almost inevitably the interests of the latter become the interests of the former. The influence of the larger company on prices is often greatly increased by its mere size, even though it does not begin to approach a monopoly. Its political influence may be tremendous. Therefore, if roughly half of the corporations and smaller companies it is fair to assume that very much more than half of industry is dominated by these great units. This concentration is made even more significant when it is recalled that a result of it, approximately 3,250 individuals out of a population of three hundred and twenty-five million are in a position to control and direct most of the American wealth and industry. This concentration of power has been growing since 1933, and has yet to stop. #RandolphHarris 3 of 15
The number of self-employed entrepreneurs has decreased considerably. While in the beginning of the nineteenth century approximately 80 percent of the occupied population were self-employed entrepreneurs, around 42 percent are now incorporated in this category. The eleven largest companies in America employ 20.18 million people. As these figure already indicate, with the concentration of enterprises goes an enormous increase of employees in these big enterprises. Altogether, nearly 50 percent of the United States of America’s population is middle class, 25 percent of American household are considered low income. With the increase in the importance of the giant enterprises, another development of utmost importance has occurred: the increasing separation of management from ownership. Another fundamental change from the nineteenth-century to contemporary Capitalism is the increase in significance of the domestic market. Our whole economic machines rests upon the principle of mass production and mass consumption. While in the nineteenth century the general tendency was to save, and not to indulge in expenses which could not be paid for immediately, the contemporary system is exactly the opposite. Everybody is coaxed into buying as much as one can, and before one has saved enough to pay for one’s purchases. #RandolphHarris 4 of 15
The need for more consumption is strongly stimulated by advertising and all other methods of psychological pressure. This development does hand in hand with the rise of the economic and social status of the working class. Especially in the United States of America, but all over Europe, the working class has participated in the increased production of the whole economic system. The salary of the worker, and one’s social benefits, permit one a level of consumption which would have seemed fantastic one hundred and fifty-six years ago. One’s social and economic power has increased to the same degree and this not only with regard to salary and social benefits, but also to one’s human and social role in the factory. The disappearance of feudal factors means the disappearance of irrational authority. Nobody is supposed to be higher than one’s neighbor by birth, God’s will, natural law. Everybody is equal and free. Nobody may be exploited or commanded by virtue of a natural right. If one person is commanded by another, it is because the commanding one bought the labor or the services of the commanded one, on the labor market; one commands because they are both free and equal and thus could enter into a contractual relationship. However, with irrational authority—rational authority became obsolete, too. #RandolphHarris 5 of 15
If the market and the contract regulates relationships, there is no need to know what is right and what is wrong and good and evil. All that is necessary is to known that things are fair—that the exchange is fair, and that things work—that they function. Another decisive fact which the twenty first century mortal experiences is the miracle of production. One commands forces thousands of times stronger than the ones nature ad given them before; steam, oil, electricity, have become their servants and beasts of burden. One crosses the oceans, the continents—first in weeks, then in days, now in hours and even minutes. One seemingly overcomes the law of gravity, and files through the air one converts deserts into fertile land, makes rain instead of praying for it. The miracle of production leads to the miracle of consumption. No more traditional barriers keep anyone from buying anything one takes a fancy to. One only needs to have the money. However, more and more people have the money—not for genuine pearls perhaps, but for the synthetic ones; there are even ethically sourced diamonds created in laboratories; people buy Fords that look like Cadillacs, for the affordable dress which look like the expensive ones, for cigarettes which are the same for millionaires and for the working person. #RandolphHarris 6 of 15
Everything is within reach, can be bought, can be consumed. Where was there ever a society where this miracle happened? Mortals work together. Millions stream into the industrial plants and the offices—they come in cars, airplanes, helicopters, in subways, in buses, in trains—they work together, according to a rhythm measured by the experts, with methods worked out by the experts, not too fast, not too slow, but together; each a part of the whole. The evening stream flows back: they read the same newspaper, they listen to the radio, they see the movies, the same for those on the top and for those at the bottom of the ladder, for the intelligent and the less advances, for the educated and those still learning. Produce, consume, enjoy together, in step, without asking questions. That is the rhythm of their lives. What kind of mortal, then does our society need? Wat is the social character suited to twenty-first-century Capitalism? It needs mortals who co-operate smoothly in large groups; who want to consume more and more, and whose tastes are standardized and can be easily influenced and anticipated. It needs mortals who feel free and independent, not subject to any authority, or principle, or conscience—yet willing to be commanded, to do what is expected, to fit into the social machine without friction. #RandolphHarris 7 of 15
How can mortals be guided without force, led without leaders, be prompted without any aim—expect the one to be on the move, to function, to go ahead? Let us approach this from the point of what we do when we live our lives. Each of us is born to certain situations or statuses in one’s life. Attached to each of these, whether we are born to them or whether we acquire them as we grow, is a set of behaviors that go with the statuses. People expect certain things, say, from a teacher, a carpenter, a doctor, a welder. Those things we expect from them makes up the roles of social interaction. Among the many things we do, then, is to perform certain expected behaviors. The authentic, fully functioning, self-actualizing person is one who plays those roles to the best of one’s ability and gets personal satisfaction from doing it. One tires to concentrate on playing only the roles that are consistent with who one is. That is, the healthy person is one who is able to sort out the various roles one may play, select for concentrating on those that are personally meaningful to one and expressive of one’s selfhood, and act out the role behavior well and satisfyingly. However, what about those roles this healthy person gets stuck with? What happens, for example, when such a guy—call him Justin—discovers that he has gotten this girl—Jill—pregnant? What about the situation if they decide to marry? #RandolphHarris 8 of 15
Already there are two new positions being forced on them, spouse and parent, and the roles will be forced on them, too. Our answers may seem callous, but let us explore this situation. Justin and Jill are human beings. As such, they have certain potential and actual skills. Thinking, reasoning, logic, and prediction are some of these skills, as well as loving, kissing and passion of physical intimacy. In many cases spontaneous pregnancies are more conscious than either party is willing to admit. Psychologists know, for instance, that many times young ladies will forget to take their birth patrol pills or other precautions before the physical intimacy. Some are unconsciously motivated to force a married or to get back at parents. Some are indulging in self-defeating behavior. However, mature, self-actualizing people like Justin and Jill are aware of the outcomes of their behavior and able to involve themselves with these outcomes to follow through pretty healthily with their involvements. Sometimes there is an understandable amount of disappointment or self-criticism, but the decision to accept the role they now find facing them is usually taken with a healthy degree of good humor. The decision the couple makes may be not to marry or to seek some other solution. However, the important thing is the decisions involve the fullest, most authentic engagement of the persons and their experiences. #RandolphHarris 9 of 15
Another way of saying this is that self-actualizing people enjoy the novelty and challenge of different situations. Even critical situations like surprises bundles of joy can be opportunities for growth and chances to display fullest selfhood. After all, life is much more than play-acting. It involves a constant round of choice-making experiences. The self-actualizing person tries to live an authentic, fully aware life, by dealing realistically and honestly with oneself, others, and the decisions one makes. How can this be done? How can a person be authentic, real and unpretentious when for much of one’s childhood one is taught to be otherwise? In the absence of a wholesale change of social attitudes to encourage authenticity, the only hope at present apparently is possessed n the freedom of the person to become more fully what one is. Suppose a person does not know he or she is free? Most of us do not. We get caught up in the bag of thinking of ourselves as determined by something—biology, destiny, God, culture—and one of the most difficult things to do is to convince someone that one is a free, moral agent, that one can live one’s life in one’s own terms, that one has choices which may be hidden but which are nonetheless freely his or hers. If a person will conscientiously study one’s own life, one’s choices, one’s preferences, one will find, we believe, that a startling amount of what one has done is one’s own thing. #RandolphHarris 10 of 15
Most of one’s preferences, one will find, are products of one’s value systems; thus preferences are automatic choices as unique to an individual as one’s value system are. To believe otherwise is to deny the richness and variability of life and to limit one’s freedom to make choices based on one’s individual character. The trick is, of course, to enable a person to develop and operate on the basis of one’s own value system. The existential attitude is one of involvement in contrast to a merely theoretical or detached attitude. Existential in this sense can be defined as participating in a situation, especially a cognitive situation, with the whole of one’s existence. This includes temporal, spatial, historical, psychological, sociological, biological conditions. And it includes the finite freedom which reacts to these conditions and changes them. An existential knowledge is a knowledge in which these elements, and therefore the whole existence of one who knows, participate. This seems to contradict the necessary objectivity of the cognitive act and the demand for detachment. However, knowledge depends on its object. #RandolphHarris 11 of 15
There are realms of reality or—more exactly—of abstraction from reality in which the most complete detachment is the adequate cognitive approach. Everything which can be expressed in terms of quantitative measurement has this character. However, it is most inadequate to apply the same approach to reality in its infinite concreteness. A self which has become a matter of calculation and management has ceased to be a self. It has become a thing. You must participate in a self in order to know what it is. However, by participating you change it. In all existential knowledge both subject and object are transformed by the very act of knowing existential knowledge is based on an encounter in which a new meaning is created and recognized. The knowledge of another person, the knowledge of history, the knowledge of a spiritual creation, religious knowledge—all have existential character. This does not exclude theoretical objectivity on the basis of detachment. However, it restricts detachment to one element within the embracing act of cognitive participation. You may have a precise detached knowledge of another person, one’s psychological type and one’s calculable reactions, but in knowing this you do not know the person, one’s centered self, one’s knowledge of oneself. #RandolphHarris 12 of 15
Only in participating in oneself, in performing an existential break-through into the center of one’s being, will you know one in the situation of your break-through to one. This is the first meaning of existential, namely existential as the attitude of participating with one’s own existence in some other existence. The other meaning of existential designates a content and not an attitude. It points to a special form of philosophy: to Existentialism. We have to deal with it because it is the expression of the most radical form of the courage to be as oneself. However, before going into it we must show why both an attitude and a content are described with words which are derived from the same word, “existence.” The existential attitude and the Existentialist content have in common an interpretation of the human situation which conflicts with a nonexistential interpretation. The latter assets that mortals are able to transcend, in knowledge and life, the finitude, the estrangement, and the ambiguities of human existence. The right thing to do with Godly habits is to immerse them in the life of the Lord until they become such a spontaneous expression of our lives that we are no longer aware of them. Love means that there are no visible habits—that your habits are so immersed in the Lord that you practice them without realizing it. “You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God,” reports 2 Corinthians 9.11. #RandolphHarris 13 of 15
An existential attitude instigates a philosophy of existence. The knowledge of that which concerns us infinitely is possible only in an attitude of infinite concern, in an existential attitude. At the same time there is a doctrine of mortals which describes the estrangement of mortals from their essential nature in terms of anxiety and despair. Mortals in the existential situation of finitude and estrangement can reach truth only in an existential attitude. Mortals have no place of pure objectivity above finitude and estrangement. One’s cognitive function is as existentially conditioned as one’s whole being. This is the connection of the two meanings of existential. Sometimes it is also important for us to understand that dream figures are like Angels. They look human, but their World is the realm of imagination, where the natural and moral laws of actual life are suspended. “Now if a mortal desired to serve God, it is one’s privilege; or rather, if one believes in God it is one’s privilege to serve him; but if one does not believe in God there was no law to punish one,” reports Alma 30.7. However, God will lead you directly through every barrier and right into the chamber of the knowledge of himself. The proof that our relationship is right with God is that we do our best whether we feel inspired or not. #RandolphHarris 14 of 15
No matter how difficult something you or a loved one faces, is should not take over your life and be the center of all your interest. Challenges are growth experiences, temporary scenes to be played out on the background of a pleasant life. Do not become so absorbed in a single event that you cannot think of anything else or care for yourself or for those who depend on your. Remember, much like the mending of the body, the healing of some spiritual and emotional challenges takes time. The Lord wants us to be patient in afflictions, for we shall have many; but endure them for he is with us until the end. As we are patient, we will come to understand what the statement, “I am with thee” thee means. God’s love brings joy and peace. “Cannot take a step, then take my hand. If you love me, you will wait. Something up ahead, just do not be scared. If you love me, stay with me. More than a life of this panic. If you love me, you will wait for me. Our dream will not surely be forgotten. If you love me, just stay with me. If you need another love song just tell me, I can write it. If you need another spaceship, just tell me, I can find it,” reports Steve Brain (Wait for Me). It is love that finds the body and in human relationship a route toward eternity. May every blessing find you. #RandolphHarris 15 of 15
Reflection on the Mysteries of the Soul—To Know Just How He Suffered Would be Dear
Open the celestial doors, guardians of the galaxy, so that we may see the treasure of beauty that she brings. Let there be Heaven on Earth, a harmonic galaxy. I was bitterly full of desire. It was unspeakable to need someone in this way. I closed my eyes and listened to the night. Ravenous, repulsive creatures singing magnificently. And working the soft fertile Earth, creatures of such loathsomeness I could not dwell on it. And the clatter of the riverfront train unendingly. And then the absurd song of the calliope on the riverboat that took the tourists up and down the waterway as they feasted and laughed and dance and sang. I believe I caused the infirmary myself. In my attempt to penetrate the other World I met its natural guardians, the embodiment of my own weakness and faults. In my case the personal self had grown porous because of my dimmed consciousness. I wanted to enter death without going mad and I stood before the Sphinx: either thou into the abyss or I! If you say they are fair game, then they are fair game, and that is good enough for me, Beloved Boss. I cannot tell my own heart and soul what I am feeling now, how much I crave this little battle. I cannot find the words, it is so raw, so rooted inside me! It goes way back into the human part of me that is not going to die, does it not? Then came illumination. A larger and more comprehensive self emerged and I could abandon the previous personality with its entire entourage. #RandolphHarris 1 of 17
I saw this earlier personality could never enter transcendental realms. A new life began for me and from now on I felt different from other people. A self that consisted of conventional lies, shams, self-deceptions, memory images, a self like that of other people, grew in me again but behind and above it stood a greater and more comprehensive self which impressed me with something of what is eternal, unchanging, immortal and inviolable and which ever since that time has been my protector and refuge. I lay amongst the flowers, and there were no thorns on the roses. Time had stopped. And the distant commotions of the house did not matter. She was fulfilled. She was the vampire in my dream. She was the Perfect Pearl, caught speechless in the miracle and staring down at me, wondering only what had become of me, as another fledgling of mine had done long ago—but understand dangers are only temporary. When the internal battles are waged, they struggle often takes its toll, as in all battles, on the battlefield itself. The battlefield is the person. Christians will recall St. Paul complaining that he was often at odds with himself. “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. #RandolphHarris 2 of 17
The conflicts that go on inside each of us are the mixed motives we have, the competing needs, the differing ideas and attitudes. They are not competing or differing selves struggling it out. We are whole persons, but there are many conflicting elements in each of us. Sometimes the rational part of us is in fierce competition with the emotional or the physiological parts. The result often seems to be a disintegration of the self, or behavior that seems to point to disintegration. To settle the conflicts, we often compromise parts of our selfhood. At times we play as if there were no conflict. “I am alright, Jack!” and “Stiff upper lip” are some of the terms our British cousins employ to portray a stolid, unperturbed façade, while inside the battle goes on. The romantic movement has produced a concept of individuality which is equally to be distinguished from the medieval concept and from that of the Enlightenment and contains elements of both. The individual is emphasized in one’s uniqueness, as an incomparable and infinitely significant expression of the substance of being. Not conformity but differentiation is the end of the ways of God. #RandolphHarris 3 of 17
Self-affirmation of one’s uniqueness and acceptance of the demands of one’s individual nature are the right courage to be. This does not necessarily mean willfulness and irrationality, because the uniqueness of one’s individual nature are the right courage to be. This does not necessarily mean willfulness and irrationality, because the uniqueness of one’s individuality is possessed by its creative possibilities. However, the danger is obvious. The romantic irony elevated the individual beyond all content and made one empty: one was no longer obliged to participate in anything seriously. In a person like Friedrich von Schlegel the courage to be as an individual self produced complete neglect of participation, but it also produced, in reaction to the emptiness of this self-affirmation, the desire to return to a collective. Friedrich von Schlegel, and with him many extreme individualists in the last hundred years became Roman Catholics. The courage to be as oneself broke down, and one turned to an institutional embodiment of the courage to be as a part. Such a turn was prepared by the other side of romantic thought, the emphasis on the collectives and semicollectives of the past, the ideal of the organic society. Organism, as has so often happened in the past, became the symbol of a balance between individualization and participation. #RandolphHarris 4 of 17
However, its historical function in the early 19th century was to express not the need for a balance, but the longing for the collectivist pole. It was used by all reactionary groups of this period who, be it for political or for spiritual reasons or both, tried to re-establish a new Middle Ages. In this way the romantic movement produced both a radical form of the courage to be as oneself and the (unfulfilled) desire for a radical form of the courage to be as a part. Romanticism as an attitude has outlived the romantic movement. So-called Bohemianism was a continuation of the romantic courage to be as oneself. Bohemianism continued the romantic attack on the established bourgeoisie and its conformism. Both the romantic movement and its Bohemian continuation have decisively contributed to present-day Existentialism. However, Bohemianism and Existentialism have received elements of another movement in which the courage to be as oneself was pronounced naturalism. The word naturalism is used in many different ways. For our purpose it suffices to deal with that type of naturalism in which the individualistic form of the courage to be as oneself is effective. The phrase romantic naturalist seems to be a contradiction in terms. The self-transcendence of romantic imagination and the naturalistic self-restriction to the empirically given appear to be separated by a deep gap. #RandolphHarris 5 of 17
However, naturalism means the identification of being with nature and the consequent rejection of the supernatural. This definition leaves the question of the nature of the natural wide open. Nature can be described mechanistically. It can be described organologically. It can be described in terms of necessary progressive integration or of creative evolution. It can be described as a system of laws or of structures as a mixture of both. Naturalism can take its pattern from the absolutely concrete, the individual self as we find it in mortals, or from the absolutely abstract, the mathematic equations which determine the character of power fields. All this and much more can be naturalism. However, not all of these types of naturalism are expressions of courage to be as oneself. Only if the individualistic pole in the structure of the natural is decisive can naturalism be romantic and amalgamate with Bohemianism and Existentialism. This is the case in the voluntaristic types of naturalism. (If nature (and for naturalism this means “being”) is seen as the creative expression of an unconscious will or as the objectivation of the will to power or as the product of the elan vital, then the center of will, the individual selves, are decisive for the movement of the whole. #RandolphHarris 6 of 17
In individuals’ self-affirmation life affirms itself or negates itself. Even if the selves are subject to an ultimate cosmic destiny they determine their own being in freedom. A large section of American pragmatism belongs to this group. In spite of American conformism and its courage to be as a part, pragmatism shared many concepts with that perspective more widely known in Europe as the philosophy of life. Its ethical principle is growth, its educational method is self-affirmation of the individual self, its preferred concept is creativity. The pragmatist philosophers are not always aware of the fact that courage to create implies the courage to replace the old by the new—the new for which there are no norms and criteria, the new which is a risk and which, measured by the old, is incalculable. Their social conformity hides from them what in Europe was expressed openly and consciously. They do not realize that pragmatism in its logical consequence (if not restricted by Christian or humanistic conformity) leads to that courage to be as oneself which is proclaimed by the radical Existentialist. The pragmatist type of naturalism is in its character, though not in its intention, a follower of romantic individualism and a predecessor of Existentialist independentism. The nature of the undirected growth is not different from the nature of the will to power and of the elan vital. However, the naturalists themselves are different. #RandolphHarris 7 of 17
The European naturalists are consistent and self-destructive; the American naturalists are saved by happy inconsistency: they still accept the conformist courage to be as a part. One of the goals of significant selfhood is that all the players play together. When a person is living authentically, one of the things that comes through is that all one’s systems are “Go” and that they work in some sort of integrated, total fashion. It all sounds so mysterious, so mystical or magical. Is it? There may be nothing magical at all. It is living your authentic existence, being truly, fully, real-ly all that you are. Authentic being means being oneself, honestly, in one’s relation with one’s fellows. It means taking the first step at dropping pretenses, defenses, and duplicity. It means an end to play it cool, an end to using one’s behavior as a gambit designed to disarm the other fellow, to get one to reveal oneself before you disclose yourself to that individual. This invitation is fraught with risk, indeed, it may inspire terror in some. Yet, while some honesty with others (and thus with oneself) may yield scars, it is likely to be an effective preventative both of mental illness and of certain kinds of physical sickness. Honesty can be literally a health-insurance policy. Mental illness is not something that comes from being dishonest and alienated from your fullest experience of self; mental illness is being dishonest and alienate from self and others. #RandolphHarris 8 of 17
When you are split off from who you are and thus from others, this psychopathology (sickness of the psyche or behaving self). If you are playing false with yourself and if this causes you to play false with others, you are not effectively functioning, nor actualizing yourself. “Grow exceedingly in the knowledge of God; yea, do begin to keep his statues and commandments, and walk in truth and uprightness before him,” reports Helaman 6.34. And thus we see that the Spirit of the Lord will begin to withdraw from mortals, because of the wickedness and the hardness of their hearts. The self in conflict often displays behaviors that other people cannot predict, and may be alarmed by. Sometimes, the behavior takes the simple form of forgetfulness. At other times, it may resemble the anxiety-possessed behavior described in the various neurotic classifications. In a number of cases, the person acts out behaviors that resemble the stereotyped “crazy” behavior of those who are labeled psychotic. If the person living falsely, inauthentically, in continual self-alienation is labeled mentally ill, then what do we call the person who is functioning fully, experiencing maximally, living and loving in the most satisfying manner possible? The term authenticity describes the reality-oriented personal and social life of the healthy person. #RandolphHarris 9 of 17
Closely related to this sense of intellectual and moral conscience is another trait characteristic of the nineteenth century: the sense of pride and mastery. If we look today at the pictures of the nineteenth-century life, the moral with the beard, the tall silk hat and walking cane, we are easily struck by the ridiculous and negative aspect of nineteenth-century male pride—a man’s vanity and naïve belief in oneself as the highest accomplishment of nature and of history; but especially if we consider the absence of this trait in our own time, we can see the beneficial aspects of this pride. Mortals had the feeling of having put oneself into the saddle, so to speak, of having freed oneself from domination by natural forces, and for the first time in history having become their master. One had freed oneself from the shackles of medieval superstition, had even succeeded in the hundred years between 1814 and 1914 in creating one of the most peaceful periods history has ever known. One felt oneself to be an individual, subject only to the laws of reason, following only one’s own decisions. The exploitative and hording attitude caused human suffering and lack of respect for the dignity of mortals; it caused Europe to exploit Africa and Asia and her own working class ruthlessly without regard for human values. The other pathogenic phenomenon of the nineteenth century, the role or irrational authority and the need to submit to it, led to the repression of thoughts and feelings which were tabued by society. #RandolphHarris 10 of 17
The most obvious symptom was the repression of physical intimacy and all that was natural in the body, movements, dress, architectural style, and so on. This repression resulted, as Dr. Freud thought, in various forms of neurotic pathology. The courage to be as oneself in all these groups has the character of the self-affirmation of the individual self as individual self in spite of the elements of nonbeing threatening it. The anxiety of fate is conquered by the self-affirmation of the individual as an infinitely significant microcosmic representation of the Universe. One mediates the power of being which are concentrated in one. One has them within oneself in knowledge and one transforms them in action. One directs the courage of one’s life, and one can stand tragedy and death in a heroic affect and a love for the Universe which one mirrors. Even the loneliness is not absolute loneliness because the contents of the Universe are in one. If we compare this kind of courage with that of the Stoics we find that the main point of difference is in the emphasis of the uniqueness of the individual self in the line of thought which starts in the Renaissance and is guided by the romantics to the present. #RandolphHarris 11 of 17
In Stoicism it is the wisdom of the wise mortal which is essentially equal in everyone of which one’s courage to be arises. In the modern World it is the individual as individual. Behind this change is possessed the Christian valuation of the individual soul as eternally significant. However, it is not this doctrine which gives the courage to be to modern mortals but doctrines of the individual in one’s quality as mirror of the Universe. “His people easy to be entreated, firm to keep the commandments of God, and slow to be led to do iniquity; and they were quick to hearken unto the Word of the Lord—yea, if my days could have been in those day, then would my soul have had joy in the righteousness of my people,” reports Helaman 7.7-8. Enthusiasm for the Universe, in knowing as well as in creating, also answers the question of doubt and meaninglessness. Doubt is the necessary tool of knowledge. And meaninglessness is no threat so long as enthusiasm for the Universe and for mortals as its center is alive. The anxiety of guilt is removed: the symbols of death, judgment, and hell are put aside. Everything is done to deprive them of their seriousness. The courage of self-affirmation will not be shaken by the anxiety of guilt and condemnation. In later romanticism another dimension of the anxiety of guilt and its conquest was opened up. The destructive trends in the human soul were discovered. #RandolphHarris 12 of 17
The second period of the romantic movement, in philosophy as well as in poetry, broke away from the ideas of harmony which were decisive from the Renaissance to the classicists and early romantics. A kind of demonic realism was born, which was tremendously influential on Existentialism and depth of psychology. The courage to affirm oneself must include the courage to affirm one’s own demonic depth. This contradicted radically the moral conformism of the average Protestant and even of the average humanist. However, it was avidly accepted by the Bohemian and the romantic naturalists. The courage to take the anxiety of the demonic upon oneself in spite of its destructive and often despairing character was the form in which the anxiety of guilt was conquered. However, this was possible only because the personal quality of evil had been removed by the preceding development and could not be replaced by the cosmic evil, which is structural and not a matter of personal responsibility. The courage to take the anxiety of guilt upon oneself has become the courage to affirm the demonic trends within oneself. This could happen because the demonic was not considered unambiguously negative but was thought to be part of the creative power of being. The demonic as the ambiguous ground of the creative is a discovery of the later period of romanticism, which over the bridges of Bohemianism and naturalism was brought to the Existentialism of the 20th century. Its confirmation in scientific terms was depth psychology. #RandolphHarris 13 of 17
In some respects all of these forms of individualistic courage to be are forerunners of the radicalism of the 20th century, in which the courage to be as oneself was brought to most powerful expressions in the Existentialist movement. The survey given shows that the courage to be as oneself is never completely separated from the other pole, the courage to be as a part; and even more, overcoming isolation and facing the danger of losing one’s World in the self-affirmation of oneself as an individual are a way toward something which transcends both self and World. Ideas like the microcosm mirroring the Universe, or the monad representing the World, or the individual will to power expressing the character of will to power in life itself—all these point to a solution which transcends the two types of the courage to be. We need to emphasize the necessity for abolishing exploitation and transforming the working person into an independent, free and respected human being. If economic suffering were abolished, and if the working people were free from the domination of the capitalist, all the beneficial achievement of the nineteenth century would come to their full fruition, while the vices would disappear. Complete freedom from irrational authorities will usher in a new millennium. #RandolphHarris 14 of 17
The working class, instead of falling behind in the economic development of the whole society, should have an increasing share in national wealth, and it is a perfectly valid assumption that provided no major catastrophe occurs, there will, in about one or two generations, be no more marked poverty in the United States of America. Closely related to the increasing abolishment of economic suffering is the fact that the human and political situation of the worker has changed drastically. People can no longer be ordered around, fired, abuse, as one was one hundred years ago. Looked upon from the standards of a World Class Leader, we have achieved almost everything which seems to be necessary for a saner society, and indeed, may people who still think in terms of the past century are convinced that we continue to progress. Consequently they also believe that the only threat to further progress lies in authoritarian societies, like California which, with its ruthless economic exploitation of workers and businesses for the sake of quicker accumulation of capital and the ruthless political authority necessary for the continuation of exploitation, resembles in many ways the early form of Capitalism, where workers were forced to work and mistreated and not looked at as human. However, we are not in danger of becoming slaves anymore, but of becoming robots. #RandolphHarris 15 of 17
There is no overt authority which intimidates us, but we are governed by the fear of the anonymous authority of conformity. We do not submit to anyone personally; we do not go through conflicts with authority, but we have also no convictions of our own, almost no individuality, almost no sense of self. Quite obviously, the diagnosis of our pathology cannot follow the lines of the nineteenth century. We have to recognize the specific pathological problems of our time in order to arrive at a vision of that which is necessary to save the Western World from increasing insanity. “Excuse me, if I right all my wrongs. Excuse me, if I give up on being strong. I have been running blind, weighed down by denial. Still you were there right beside me. Never thought I would have someone like you. Never thought you would be the one to save me. Now I am ready to believe you always. Say I am worthy and I can finally say I agree. How I try to defy?” reports RAM and Susana (Someone Like you). Obedience means that I have completely placed my trust in the atonement, and my obedience is immediately met by the delight of the supernatural grace of God. “Praise be to the LORD my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my finger for battle. He is my loving God and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my shield, in whom I take refuge, who subdues peoples under me,” reports Psalm 144.1-2. #RandolphHarris 16 of 17
It is painful work to get in step with God and to keep pace with him—it means getting your second wind spiritually. The individual person is merged into a personal oneness with God, and God’s stride and his power alone are exhibited. We have the vision of God and a very clear understanding of what God wants. “Dusk till dawn this is where we belong, waiting for the Sun. Night till day, this is what I would say, our light will not fade away. I cannot breathe, I am falling to my feet, you are that I believe. Stay with me. I cannot see the fire next to me because you are all that I believe,” reports John O’Callaghan featuring Deidre McLaughlin (Stay With Me). If you are going through a time of discouragement, there is a time of great personal growth ahead. We may discover that there are ways to be spiritual that do not counter the soul’s needs for body, individuality, imagination, and exploration. Eventually we might find that all emotions, all human activities, and all spheres of life have deep roots in the mysteries of the soul, and therefore are holy. Still another way to be spiritual and soulful at the same time is to hear the words of formal religion as speaking to and about the soul. It further signals incarnation of the divine within moral life. #RandolphHarris 17 of 17
All Other Hearts I knew My Worthiness is All My Doubt—Conform My Soul as ‘t Were a Church
The Savage Garden—it is just a phrase I used to use for Earth in the old times when I did not believe in anything, when I believed the only laws were aesthetic laws. But I was young then and expecting further miracles. Before I knew we knew more of nothing, and nothing more. Sometimes I think of the phrase again when the night is like this, so accidentally beautiful. Capitalism is based on the principle that is to be found in all class societies: the use of mortal by mortal. Since the modern capitalist employs labor, the social and political form of this exploitation has changes; what has not changed is that the owner of capital uses other mortals for the purpose of his or her own profit. The basic concept of use has nothing to do with cruel, or not cruel, ways of human treatment, but with the fundamental fact that one mortal serves another for purposes which are not one’s own but those of the employer. The concept of use of mortal by mortal has nothing to do even with the question whether one mortal uses another, or uses oneself. The fact remains the same, that a mortal, a living human being, ceases to be an end in himself, and becomes the means for the economic interests of another mortal, or oneself, or of an impersonal giant, the economic machines. “For he truly spake many great things unto them, which were hard to be understood, save a mortal should inquire of the Lord; and they being hard in their hearts, therefore, they did not look unto the Lord as they ought,” 1 Nephi 15.3. #RandolphHarris 1 of 11
There are obvious objections to the foregoing statements. One is that modern mortals are free to accept or to decline a contract, and therefore one is a voluntary participant in one’s social relation to the employer, and not a thing. However, this objection ignores the fact that in the first place one has no choice but to accept the existing conditions, and secondly, that even if one were not forced to accept these conditions, one would still be employed, that is, made use of for purposes not one’s own, but of the capital whose profit one serves. The other objection is that all social life, even in its most primitive form, requires a certain amount of social co-operation, and even discipline, and that certainly in the more complex form of industrial production, a person has to fulfill certain necessary and specialized functions. While this statement is quite true, it ignores the basic difference: in a society where no person has power over another, each person fulfills one’s functions on the basis of co-operation and mutuality. No one can command another person, except insofar as a relationship is based on mutual co-operation, on love, friendship or natural bonds. “Do ye not remember the things which the Lord hath said?—If ye will not harden your hearts, and ask me in faith, believing that ye shall receive, with diligence in keeping my commandments, surely these things shall be made known unto you,” reports 1 Nephi 15.11. #RandolphHarris 2 of 11
Actually we find this present in many situations in our society today: the normal co-operation of husband and wife in their family life is to a large extent not any more determined by the power of the husband to command his wife, as it existed in antiquated forms of patriarchal society, but on the principle of co-operation and mutuality. The same holds true for the relationship of friends, inasmuch as they perform certain services for each other and co-operate with each other. In these relationships no one would dare to think of commanding the other person; the only reason for expecting one’s help lies in the mutual feeling of love, friendship or simply human solidarity. The help of another person is secured by my active effort, as a human being, to elicit one’s love, friendship and sympathy. In the relationship of the employer to the employee, this is not the case. The employer has bought the services of the worker, and however human one’s treatment may be, one still commands one, not on a basis of mutuality, but on the basis of having bought one’s working time for so many hours a day. The use of mortal by mortal is expressive of the system of values underlying the capitalistic system. Capital, the dead past, employs labor—the living vitality and power of the present. In the capitalistic hierarchy of values, capital stands high.er than labor, amassed things higher than the manifestations of life. #RandolphHarris 3 of 11
Capital employs labor, and not labor capital. The person who owns capital commands the person who only owns one’s life, human skill, vitality and creative productivity. Things are higher than mortals. The conflict between capital and labor is much more than the conflict between classes, more than their fight for a greater share of the social product. It is the conflict between two principles of value: that between the World of things, and their amassment, and the World of life and its productivity. Every time I insist on having my own rights, I hurt the Son of God, while in fact I can prevent Jesus from being hurt if I will endure the challenge myself. A disciple realized that it is one’s Lord’s honor that is at stake in one’s life, not one’s own honor. My life’s spiritual honor and duty is to fulfill my debt to Christ in relation to lost souls. Every tiny bit of my life that has value I owe to the redemption of Jesus Christ. Am I doing anything to enable Christ to bring his redemption into evident reality in the lives of others? “In the name of the Almighty God, I command you that ye touch me not, for I am filled with the power of God, even unto the consuming of my flesh; and whose shall lay his or her hands upon me shall wither even as a dried reed; and one shall be as naught before the power of God, for God shall smite that individual,” reports 1 Nephi 17.48. #RandolphHarris 4 of 11
Closely related to the problem of exploitation and use, although even more complicated, is the problem of authority in modern mortals. Any social system in which one group of the population is commanded by another, especially if the latter is a marginalized member of the population, must be based on a strong sense of authority, a sense which is increased in a strongly patriarchal society where the male gender is supposed to be superior to and in control of the female gender. Since the problem of authority is so crucial for our understanding of human relations in any kind of society, and since the attitude of authority has changed fundamentally from the past to the present, authority is not a quality one person has, in the sense that one has property or physical qualities. Authority refers to an interpersonal relation in which one person looks upon another as somebody superior to oneself. However, there is a fundamental difference between a kind of superiority-inferiority relation which can be called rational authority and one which may be described as inhibiting, or irrational authority. An example will show what I have in mind. The relationship between teacher and student that between slave owner and slave are both based on the superiority of the one over the other. #RandolphHarris 5 of 11
The interest of teacher and pupil are compelled in the same direction. If the teacher succeeds in furthering the pupil, he or she is satisfied. If the teacher has failed to do so, the failure is the teacher problem and the pupil’s problem. The slave owner, on the other hand, wants to exploit the enslaved human being, which is why the call them salves. It is an effort to classify them as problem which is not even worthy of being. The slave owner wants to exploit the slave as much as possible; the more one gets out of the slave, the more the slave master is satisfied. At the same time, the slave seeks to defend as best he or she can one’s claims for a minimum of happiness. These interests are definitely antagonistic, as what is of advantage to the one is detrimental to the other. The superiority has a different function in both cases: in the first, it is the condition for helping of the person subjected to the authority; in the second, it is the condition for one’s exploitation. The dynamics of authority in these two types are different too: the more the student learns, the less wide is the gap between one and the teacher. One becomes more and more like the teacher. In other words, the rational authority relationship tends to dissolve itself. However, when the superiority serves as a basis for exploitation, the distance becomes intensified through its long duration. #RandolphHarris 6 of 11
The psychological situation is different in each of these authority situations. In the first, elements of love, admiration, or gratitude are prevalent. The authority is at the same time an example with which one wants to identify one’s self partially or totally. In the second situation, resentment or hostility will arise against the exploiter, subordination to whom is against one’s own interests. However, often as in the case of a slave, one’s hatred would only lead to conflicts which would subject the slave to suffering without a chance of winning. Therefore, the tendency will usually be to repress the feeling of hatred and sometimes even to replace it by a feeling of blind admiration. This has two functions: to remove the painful and dangerous feeling of hatred, and to soften the feeling of humiliation. If the person who rules over me is so wonderful or perfect, then I should not be ashamed of obeying him or her. I cannot be one’s equal because he or she is so much stronger, wiser, better, and so on, than I am. As a result, in the inhibiting kind of authority, the element either of hatred or of irrational overestimation and admiration of the authority will tend to increase. In the rational kind of authority, the strength of the emotional ties will tend to decrease in direct proportion to the degree in which the person subjected to the authority becomes stronger and thereby more similar to the authority. #RandolphHarris 7 of 10
The difference between rational and inhibiting authority is only a relative one. Even in the relationship between slave and master there are elements of advantage for the slave. One gets a minimum of food and protection which at least enables one to work for the master. (Provided one does not get beat to death for not producing enough, or disabled to the point they cannot work and are deemed useless, at which point food and shelter and the luxury of life might cease.) On the other hand, it is only in an ideal relationship between teacher and the student that we find a complete lack of antagonism of interests. There are many gradations between these two extreme cases, as in the relationship of a factory worker with his or her boss, or a farmer’s son with his father, or a hausfrau with her husband. Nevertheless, although in reality the two types of authority are blended, they are essentially different, and an analysis of a concrete authority situation must always determine the specific weight of each kind of authority. The character of society a mixture of rational and irrational authority, with essentially a hierarchical blend, based on divine law and tradition, where the ownership of capital allows one to buy and thus command labor of those who do not, and the latter has to obey, under penalty of going on government relief or starvation. #RandolphHarris 8 of 11
One cannot deny that in America today, there is a certain blending between slavery and freedom, the new and the old hierarchical pattern. The state, especially in the monarchial form, cultivates the antiquated virtues of obedience and submission, and applies them to new contents and values. Obedience, int the middle class, is still one of the fundamental virtues and disobedience one of the elementary vices. “They were confounded and could not contend against me; neither durst they lay their hands upon me nor touch me with their fingers, even for the space of many days. Now they durst not do this lest they should wither before me, so powerful was the Spirit of God; and this it has wrong upon them. And it came to pass that the Lord declared unto me: Stretch forth thine hand again unto thy brethren, and they shall not wither before thee, but I will shock them, saith the Lord, and this will I do, that they may know that I am the Lord their God. And it came to pass that I stretched forth my hand unto my people, and they did not wither before me; but the Lord did shake them, even according to the word which he had spoken,” reports 1 Nephi 17.52-54. At the same time, however, rational authority had developed side by side with irrational authority. Since the Reformation and the Renaissance mortals had begun to rely on their own reason as a guide to action and value judgment. #RandolphHarris 9 of 11
The mortals felt proud to have convictions which were theirs, and they respected the authority of scientists, philosophers, historians, who helped them to form one’s own judgments and to be sure of one’s own conviction. The decision between true and false, right and wrong, was one of the utmost important and, indeed, both the moral and the intellectual conscience assumed a paramount place in the character structure of current mortals. One may not have applied the rules of one’s conscience to mortals of a different color or even of a different social class, yet to some extent one was determined by one’s sense of right and wrong, and at least by the repression of the awareness of wrong-doing, if one did succeed in avoiding wrong action. “May God arise, may his enemies be scattered; may his foes flee before him. As smoke is blown away by the wind, may you blow them away; as wax melts before the fire, may the wicked perish before God. However, may the righteous be glad and rejoice before God; may they be happy and joyful. Sing to God and praise to his name, extol him who rides on the clouds—his name is the LORD—and rejoice before him. A father to the fatherless, a defender of windows, is God in his holy dwelling. God sets the lonely in families, he leads forth the prisoners with singing; but the rebellious live in a Sun-scorched land,” reports Psalm 68.1-6. #RandolphHarris 10 of 11
There is nothing neutral about the soul. It is the possession of the source of life. Either we respond to what the soul presents in its fantasies and desires, or we suffer from this neglect of ourselves. The power of the soul can hurl a person into ecstasy or into depression. It can be creative or destructive, gentle or aggressive. “And the fire will never leave us though the path divides between us. You always had the strength to walk alone and the quiet hours would haunt you and the wilder winds, they called you, I almost had the strength to let you go. Why were you falling? Far, far away. I still remember you and those days could not get better. I keep it all, this will not fade, I will never let it. I know you gave it all so good, I cannot forget it. Still lost in you, on that day we will stay forever. Stay forever. And I know that time is speeding, experiences fleeting. I would give them all away to bring you home. Why were you falling? Far, far away. Forever lost in you and those days could not get better. I keep it all, this will not fade, I will never let it. I know you gave it all so good, I cannot forget it. Still lost in you, on that day we will stay forever. Forever lost in you…” reports Emma Hewitt (Still remember). Power incubates within the soul and then makes its influential move into life as the expression of the soul. If there is so soulfulness, then there is no true power, and if there is no power, then there can be no true soulfulness. #RandolphHarris 11 of 11
Angels in the Early Morning are Guests in this Stupendous Place
I thought of God Incarnate, with whom I had spoken. I thought of all my doubts that any of it had been real, of all my suspicious that I was the mere pawn of spirits. While everybody believes oneself to act according to one’s own interest, many people are actually determined by the anonymous laws of the market and of the economic machines. The individual capitalist expands his or her enterprise not primarily because one wants to, but because one has to, because postponement of further expansion would mean regression. Actually as a business grows, one has to continue making it bigger, whether one wants to or not. In this function of the economic law which operates behind the backs of mortals and forces them to do things without giving them the freedom to decide, we see that it is not only the law of the market which has its own life and rules over mortals, but also the development of science and technique. For a number of reasons, the problems and organization of science today are such that a scientist does not choose one’s problems; the problems force themselves upon the scientist. One solves one problem, and the result is not that one is more secure or certain, but that ten other new problems open up in place of the single solved one. They force the scientist to solve them; one has to go ahead at an ever-quickening pace. The same holds true for industrial techniques. The pace of science forces the pace of techniques. #RandolphHarris 1 of 15
Theoretical physics forces atomic energy on us; the successful production of the fission bomb forces upon us the manufacture of the hydrogen bomb. We do not choose our problems, we do not choose our products; we are pushed, we are forced—by what? By a system which has no purpose and goal transcending it, and which makes mortals its appendix. If the wealth of society corresponded to the actual needs of all its members, there would be no problem of distributing it; each member could take from the social product as much as he or she likes, or needs, and there would be no need of regulation, except in the purely technical sense of distribution. However, aside from primitive societies, this condition has never existed up to now in human history. The needs were always greater than the sum total of the social product, and therefore a regulation had to be made on how to distribute it, how many and who should have the optimal satisfaction of their needs, and which classes had to be satisfied with less than they wanted. In most highly developed societies of the past, the decision was made essentially by force. Certain classes had the power to appropriate the best of the social product for themselves, and to assign to other classes the heavier and dirtier works and a smaller share of the product. #RandolphHarris 2 of 15
Force was often implemented by social and religious tradition, which constituted such a strong psychic force within people that it often made the threat of physical force unnecessary. However, the modern market is a self-regulating mechanism of distribution, which makes it unnecessary to divide the social product according to an intended or traditional plan, and thus does away with the necessity of the use of force within society. Of course, the absence of force is more apparent than real. The worker who has to accept the wage rate offered to him or her on the labor market is forced to accept the market condition because one could not survive otherwise. Thus the freedom of the individual is largely illusory. One is aware of the fact that there is no outer force which compels one to enter into certain contracts; one is less aware of the laws of the market which operate behind one’s back as it were; hence one believes that one is free, when one is actually not. However, while this is so, the capitalist method of distribution by the market mechanism is better than any other method devised so far in a class society, because it is a basis for the relative political freedom of the individual which characterizes capitalism. #RandolphHarris 3 of 15
The economic functioning of the market rests upon competition of many individuals who want to sell their commodities on the commodity market, as they want to sell their labor or services on labor and personality market. Everyone is struggling for the best places, even though only a few are chosen to attain them. In this scramble for success, the social and moral rules of human solidarity break down; the importance of life is in being first in a competitive race. Another factor which constitutes the capitalistic made of production is that in this system the aim of all economic activity is profit. Now around this profit motive of Capitalism, a great deal of calculated and uncalculated confusion has been created. We have been told—and rightly so—that all economic activity is meaningful only if it results in a profit, that is to say, if we gain more than we have spent in the act of production. To make a living, even the precapitalist artisan had to spend on raw material and the apprentice’s wages less than the price one charged for one’s product. In any society that supports industry, simple or complex, the value of the salable product must exceed the cost of production in order to provide capital needed for the replacement of machinery or other instruments for the development of increase of production. However, the question of the profitableness of production is not the issues. #RandolphHarris 4 of 15
Our problem is that our motive for production is not social usefulness, not satisfaction in the work process, but the profit derived from investment. The usefulness of one’s product to the consumer need not interest the individual capitalist at all. This does not mean that the capitalist, psychologically speaking, is driven by an insatiable greed for money. This may or may not be so, but it is not essential for the capitalistic quently the capitalist’s motive in an earlier phase than it is now, when ownership and management are largely separated, and wen the aim of obtaining higher profits is subordinate to the wish for the ever-growing expansion and smooth running of an enterprise. Incomes can, under the present system, be quite apart from person effort or service. The owner of capital can earn without working. The essential human function of exchange of effort for income can become the abstracted manipulation of money for more money. This is most obvious in the case of the absentee owner of an industrial enterprise. It does not make any difference whether one owns the whole enterprise, or only a share of it. In each case one makes a profit from one’s capital and from the work of others without having to make any effort oneself. There have been many pious justifications for this state of affairs. #RandolphHarris 5 of 15
It has been said that the profits were a payment for the risk one takes in one’s investment of capital, or for one’s self-depriving effort to save, which enabled one to accumulate the capital one can invest. However, it is hardly necessary to prove that these marginal factors do not alter the elementary fact that Capitalism permits the making of profits without personal effort and productive function. However, as far as those who do work and perform services, their incomes are not always in any reasonable correlation to the effort they make. One of the reasons is because the underevaluation of work, of human effort and skill. The other lies in the fact that as long as my gain is limited by the effort I make, my desire is limited. If, on the other hand, my income is not in proportion to my effort, there are no limitations to my desires, since their fulfillment is a matter of opportunities offered by certain market situations, and not dependent on my own capacities. Capitalism is supposed to truly be private Capitalism. Individuals see and seize new opportunities, act economically, sense new methods, are encouraged to acquire property. This pleasure in property, aside from competitiveness and profit seeking, is one of the fundamental aspects of the character of the middle and upper classes. #RandolphHarris 6 of 15
Individualism is the self-affirmation of the individual self as individual self without regard to its participation in its World. As such it is the opposite of collectivism, the self-affirmation of the self as part of a lager whole without regard to its character as an individual self. Individualism has developed out of the bondage of primitive collectivism and medieval semicollectivism. Primitive collectivism was undermined by the experience of personal guilt and individual question-asking. Both were effective at the end of the ancient World and led to the radical nonconformism of the cynics and skeptics, to the moderate nonconformism of the Stoics, and to the attempt to reach a transcendent foundation for the courage to be in Stoicism, mysticism, and Christianity. All these motives were present in medieval semicollectiveism, which came to end like early collectivism with the experience of personal guilt and the analytic power of radical question-asking. However, it did not immediately lead to individualism. Protestantism, in spite of its emphasis on the individual conscience, was established as a strictly authoritarian and conformist system, similar to that of its adversary, the Roman Church of the Counter-reformation. There was no individualism in either of the great confessional groups. And there was only hidden individualism outside them, since they had drawn the individualistic trends of the Renaissance into themselves and adapted them to their ecclesiastical conformity. #RandolphHarris 7 of 15
This situation lasted for 150 years but no more. After this period, that of confessional orthodoxy, the personal element came again to the fore. Pietism and methodism re-emphasized personal guilt, personal experience, and individual perfection. They were not intended to deviate from ecclesiastical conformity, but unavoidably they did deviate; subjective piety become the bridge of the victorious reappearance of autonomous reason. Pietism was the bridge to Enlightenment. However, even the Enlightenment did not consider itself individualistic. One believed not in a conformity which is based on the power of reason in every individual. The principles of practical and theoretical reasons were supposed to be universal among mortals and able to create, with the help of research and education, a new conformity. The whole period believed in the principle of harmony—harmony being the law of the Universe according to which the activities of the individual, however individualistically conceived and performed, lead behind the back of the single actor to a harmonious whole, to a truth in which at least a large majority can agree, to a good in which more and more people can participate, to a conformity which is based on the free activity of every individual. #RandolphHarris 8 of 15
The individual can be free without destroying the group. The function of the economy seem to confirm this view: that laws of the market produced, behind the backs of the competitors in the marker, the greatest possible amount of goods for everybody. However, what characterizes income distribution in Capitalism is the lack of balanced proportion between an individual’s effort and work and the social recognition accorded one—financial compensation. This disproportion would, in a less affluent society than ours, result in greater extremes of luxury and poverty than our standards of morals would tolerate. I am not stressing, however, the material effects of this disproportion, but its moral and psychological effects. In the past, the worker, or rather one’s labor, was a commodity to be bought by the owner of capital, not essentially different from any other commodity on the market, and it was used to its fullest capacity by the buyer. Since it has been bought for its proper price on the labor market, there was no sense of reciprocity, or of any obligation on the part of the owner of capital, beyond that of paying the wages. If hundreds of thousands of workers were without work and on the point of starvation, that was their bad luck, the result of their inferior talents, or simply a social and natural law, which could not be changed. #RandolphHarris 9 of 15
Exploitation was not personal anymore, but it had become anonymous, as it were. It was the law of the market that condemned a mortal to work for starvation wages, rather than the intention or greed of any one individual. Nobody was responsible or guilty, nobody could change conditions either. One was dealing with the iron laws of society, or so it seemed. The alienation we feel regarding other people is bad enough. Alienation from ourselves is devasting. The crisis of insignificance is originally and functionally interwoven with intrapersonal alienation. Intrapersonal is not the same as interpersonal, which is what goes on between two or more people. Intrapersonal experiences are those which occur within one human being. We have talked of conflict, when two or more needs or motives are in contention. When this occurs, we may reach a stalemate in which neither need is met, or we may choose one over the other, or we may alternate from one motive to the other. In a few people, those whom psychiatrist call neurotics, the anxiety produced by conflicts reaches such a level that choice is out of the question. Not that the person has no choices, but the agony produced by anxiety is so great that one absolutely gives up any idea of making a choice; one abdicates one’s responsibility as a free person. #RandolphHarris 10 of 15
Neurotics may freeze and do nothing. They may find the anxiety converted into any number of bodily disorders. Truly, this level of conflict in certain people is so crippling that they often resort to dropping out of their humanity. As with other self-defeating behaviors, including masochistic actions or relationships, wherein the person gains only when he or she loses, these are the actions of people who feel too much guilt to take advantage of their freedom. Often they become compulsive about the things they do; their behavior is behavior without a choice. The most severe of the self-defeating situations is what we call intrapersonal alienation. The self is in some degree of dis-integration. When this occurs, as it does to all of us at times, and in many of us all the time, the self is not reaching its fullest potential. The dis-integration of self occurs in varying degrees. A particularly troublesome feeling or thought may be shelved. It may be repressed more or less permanently. When it is blocked off, through one or another of the self-defeating behaviors, the individual functions at less than full potential. Like a remote-control car with a low battery, one is not operating at full capacity. Intrapersonal alienation occurs wen we do not know the full extent of our selfhood, or, if we do know, when we segregate parts of it. #RandolphHarris 11 of 15
People who segregate parts of themselves usually dislike themselves, in whole or part, and often make self-derogatory remarks. They are not trying to be modest or to fish for compliments; they really mean it. More often than not, they try to live through other people. An example of this is the father whose only satisfaction comes from seeing his children (usually a son) succeed in areas where he never could. Sports are often overly emphasized by fathers who are literally re-living life through their sons. Dis-integration is also present in the person who lets others live one’s life for them. If all sides of one were working together in a harmonious way, one might pay attention to other people’s advice, opinions, or judgment, but one would retain full command of one’s own life. This is the essence of self-actualizing living. However, too many of us live our lives on other people’s terms. We let others direct the courage of our lives and if we discover it, instead of taking the steering wheel again, we simply grumble about it and go on doing the same thing. People who seem to be watching their own behavior from the point of view of a spectator are not integrated within. They often speak of themselves in the second or third person and will describe Life, but not their own. It is as if the life of such a person were being lived, not by the individual. #RandolphHarris 12 of 15
When people are disassociated from their own reality, they are not only other-directed, one is blocked off the active, spontaneous center of one’s own being, so that there is little or no will of one’s own being experienced. Alienation prevents disturbing self-awareness. The alienated patient often complains of being in a fog, but unconsciously one wants to stay in it. One welcomes self-anesthesia. Alienation, in the sense of conforming like an automaton, prevents one from the burden and the responsibility of commitment to oneself and one’s identity. It permits self-elimination. Alienation, in its most active form, is the rejection of being oneself and the attempt to become the other, the ideal self. It means escape from the hated self through self-idealization. When this war within goes on, the person often lives a dis-integrated or partial existence. Education showed that emphasis on the free development of the individual child does not reduce the chances of one becoming an active member of a conformist society. And the history of Protestantism confirmed the belief of the Reformers that the free encounter of everybody with the Bible can create an ecclesiastical conformity—in spite of individual and even denominational differences. #RandolphHarris 13 of 15
The law of preestablished harmony means the monads of which all things consist, although they have no doors and windows that open toward each other, they participate in the same World which is present in each of them, whether it be dimly or clearly perceived. The problem of individualization and participation seemed to be solved philosophically as well as practically. Courage to be as oneself, as this is understood in the Enlightenment, is a courage in which individual self-affirmation includes participation in the universal, rational self-affirmation. Thus it is not the individual self as such which affirms itself but the individual self as such which affirms itself but the individual self as the bearer of reason. The courage to be as oneself is the courage to follow reason and to defy irrational authority. In this respect—but only in this respect—it is Neo-Stoicism. For the courage to be of the Enlightenment is not a resigned courage to be. It dares not only to face the vicissitudes of fate and the inescapability of death but o affirm itself as transforming reality according to the demands of reason. It is a fighting, daring courage. It conquers the threat of guilt by accepting errors, shortcomings, misdeeds in the individual as well as in social life as unavoidable and at the same time to be overcome by education. #RandolphHarris 14 of 15
The courage to be as oneself within the atmosphere of Enlightenment is the courage to affirm oneself as a bridge from a lower to a higher state of rationality. It is obvious that this kind of courage to be must become conformist the moment its revolutionary attack on that which contradicts reason has ceased, namely in the victorious bourgeoisie. Strong faith in the Savior is submissively accepting of his will and timing in our lived—even if the outcome is not what we hoped for or wanted. As we confront our own trials and tribulations, we can plead with the Heavenly father, however. Not shrinking if much more important than surviving! God wants us to be able to accept bitter situations without becoming bitter. Do you take the time to discover each day how beautiful your life can be? How pleasant is it to plant a baby tree and watch it grow into a mature tree. With care it will surely become what it is destined to be, crowed with grace and beauty. Each day allows of to develop new and impressive character, more promise of beauty until we become what God has designed us to be. We are one of the noblest of God’s creations. His intent is that our lives will be gloriously beautiful regardless of what our circumstances are. As we are grateful and obedient, we can become all that God intends us to be. #RandolphHarris 15 of 15
Have You Got a Brook in Your Little Heart—The Heart I Cherish in My Own
It was a cacophony of minds filling me in on everything from the beginning. And the whole thing sent a little panic through my enormous brave soul. A problem that comes with living is a kind of conflict called alienation. It means that the person feels or is made to feel that he or she is totally other than people in his or her own groups. People feel that they are an alien in the same sense as non-naturalized residents in the United States of America are considered aliens by the American government. They are a physically present nonmember of the group. The term “alien” may also carry negative and discriminatory connotations. Alienation is more than isolation or separateness; it is estrangement. It carries with it the idea of detachment from ourselves and from others. Among the many possible definitions of the term “alienation,” it seems appropriate to limit them term alienation to mean an individual feeling or state of dissociation from self, from others, and from the World at large. Such states, although functions of the conditions that produce them, should not be confused with the conditions themselves. When you feel alienated it may be that you have chosen to elaborate parts of your total self that others cannot tolerate or live with. #RandolphHarris 1 of 11
When it comes to alienation, you may, in other words, choose to express a particular aspect of yourself that puts distance, both spatial and social, between you and other people. Take the hero (or anti-hero, if you wish) of Supernatural’s Dean Winchester. He chose not to live like other people. He did not have the apple pie life everyone dreams of with a nice house, in a lace curtains suburb, two cars, a wife, two kids, great career, and a white picket fence. Dean would do so many things that where so radical and so different from society’s norms that when he was hunting monsters, he was at times so alone and apart from other people. He subsequently did not trust many people, including his own brother at times. Simply being different does not qualify one as an alien, however. The alienated feels that his or her differences makes a difference. The individual (or one’s group) adopts the attitude that one’s actions create a gap that is unbridgeable. Obviously either party can create this situation and can participate in the attitude. A person can so order one’s life, can so emphasize these dissociating aspects of self, that it will almost guarantee a schism. One may do this intentionally, either to thumb one’s nose at those one dislikes or to show how little one needs them or their approval. Many of us do this in little ways throughout our lives, yet the feeling of alienation is hardly ever there, or not for very long. #RandolphHarris 2 of 11
We can create a divine between us and society out of spite, or to test our individuality, or simply as an experiment. As an example of the latter, a young lady in one of our classes deliberately tested the alienating process by using in class what most of her female classmates called “obscene” language. She wanted to see what it might take to condition alienation in them. At the end of a prearranged time, she told them what she had been doing, but a few of the ladies never quite forgave her! Sometimes the people in a group decide that the person’s self-expression is detestable or alien, and they create the attitude and the subsequent behavior. The alien can choose to go along with it and feel alienated simply because the group is expressing alienation or one can refuse to play the game and either change one’s behavior or leave the scene. An example of how the group can force the alienation: A young teacher decided to supplement her salary by writing fiction. She had talent and sold two novels to a firm that specialized in somewhat controversial fiction. She chose to write under her own name (since she felt that her selfhood included writing as well as teaching, and she saw nothing wrong with what she was doing). #RandolphHarris 3 of 11
The books were not best-sellers, but they were available on most newsstands in the city where she taught. The books were very frank and explicit in their language and were classified by many people as “obscene.” She protested that they were simply portrayals of real life as she had observed it, and, though none of the experiences she described had actually happened to her, she was capitalizing on the public’s states for sensational literature. Not only were parents and townspeople angry at her, but her fellow teachers began expressing their displeasure. She was avoided in the faculty lounge, in the lunch room, and even by close associates. Her fiancé assumed her to be a cheap opportunist and broke off the engagement. (She felt, however, that, in spire of his vehement denials, he believed she had done most of the things she had written about.) A group of townspeople and teachers succeeded in getting her fired. Though the young lady admitted she was taking advantage of the opportunities to sell sensational literature, she felt that she was also making social commentary with her stories. Whatever her motives, she chose to exhibit a part of her self that flew in the face of conventional morality. The group felt it necessary to alienate itself from the young woman and succeeded in communicating its attitude to her. #RandolphHarris 4 of 11
Alienation may have another very important aspect. A person may find it vitally necessary to split off from the group in order that one might survive as a person. Feelings of alienation and the rejection of others might well be the results of the way in which one does this. Our society may itself have become biologically dysfunctional, and some forms of schizophrenic alienation from the alienation of society may have a sociobiological function that we have not recognized. What we call schizophrenia is not a disease or sickness at all. It is a way of living that may be vital and necessary. One feels that the schizophrenic is a person who is extremely sensitive to the depersonalizing and fragmenting experiences of life and is going within to try to dramatize this fragmentation, this alienation to help bring the pieces back into their intended togetherness again: Perhaps we can retain the now old name, and read into it its etymological meaning: Schiz—“broken”; Phrenos—“soul” or “heart.” The schizophrenic in this sense is one who is brokenhearted. If we have the heart to let them, even broken hearts have been known to mend. “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness,” reports 2 Corinthians 12.9. Schizophrenia, or any other so-called mental illness may be the step or process certain people take on their way to healthy functioning. #RandolphHarris 5 of 11
That is, a person may have to experience one’s own disorientation or sickness of soul before one can really know oneself fully. “Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has declared, ‘Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you,’” reports Hebrews 13.5. Alienation, in whatever form, is a widespread and deeply painful experience. The courage to be as a part in the progress of the group to which one belongs, of this nation, of all humankind, is expresses in all specifically American philosophies: pragmatism, process philosophy, the ethics of growth, progressive education, and crusading in politics. However, this type of courage is not necessarily destroyed if the belief in progress is shaken, as it is today. Progress can mean two things. In every action in which something is produced beyond what was already given, a progress is made (pro-gress means going forward). In this sense action and the belief in progress are inseparable. The other meaning of progress is a universal, metaphysical law of progressive evolution, in which accumulation produces higher and higher forms and values. The existence of such a law cannot be proved. #RandolphHarris 6 of 11
Most processes show that gain and loss are balanced. Nevertheless the new gain is necessary, because otherwise all past gains would also be lost. The courage of participation in the productive process is not dependent on the metaphysical idea of progress. The courage to be as a part in the productive process takes anxiety in its three main forms into itself. The way in which it deals with the anxiety about fate as been described. This is especially remarkable in a highly competitive society in which the security of the individual is reduced to almost nothing. The anxiety conquered in the courage to be as a part in the productive process is considerable, because the threat of being excluded from such a participation by unemployment or the loss of an economic basis is what, above all, fate means today. Only in the light of this situation can the tremendous impact of the great crisis of the 1930’s on the American people, and the frequent loss of the courage to be in it, be understood. The anxiety about death is met in two ways. The reality of death is excluded from daily life to the highest possible degree. The dead are not allowed to show that they are dead; they are transformed into a mask of the living. The other and more important way of dealing with death is the belief in a continuation of life after death, called the immortality of the soul. #RandolphHarris 7 of 11
The immortality of the soul is not a Christian and hardly a Platonic doctrine. Christianity speaks of the resurrection and eternal life, Platonism of a participation of the soul in the transtemporal sphere of essences. However, the modern idea of immortality means a continuous participation of the soul in the transtemporal sphere of essences. However, the modern idea of immortality means a continuous participation in the productive process—time and World without end. It is not the eternal rest of the individual in God but his unlimited contribution to the dynamics of the Universe that gives one the courage to face death. In this kind of hope, one can tell God is always in their picture, regardless of if you have scientific proof or not. God is understood as the productive process itself. “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand,” reports Isaiah 41.10. The anxiety of doubt and meaninglessness is potentially as great as the anxiety of fate and death. It is rooted in the nature of finite productivity. Although, as we have seen, the tool as a tool is not important but rather the tool as a result of human productivity, the question: for what? cannot be suppressed completely. It is silenced but always ready to come into the open. #RandolphHarris 8 of 11
Today, we are witnessing a rise of this anxiety and a weakening of the courage to take it into itself. The anxiety of guilt and condemnation is deeply rooted in the American mind, first through the influence of puritanism, then trough the impact of the evangelical-pietistic movements. It is strong even if its religious foundation is undermined. However, in connection with the predominance of the courage to be as a part in the productive process it has changed its character. Guilt is produced by manifest shortcomings in adjustments to and achievements within the creative activities of society. It is the social group in which one participates productively that judges, forgives, and restores, after the adjustments have been made and the achievements have become visible. This is the reason for the existential insignificance of the experience of justification or forgiveness of sins in comparison with the striving for sanctification and the transformation of one’s own being as well as one’s World. A new beginning is demanded and attempted. This is the way in which the courage to be as a part of the productive process takes the anxiety of guilt into itself. #RandolphHarris 9 of 11
Participation in the productive process demands conformity and adjustment to the ways of social production. This necessity became stronger the more uniform and comprehensive the methods of production became. Technical society grew into fixed patterns. Conformity in those matters which conserve the smooth functioning of the big machine of production and consumption increased with the increasing impact of the means of public communication. World political thinking, the struggle with collectivism, forced collectivist features on those who fought against them. This process is still going on and may lead to a strengthening of the conformist elements in the type of the courage to be as a part which is represented by America. Conformism might approximate collectivism, not so much in economic respects, and not too much in political respects, but very much in the pattern of daily life and thought. Whether this will happen or not, and if it does to what degree, is partly dependent on the power of resistance in those who represent the opposite pole of the courage to be, the courage to be as oneself. Since their criticism of the conformist and collectivist forms of the courage to be as part is a decisive element of their self-expression, it is worth looking into more deeply. #RandolphHarris 10 of 11
We are extremely blessed to have the gospel of Jesus Christ in our lives. It brings hope to a troubles World. Christ is the personal antidote we need to find peace in a World that is absolutely unfair. “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the World ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the World,” reports John 16.33. None of us makes it through this life without problems and challenges—and sometimes tragedies and misfortunes. After all, in a large part we are here to learn and grow from such events in our lives. We know that there are times when we will suffer, when we will grieve, and when we will be saddened. “Adam fell that mortals might be; and mortals are, that they might have joy,” reports 2 Nephi 2.25. We should be able to see joy in our entire life. Sometimes moments can be difficult, but many of us have had many successes over a lifetime and let that joy inspire you and carry you on until it is your time to shine again. “How might we have joy in our lives, despite all that we may face? Again from the scriptures: ‘Wherefore, be of good cheer, and do not fear, for I the Lord am with you, and will stand by you,’” reports Doctrine and Covenants 68.6. #RandolphHarris 11 of 11
Dedicated to Mrs. Bonnie Faye Todd and Ms. Crystal Faye Todd
Not Knowing When the Dawn Will Come I Opened Every Door so Heaven Would Look Upon Us
I wrapped myself in comforting phantasms and envisioned bowers of love, places of Divine safety foreordained beyond good and evil. In reaction to the predominance of the courage to be as oneself in modern Western history, movements of a neocollectivist character has arisen: fascism, Nazism, and communism. It is all an attempt to put a leader or a group above God and dedicate oneself to the mission of the authority figure or the group. America is a Capitalistic country, but we currently have democrats who cannot seem to respect the laws and government of the land. They feel that they have taken the only right way in which to reach their own fulfillment. If these democrats affirm themselves by affirming the collective in which they participate, they receive themselves back from the collective, filled and fulfilled by it. They give much of what belongs to their individual self, perhaps its existence as a particular being in time and space, but these liberals receive more because their true being is enclosed in the being of the group. In surrendering themselves to the cause of the collective liberals surrender that in them which is not included in the self-affirmation of the collective; and this they do not deem worthy of affirmation. In this way the anxiety of the individual nonbeing is transformed into anxiety about the collective, and anxiety about the collective is conquered by the courage to affirm oneself through participation in the collective. #RandolphHarris 1 of 15
As in every human being the anxiety of fate and death is present in the convinced Communist, which many democrats are becoming. No being can accept its own nonbeing without a negative reaction. The terror of a totalitarian democratic state would be meaningless without the possibility of producing terror in its subjects, and they are doing this by threatening to vanquish law enforcement and criticizing branches of government who are defending us and also passing laws to prevent branches of law enforcement from protecting us, and at the same time legalizing drugs and letting dangerous criminals out of jail early. This is fear is also reinforced with the threat of open boarders, and people fear that their safety is being compromised and the ways of the Wild, Wild, West may be becoming back where it is everyone for themselves because there will be no one there to protect the, no privacy, no laws, and that their personal property will be liquidated for the collective as well as their wages renegotiated to the point where doctors are making the same wages as the cashier at the local Steak N Shake. In some countries, doctors are working for free and being paid as little as $8 USD per hour because of budget problems. Through the participation in the communist type of government he liberals are trying to form, one affirms that which may become destructive fate or even cause the death for oneself. #RandolphHarris 2 of 15
A more penetrating analysis shows the following structure in the democratic plan: Participation is partial identity, partial nonidentity. Fate and death may hurt or destroy part of oneself that is not identical with the collective in which one participates. However, there is another part according to the partial identity of participation. And this other part is neither hurt nor destroyed by the demands and actions of the whole. It transcends fate and death. It is eternal in the sense in which the collective is considered to be eternal, namely as an essential manifestation of being universal. All this need not be conscious in the members of the collective. However, it is implicit in their emotions and actions as they replace God with their leader and this moment, this Earth is all they have. Therefore, they are infinitely concerned about the fulfillment of the group. And from this concern they derive their courage to be. However, the term eternal and immortal should not be confused with finite. Immortal is the soul, but not yet the body and that would the body would go on living indefinitely. Eternal is living forever with God, leaving this planet and the body behind and having the power to create our own Worlds. #RandolpHarris 3 of 15
Finite is what we currently are. Our physical bodies can only live for so long. There is no idea of the individual mortality in old and new collectvism. The collective in which one participates replaces individual immortality. One the other hand, it is not a resignation to annihilation—otherwise no courage to be would be possible—but it is something above both immortality and annihilation; it is the participation in something which transcends death, namely the collective, and through it, in being-itself. One who is in this position feels in the moment of the sacrifice of one’s life that one is taken into the life of the collective and through it into the life of the Universe as an integral element of it, even if not as a particular being. The liberal political party has become a serious alternative to Christianity, and the anxiety of fate and death is taken into the courage to be as a part. The meaning of life for them is the meaning of the collective. Even those who live as victims of the terror at the lowest level of the social hierarchy do not doubt the validity of the democratic principles. What happens to them is a problem of fate and demands the courage to overcome the anxiety of fate and death and not the anxiety of doubt and meaninglessness. This is one of the reasons for the expulsion and prohibition of most of the modern forms of expression in many developed nations. #RandolphHarris 4 of 15
There have been some benefits from communism in the arts and literature, but it not a system most Americans want to participate in. However, the democrats are using the immigration debacle to make their party look humane, when all they want is to get sympathy and votes and enforce their communist rule, where the people have no say. And it is not their person sin that produces anxiety of guilt, anything they do is seen as necessary means to gain power. The collective, in this respect, replaces for themselves the God of judgment, repentance, punishment, and forgiveness. To the collective they accept judgment and punishment. To it they direct their desire for forgiveness and their promise of self-transformation. If one is accepted back by it, their guilt is overcome and a new courage to be is possible. These most striking features in the communist way of life can hardly be understood if one does not go down to their ontological roots and their existential power in a system which is based on the courage to be as a part. “The Lord had blessed them so long with the riches of the World that they had not been stirred up to anger, to wars, nor to bloodshed; therefore they began to set their hearts upon their riches; yea, they began to seek to get gain that they might be lifted up one above another; therefore they began to commit secret murders, and to rob and to plunder, that they might get gain,” reports Helaman 6.17. #RandolphHarris 5 of 15
Mental health cannot be discussed meaningfully as an abstract quality of abstract people. If we are to discuss now the state of mental health in contemporary Western mortals, and if we are to consider what factors in one’s mode of life make for in-sanity and what others are conducive to sanity, we have to study the influence of the specific conditions of our mode of production and of our social and political organization on the nature of mortals; we have to arrive at such a picture of the personality of the average mortal living and working under these conditions. Only if we can arrive at such a picture of the social character, tentative and incomplete as it may be, do we have a basis on which to judge the mental health and sanity of modern mortals. What is mean by social character? I refer in this concept to the nucleus of the character structure which is shared by most members of the same culture in contradistinction to the individual character in which people belong to the same culture differ from each other. The concept of social character is not a statistical concept in the sense that it is simply the sum total of character traits to be found in the majority of people in a given culture. It can be understood only in reference to the function of the social character which we shall now proceed to discuss. #RandolphHarris 6 of 15
Each society is structuralized and operates in certain ways which are necessitated by a number of objective conditions. These conditions include methods of production and distribution which in turn depend on raw materials, industrial techniques, climate, size of population, and political and geographic factors, cultural traditions and influences to which society is exposed. These is no society in general, but only specific social structures which operate in different and ascertainable ways. Although these social structures do change in the course of historical development, they are relatively fixed at any given historical period, and society can exist only by operating within the framework of it particular structure. The members of the society and/or the various classes or status groups within it have to behave in such a way as to be able to function in the sense required by the social system. It is the function of the social character to shape the energies of the members of society in such a way that their behavior is not a matter of conscious decision as to whether or not to follow the social pattern, but one wanting to act as they have to act and at the same time finding gratification in acting according to the requirements of the culture. In other words, it is the social character’s function to mold and channel human energy within a given society for the purpose of the continued functioning of this society. #RandolphHarris 7 of 15
Modern, industrial society, for instance, could not have attained its ends had it not harnessed the energy of free mortals for work in an unprecedented degree. Mortals had to be molded into a person who was eager to spend most of their energy for the purpose of work, who acquired discipline, particularly orderliness and punctuality, to a degree unknown in most other cultures. It would not have sufficed if each individual had to make up one’s mind consciously every day that one wanted to work, to be on time, etcetera, since any such conscious deliberation would lead to many more exceptions than smooth functioning of society can afford. Nor would threat and force have sufficed as a motive, since the highly differentiated tasks in modern industrial society can in the long run only be the work of free mortals and not of forced labor. The necessity for work, for punctuality and orderliness had to be transformed into an inner drive for these aims. This means that society had to produce a social character in which these strivings were inherent. “Yea, O God, and thou wast merciful unto me when I did cry unto thee in my field; when I did cry unto thee in my prayer, and thou didst hear me. And again, O God, when I did turn to my house thou didst hear me in prayer. Yea, O God, thou hast been merciful unto me, and heard my cries in the midst of thy congregations,” reports Alma 33.5-6 and 9. #RandolphHarris 8 of 15
The genesis of the social character cannot be understood by referring to one single cause but by understanding the interaction of sociological and ideological factors. Inasmuch as economic factors are less easily changeable, they have a certain predominance in this interplay. This does not mean that the drive for material gain is the only or even the most powerful motivating force in mortals. It does mean that the individual and society are primarily concerned with the task of survival, and that only when survival is secured can they proceed to the satisfaction of other imperative human needs. The task of survival implies that mortals have to produce, that is, one has to secure the minimum of food and shelter necessary for survival, ad the tools needed for even the most rudimentary process of production. The method of production in turn determines the social relations existing in a given society. It determines the mode of practice in life. However, religious, political and philosophical ideas are not rooted in the social character, they in turn also determine, systematize and stabilize the social character. “See that ye take care of these sacred things, yea, see that ye look to God and live. Go unto this people and declare the word, and be sober,” reports Alma 37.47. #RandolphHarris 9 of 15
Let me state again, in speaking of the socioeconomic structure of society as molding mortal’s character, we speak only of one pole in the interconnection between social organization and mortal. The other pole to be considered is mortal’s nature, molding in the social conditions in which one lives. The social process can be understood only if we start out with the knowledge of the reality of mortals, one’s psychic properties as well as one’s physiological ones, and if we examine the interaction between the nature of humans and the nature of the external conditions under which one lives and which one has to master if one is to survive. While it is true that mortals can adapt themselves to almost any conditions, one is not a blank sheet of paper on which culture writes its text. Needs like striving for happiness, harmony, love and freedom are inherent in one’s nature. They are also dynamic factors in the historical process which, it frustrated, tend to arouse psychic reactions, ultimately creating the very conditions suited to the original strivings. As long as the objective conditions of the society and the culture remain stable, the social character has a predominantly stabilizing function. If the external conditions change in such a way that they do not fit any more with the traditional social character, a lag arises which often changes the function of character into an element of disintegration instream of stabilization, into dynamite instead of a social mortar, as it were. #RandolphHarris 10 of 15
Provided this concept of the genesis and function of the social character is correct, we are confronted with a puzzling problem. Is not the assumption that the character structure is molded by the role which the individual has to play in one’s culture contradicted by the assumption that a person’s character is molded in one’s childhood? Can both views pretend to be true in view of the fact that the child in one’s early years of life has comparatively little contact with society as such? This question is not as difficult to answer as it may seem at first glance. We must differentiate between the factors which are responsible for the particular contents of the social character and the methods by which the social character is produced. The structure of society and the function of the individual in the social structure may be considered to determine the content of the social character. The family on the other hand may be considered to be the psychic agency of society, the institution which has the function of transmitting the requirements of society to the growing child. The family fulfills this function in two ways. First, and this is the most important factor, by the influence the character of the parents has on the character formation of the growing child. Since the character of most parents is an expression of the social character, they transmit in this way the essential features of the socially desirable character structure to the child. The parents’ love and happiness are communicated to the child as well as their anxiety or hostility. #RandolphHarris 11 of 15
In addition to the character of the parents, the methods of childhood training which are customary in a culture also have the function of molding the character of the child in a socially desirable direction. There are various methods and techniques of child training which can fulfill the same end, and on the other hand there can be methods which seem identical but which nevertheless are different because of the character structure of those who practice these methods. By focusing on methods of child training, we can never explain the social character. Methods of child training are significant only as a mechanism of transmission, and they can be understood correctly if we understand first what kinds of personalities are desirable and necessary in any given culture. The problem, then, of the socioeconomic conditions in modern industrial society which create the personality of modern Western mortals and are responsible for the disturbances in one’s mental health require an understanding of those elements specific to the capitalistic mode of production, of an acquisitive society in an industrial age. Sketchy and elementary as such a description by noneconomist must necessarily be, I hope it is nevertheless sufficient to form the basis for the following analysis of the social character of mortals in present-day Western society. #RandolphHarris 12 of 15
Our individual accomplishments, opinions, and contributions enable us to know our own unique identity and to take pleasure in feeling that we are significant member of the human family. However, at times, differences in the way we act, look, dress, or think can separate us from those around us. The young person who want to repudiate his group identities can go to the extremes of grab and speech that show the World that he does not want to be just another one of the crowd, another manipulable warm body. Since society needs solidarity and conformity to get its work done, people tend to react to the nonconformer in a number of different ways. There can be the hostile, resentful reactions that were illustrated in the climax of the great film of 2001, Romeo Must Die. Here, two major families of relatively conforming parties are competing for land it starts a war, especially when their child starting dating. Sometimes we simply point the finger of scorn: “Why do you not shape up, you weirdo?” When are you going to rejoin the human race?” This attempt may not be so much to get them to conform as to make them feel contemptible, lowly. Often, the reaction is exile, driving the nonconformers away. They can be figuratively ridden out of town on a rail, or literally made to feel that their presence is noxious and that they would be doing everyone a favor by moving on. #RandolphHarris 13 of 15
There are, of course, other ways, but the overall pattern is one of separating the nonconformer from the conforming group. It seems that may people living conforming, comfortable, not too differentiated lives are ill at ease, awkward, uncomfortable, or even angry with those who choose to live differently. Often these nonconformers live differently because they are trying to experience more of their total selfhood than the larger group is willing to risk. There is a variety of reactions on the part of the nonconformers, too. Many of them choose to drop out, to live apart from the larger group. They set up housekeeping in solitary camps, abandoned cars, or communes, or they drift from place to place, disdaining to take on the way of life of those they feel are only experiencing themselves partially. Naturally, not all the drop-outs are in the category of self-actualizers, but an increasing number of young people do feel that this is the only way to grow. Again, knowing who the true hippie or hipster is and who the commercializers or opportunist are is a matter of becoming personally acquainted with them. Separateness is not an emotional illness per se. It is a conscious choice on the part of the separated or a conscious movement on the part of the larger group. It consists of creating separate and different living spaces for each of them. It may be an opportunity for the separated one to grow in selfhood, or it may lead to marginality. #RandolphHarris 14 of 15
However, seeking and receiving the acceptance of the Lord will lead to the knowledge that we are chosen and blessed by him. The feeling of being accepted by someone we love is a basic human need. Being accepted by good people motivates us. It increases our sense of self-worth and self-confidence. Those who cannot find acceptance from desirable sources often seek it elsewhere. They may look at people who are not interested in their well-being. They may attach themselves to false friends and do questionable things to try to receive the acknowledgment they are seeking. They may seek acceptance by wearing a particular brand of clothing to generate a feeling of belonging or status. For some, striving for a role or a position of prominence can also be a way of seeking acceptance. They may define their worth by a position they hold or a status they obtain. Seeking acceptance from the wrong sources or for incorrect reasons puts us on a dangerous path—one that is likely to lead us astray and even to destruction. Instead of feeling cherished and self-confident, we will eventually feel abandoned and inferior. Therefore, see that you look to God and live. The ultimate source of empowerment and lasting acceptance is our Heavenly Father and his son, Jesus Christ. They know us. They love us. They do not acceptance of because of our title or position. They do not look at our status. They look into our hearts and accept us for who we are and what we are striving to become. #RandolphHarris 15 of 15
Sun Goes Down and Her Voice Among the Aisles Incites Timid Prayer Willing Silence Everywhere
You are a mocking little thing. Do you like to fight? Fighting with mortals is no fun because it is no fair. The concepts of carousel of mental health follows from the very conditions of human existence and it is the same for mortals in all ages and all cultures. Mental health is characterized by the ability to love and to create, by the emergence from incestuous ties to clan and soil, by a sense of identity based on one’s experience of self as the subject and agent of one’s powers, by the grasp of reality inside and outside of ourselves, that is, by the development of objectivity and reason. This concept of mental health coincides essentially with the norms postulated by the great spiritual teachers of the human race. This coincidence appears to some modern psychologists to be proof that our psychological premises are not scientific but philosophic or religious ideals. They find it difficult, apparently, to draw the conclusion that the great teachings of all cultures were based on rational insight into the nature of mortals, on the conditions for one’s full development. This latter conclusion seems also to be more in line with the face that in the most diverse places of this globe, at different periods of history, the awakened ones have preached the same norms, with none, or with little influence from one upon another. Ikhnaton, Moses, Confucius, Lao-tse, Buddha, Isaiah, Socrates, Jesus have postulated the same norms for human life, with only small and insignificant differences. #RandolphHarris 1 of 12
Mental health is not physical, but it is about the total human personality in its interaction with the World, nature and morals; it is the human practice of life as it results from the conditions of human existence. To understand a living being, one has to take the action of mortals and their interaction with their fellow humans and wit nature as the basic empirical datum for the study of a real being. Our concept of mental health leads into a theoretical difficulty if we consider the concept of human evolution. There is reason to assume that the history of mortals, hundreds of thousands of years ago, starts out with a truly primitive culture, where mortal’s reason has not developed beyond the most rudimentary beginnings, where one’s frame of orientation as little relation to reality and truth as we now know it. However, should we speak of these primitive mortals as lacking in mental health, when they are simply lacking in qualities which only further evolution could give them? Indeed, one answer could be given to this question which open up an easy solution; this answer is based in the obvious analogy between the evolution of the human race, and the evolution of the individual. “Now these mysteries are not yet fully made known unto me; therefore I shall forbear,” reports Alma 37. 11. #RandolphHarris 2 of 12
If an adult had the attitude and orientation of a one-moth-old child, we would certainly classify that individual as unusual. For the one-month-old baby, however, the same attitude of sleeping all day, laughing and acting cute, crying at night when they want attention, food, or a nappy change is normal and healthy, because it corresponds to the stage of psychic development for the point in life. The mental sickness of the adult, then, can be characterized as a fixation or regression to an orientation which belongs to a former evolutionary state, and which is not adequate any more, considering the state of development the person should have reached. And when someone is in a state of regression, there is no question to it. It is similar, for example, to a girl sixteen years of age, who suddenly starts acting and talking like she is possessed by a five-year-old girl and doing things like having a tea party with a set of dolls and speaking like she is younger than she is. However, in regression, she has no idea of her age because of her mind trying to protect itself by taking her to another era, she is basically unconscious and unaware of her biological age. And until she is able to work through the trauma, she will not return to he normal state of development. #RandolphHarris 3 of 12
In the same way one could say that the human race, like the infant, starts out with a primitive orientation, which correspond to the adequate state of human evolution; while one would call sick those fixations or regressions which represent earlier states of development after the human race has already passed through them. Attractive as such a solution is, it does not take into account one fact. The child one-month-of age has not yet the basis for a completely mature attitude. Therefore, one may not under normal circumstances think, feel or act like a mature adult. Mortals, on the contrary, for hundreds of thousands of years, have had all the organic equipment for maturity; their brain, bodily co-ordination, physical strength have not changed in all that time. One’s evolution depended entirely on one’s ability to transmit knowledge to future generations, and thus to accumulate it. Human evolution is the result of cultural development, and not of an organic change. The infant of the most primitive culture, put into a highly developed culture, would develop like other children in this culture, because the only factor determining one’s development is the cultural factor. #RandolphHarris 4 of 12
In other words, while the child who is one month of age may not have spiritual maturity of an adult—whatever the cultural conditions are—any mortal from the primitive stage on, could have the perfection of mortals at the peak of one’s evolution provided one was given the cultural conditions for such maturity. It follows that to speak of primitive, incestuous, unreasonable mortals, as being in a normal evolutionary phase is different from making the same statement about the infant. Yet, on the other hand, the development of culture is a necessary condition for human development. Thus, there does not seem to be a completely satisfactory answer to this problem; from one standpoint we may speak of a lack in mental health; from another standpoint we may speak of an early phase in development. However, the difficulty is great only if we deal with the problem in its most general form; as soon as we come to the more concrete problems of our time, we find the problem much less complicated. We have reached a state of individuation in which only the fully developed mature personality can make fruitful use of freedom; if the individual has not developed one’s reason and one’s capacity for love, one is incapable of bearing the burden of freedom and individuality, and tries to escape into artificial ties which give one a sense of belonging and rootedness. #RandolphHarris 5 of 12
Any regression today from freedom into artificial rootedness in state of race is a sign of mental illness, since such regression does not correspond to the state of evolution already reached and results in unquestionably pathological phenomena. However, the unconscious mechanisms for protecting personality are essential; they help maintain a balance that enables us to make a sane way through life. Yet, sometimes the mechanism is weighty enough to upset the balance in unusual ways. Consider the follow case: A student enters a psychology class, consciously setting out to do a good job,learn a lot, and get a very good grade in the course. He has the tools: a good head (brain), lots of motivation, and a fair background. He gets good grades in classroom discussion and on his papers. However, on exams, he constantly gets F’s (denotes failure to comprehend the material). In his consternation, he comes to visit the professor. “What is this?” He asks both himself and the instructor. “I knew this stuff. I understand everything you are talking about. Your lectures are clear and understandable. The book is no problem. I can read and write well. I do not do this in other classes. What gives?” #RandolphHarris 6 of 12
The instructor and the student begin talking about the student’s home life, his motivations, his goals, and dreams. After a few weeks, a startling thing is unveiled: the student admits that he really dislikes his father. The father is a tyrant, unyielding and unresponsive to the student. The instructor tries something risky: he asks the student if there is anything about him—the instructor—that reminds the boy of his father. “No, of course not!” the boy begins. Then, he smiles. “Except….He is about the same height. He is very self-confident, like you are. Hey! There is a hecka lot about you that reminds me of my old man!” The young man has acquired a rather strong dislike for all authority figure because of the strong negative feelings he has for his father. He goes on to admit that he hates policemen and judges, he hated his commanding officer in the Army, and he has generalized this dislike to some of his male teachers. As it turns out, the young man continued to do poorly in this particular class. At the suggestion of the instructor, he entered into psychotherapy with a psychologist in his home country. Though he continued to have trouble with exams in this professor’s class, he managed to work out an arrangement with the teacher whereby exams were done in a different matter. #RandolphHarris 7 of 12
After working with the professors, the student got better grades than he might have otherwise. However, what particular problem did the exam represent? The student later told the instructor that he felt the exams represented a power struggle between the students and the instructors. His hostility toward his father was such a source of concern and guilt to him that he did everything he could to minimize competition. He felt that if he lost the competition in exam-taking to the instructor, he would be doing some sort of penance for his hostility. Regardless of whether we speak of mental health or of the mature development of the human race, the concept of mental health or of maturity is an objective one, arrived at by the examination of the human situation and the human necessities and needs stemming from it. It follows that mental health cannot be defined in terms of the adjustments of the individual to one’s society, but, on the contrary, that it must be defined in terms of the adjustment of society to the needs of mortals, of its role in furthering or hindering the development of mental health. Whether or not the individual is healthy, is primarily not an individual matter, but depends on the structure of society. #RandolphHarris 8 of 12
A healthy society furthers mortal’s capacity to love their fellow living beings and other organic and inorganic life. Another goal for a healthy society is to work creatively, to develop one’s reason and objectivity, to have a sense of self which is based on the experience of one’s own personal powers. An unhealthy society is one which creates mutual hostility, distrust, which transforms mortals into an instrument of use and exploitation for others, which deprives one of a sense of self, except inasmuch as one submits to others or becomes an automation. Society can have both functions; it can further mortal’s healthy development, and it can hinder it; in fact most societies do both, and the question is only to what degree and in what direction their beneficial and negative influence is exercised. Two things happened in the ancient World which separate medieval collectivism definitively from primitive collectivism. One was the discovery of personal guilt—called by the prophets guilt before God: the decisive step to the personalization of religion and culture. The other was the beginning of autonomous questions-asking in Greek philosophy, the decisive step to the problematization of culture and religion. #RandolphHarris 9 of 12
Both elements, culture and religion, were transmitted to the medieval nations by the Church. With them went the anxiety of doubt and meaninglessness. As in later antiquity could have led to a situation in which the courage to be as oneself was necessary. However, the Church gave an antidote against the threat of anxiety and despair, namely itself, its traditions, its sacraments, its education, and its authority. The anxiety of guilt was taken into the courage to be as part of the sacramental community. The anxiety of doubt was taken into the courage to be as a part of the community in which revelation and reason are united. In this way the medieval courage to be was, in spite of its difference from primitive collectivism, the courage to be as a part in the powerful participation of the universal. Some people believed in the self-respect of the individual as self-affirmation as the follower of a feudal lord or a member of guild or as the student in an academic corporation or as a bearer of a special function like that of a craft or a trade or a profession. The tension created by this situation is theoretically expressed in the attack of nominalism on medieval realism and the permanent conflict between them. Nominalism attributes ultimate reality to the individual and would have much earlier than it actually did to a dissolution of the medieval system of participation if the immensely strengthened authority of the Church had not delayed it. #RandolphHarris 10 of 12
In religious practice the same tension was expressed in the duality of the sacraments of the mass and of penance. The former mediated the objective power of salvation in which everybody was supposed to participate, if possible by being present at its daily performance. In consequence of this universal participation guilt and grace were felt not only as personal but also as communal. The punishment of the sinner had representative character representative character in such a way that the whole community suffered with one. And the liberation of the sinner from punishment on Earth and in purgatory was partly dependent on the representative holiness of the saints and the love of those who made sacrifices for one’s liberation. Nothing is more characteristic of the medieval system of participation than this mutual representation. The courage to be as a part and to take upon oneself the anxieties of nonbeing is embodied in medieval institutions as it was in primitive forms of life. However, medieval semi collectivism came to an end when the anticollectivist pole, represented by the sacrament of penance, came to the fore. The principle that only contrition, the personal and total acceptance of judgment and grace, can make the objective sacraments effective was impelling toward reduction and even exclusion of the objective element, of representation and participation. “And now, it has hitherto been wisdom in God that these things should be preserved; for behold, they have enlarged the memory of his people,” reports Alma 37.8 #RandolphHarris 11 of 12
In the act of contrition everybody stands alone before God; and it was hard for the Church to mediate this element with the objective one. Finally it proved impossible and the system disintegrated. At the same time the nominalistic tradition became powerful and liberated itself from the heteronomy of the Church. In Reformation and Renaissance the medieval courage to be as apart, its semicollectvist system, came to an end, and developments started which brought the question of the courage to be as oneself to the fore. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the Heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. When feelings of anxiety and inferiority surface, we can get at the roots of the problems, not just the symptoms. Hearing and understanding the feelings of those we love makes them feel loved. It helps us as parents adjust our behavior to deal with them more effectively. “And we never took the time to see where we were going. We were only passing by and we never questioned why; the river keeps flowing; the beauty of the ride. If I could all you for a day just to hear the words you would, I would,” Colours by Emma Hewitt. #RandolphHarris 12 of 12
After a Hundred Years Great Streets of Silence Led Away as the Bells at Distance Called
It occurred to me with uncommon strength that I had grown too fond of all these people, and I was impressed that the Japanese invented ice cream that can stand at room temperature for an hour without melting. I hear it is popular and gorgeous treat. The concept of mental health depends on our concept of the nature of mortals. The needs and passions of mortals stem from the peculiar condition of their existence. Those needs which mortals shares with the animals—hunger, thirst, need for sleep and physical intimacy—are important, being rooted in the inner chemistry of the body, and when they remain unsatisfied, they can become all powerful. (This holds true, of course, more of the need for food and sleep than of physical intimacy, which is not satisfied never assumes the power of the other needs, at least not for physiological reasons.) However, even their complete satisfaction is not a sufficient condition for sanity and mental health. These depend on the satisfaction of those needs and passions which are specifically human, and which stem from the conditions of the human situation: the need for relatedness, transcendence, rootedness, the need for a sense of identity and the need for a frame of orientation and devotion. The great passions of mortals, their lust for power, their vanity, their search for truth, their passion for love and fellowship, their destructiveness as well as their creativeness, every powerful desire which motivates mortal’s actions, is rooted in their specific human source, not in the various stages of their libido. #RandolphHarris 1 of 8
Mortal’s solution to their physiological needs are, psychologically speaking, utterly simple; the difficulty here is a purely sociological and economic one. Human’s solution to their mortal needs are exceedingly complex, it depends on many factors and last, not least, on the way one’s society is organized and how this organization determines the human relations within it. The basic psychic needs stemming from the peculiarities of human existence must be satisfied in one form or other, unless mortals are to become insane, just as one’s physiological needs must be satisfied lest one die. However, the way in which the psychic needs can be satisfied are manifold, and difference between various ways of satisfaction is tantamount to the differences between various degrees of mental health. If one of the basic necessities has found no fulfillment, insanity is the result; if it is satisfied but in an unsatisfactory way—considering the nature of human existence—considering the nature of human existence—neurosis (either manifest or in the form of a socially patterned defect) is the consequence. Mortals have to relate themselves to others; but if they do it in a symbiotic or alienated way, they lose their independence and integrity; they are weak, suffers, become hostile, or apathetic; only if one can relate oneself to others in loving ways does one feel one with them and at the same time preserve their integrity. #RandolphHarris 2 of 8
Only by productive work does one relate oneself to nature, becoming one with her, and yet not submerging in her. As long as mortals remain rooted incestuously in nature, family, clan, one is blocked from developing one’s individuality, one’s reason; one remains the helpless prey of nature, and yet one can never feel one with her. Only if one develops one’s reason and one’s love, if one can experience the natural and the social World in a human way, can one feel at home, secure in oneself, and the master of one’s life. It is hardly necessary to point out that of two possible forms of transcendence,destructiveness is conducive to suffering, creativeness to happiness. It is also easy to see that only a sense of identity based on the experience of one’s own powers can give strength, while all forms of identity experience based on the group, leave people dependent, hence weak. Eventually, only to the extent to which one grasps reality, can one make this World one’s own possession; if one lives in illusions, one never changes the conditions which necessitate these illusions. #RandolphHarris 3 of 8
Critical has to do with a crisis. The Chinese characters for the word “crisis” are actually made up of the pictograms for two works, “dangerous”and “opportunity.” A crisis, in the Eastern perspective, is a dangerous opportunity. It may be that we can find some useful insight here as we assess the matter of crises. For instance, a critical conflict situation may be that moment in time, full of threat, full of risk, yet full of potential, that provides a turning point, a crossroad encounter, a chance to try something new or untried. Some of the conflict we encounter are strong reminders that parts of the self are not working harmoniously, that we are not together. One of the things we humans often do, mostly because we do have choices in so many things, is to get ourselves into messed-up situations. In our attempts to give meaning and significance to our lives, we often do things that are at cross-purposes. We make two dates or appointments for the same times, often for places that are miles apart! Say for the same one thing (“I am going to stay home and catch upon my work.”) and do another (“Well, okay, I will meet you for just one Harvey Wall Banger.”). We have a strong urge to commit an act (tell a person off) and we do the opposite (nod agreement). These are some of the things we do that illustrate what we call “self-defeating actions.” #RandolphHarris 4 of 8
What happens, of course, is that our motivations run headlong into each other or into something else. “The best-laid schemes o’ mice an’ men gang aft a-gley,..” Scottish poet Robert Burns tells us, and how right he is. Our plans, no matter how well-planned, often go “a-gley” or fall flat on their faces. The conflict that described for us are partly to blame. Yet, we find too many people who enter into self-defeating situations for reasons. Some of these are unconscious. Now, as much choice-making as any of us can do, there are still some decisions that seem to make themselves, or get made for us by others or by circumstances. Though we have much control, there is still a lot of chance or circumstance at work. Things happen, people change, and times change. Circumstantial conflicts are all about. At the unconscious level there are many motivations working that a person may be unaware of. We have to acknowledge that things like Repression do operate. Repression is one of those unconscious operations that Dr. Freud and his followers called defense mechanism. The purpose of these mechanisms is to guard the fragile personality from ideas, thoughts, experiences and behaviors that might to damage. Sleep is sometimes considered a defense against conflict. #RandolphHarris 5 of 8
Amnesia is also another way people defend against conflict, as any soap operas like Criminal Minds, Dynasty, All American, Law and Order SVU, Supernatural, S.W.A.T, Manifest, Midnight Texas, Blue Bloods, Chicago P.D., Chicago Fire, Poldark, New Amsterdam, Black Lighting, Big Little Lies, All in the Family and many others will attempt to show. Common forgetfulness is often a repression of an experience that is threatening or beyond control at the time it occurs. Placing blame outside oneself, various compulsions—defense mechanisms come in many forms. Nonebeing in the form of the threat of loss of self in the group has not yet appeared. Self-affirmation within a group includes the courage to accept guilt and its loss of self in the group includes the courage to accept guilt and its consequences as public guilt, whether one is oneself responsible or whether somebody else is. It is a problem of the group which has to be expiated for the sake of the group, and the methods of punishment and satisfaction requested by the group are accepted by the individual. Individual guilt consciousness exists only as the consciousness of a deviation from the institutions and rules of the collective. #RandolphHarris 6 of 8
Truth and meaning are embodied in the traditions and symbols of the group, and there is no autonomous asking and doubt. However, even in a primitive collective, as in every human community, there are outstanding members, the bearers of the traditions and leaders of the future. They must have sufficient distance in order to judge and to change. They must take responsibility and ask questions. This unavoidably produces individual doubt and personal guilt. Nevertheless, the predominant pattern is the courage to be as a part in all members of the primitive group. “For since the beginning of the World have not mortal heard nor perceived by the ear, neither hath any eye seen, O God, besides thee, how great things thou hast prepared for one that waiteth for thee,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 133.45. God is in his work to being pass the salvation and exaltation of his children. Our desire is that faith in the Heavenly Father’s plan and in the Savior’s redeeming mission might increase the Earth and that God’s everlasting covenant might be established. Our only objectives are to facilitate continuing conversation to the Lord and to love more completely and serve more effectively our human, plant, animal, and others beings in our family. #RandolphHarris 7 of 8
The purpose and purification, the happiness and joy, and the continuing conversion and protection that come from yielding our hearts unto God and receiving his image in our countenances cannot be obtained merely by performing and checking off all the spiritual things we are supposed to do. Rather, the power of the Savior’s gospel to transform and bless us flows from discerning and applying the interrelatedness of its doctrine, principles, and practices. Only as we gather together in one all things Christ, with firm focus on him, can gospel truths synergistically enable us to become what God desires us to become and endure valiantly to the end. The gospel of Jesus Christ is a magnificent tapestry of truthfully framed and woven together. As we learn and link together revealed gospel truths, we are blessed to receive precious perspective and increased spiritual capacity through eyes that can see the Lord’s influence in our lives and ears that can see the Lord’s influence in our lives and ears that can hear his voice. And the principle of gathering together in one—even in him—can assist us in changing the traditional checklists into a unified, integrated, and complete whole. “The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing,” Zephaniah 3.17. #RandolphHarris 8 of 8
I Felt a Clearing in My Mind as if My Brain Had Split—God’s Residence is Next to Mine!
The fact that mortals have reason and imagination leads not only to the necessity for having a sense of one’s own identity, but also for orienting oneself in the World intellectually. This need can be compared when the child can walk by oneself, touch and handle things, knowing what they are. However, when the ability to walk and to speak has been acquired, only the first step in the direction of orientation has been taken. Mortals find themselves surrounded by many puzzling phenomena and, having reason, one has to make sense of them, has to put them in some context which one can understand and which permits one to deal with them in one’s thoughts. The further one’s reason develops, the more adequate becomes one’s system of orientation, that is, the more it approximates reality. However, even if a person’s frame of orientation is utterly illusory, it satisfies one’s need for some picture which is meaningful to one. Whether one believes in the power of a totem animal, in a rain god, or in the superiority and destiny of one’s own race, one’s need for some frame of orientation is satisfied. #RandolphHarris 1 of 8
Quite obviously, the picture of the World which one has depends on the development of one’s reason and of one’s knowledge. Although biologically the brain capacity of the human race has remained the same for thousands of generations, it takes a long evolutionary process to arrive at objectivity, that is, to acquire the faculty to see the World, nature, other persons and oneself as they are, and not distorted by desires and fears. The more mortals develop this objectivity, the more one is in touch with reality, the more one matures, the better can one can create a human World in which one is at home. Reason is mortal’s faculty for grasping the World by thought, in contradiction to intelligence, which is mortal’s ability to manipulate the World with the help of thought. Reason is mortal’s instrument for arriving at the truth, intelligence is mortal’s instrument for manipulating the World more successfully; the former is essentially human, the latter belongs to the terrestrial aspect of mortal. Reason is a faculty which must be practiced, in order to develop, and it is indivisible. By this I mean that the faculty for objectivity refers to the knowledge of nature as well as to the knowledge of mortals, of society and of oneself. If one lives in illusions about one sector of life, one’s capacity for reason is restricted or damaged, and this the use of reason is inhibited with regard to all other sectors. #RandolpHarris 2 of 8
Reason in this respect is like love. Just as love is an orientation which refers to all objects and is incompatible with the restriction to one object, so is reason a human faculty which must embrace the whole of the World with which humans are confronted. The need for a frame of orientation exists on two levels; the first and the more fundamental need is to have some frame or orientation, regardless of whether it is true or false. Unless mortal have such a subjectively satisfactory frame of orientation, one cannot live sanely. On the second level the need is to be in touch with reality by reason, to grasp the World objectively. However, the necessity to develop one’s reason is not as immediate as that to develop some frame of orientation, since what is at stake for mortals in the latter case is one’s happiness and serenity, and not one’s sanity. This become very clear if we study the function of rationalization. However unreasonable or immoral an action may be, mortals have an insuperable urge to rationalize it, this is, to prove to oneself and to others that one’s action is determined by reason, common sense, or at least conventional morality. One has little more difficulty in acting irrationally, but it is almost impossible for one not to give one’s action the appearance of reasonable motivation. #RandolphHarris 3 of 8
If mortals were only a disembodied intellect, one’s aim would be achieved by a comprehensive thought system. However, since one is an entity endowed with a body as well as a mind, one has to react to the dichotomy of one’s existence not only in thinking but in the total process of living, in one’s feelings and actions. Hence any satisfying system of orientation contains not only intellectual elements but elements of feeling and sensing which are expressed in the relationship to an object of devotion. The answers given to mortal’s need for a system of orientation and an object of devotion differ widely both in content and in form. There are primitive systems such as animals and totemism in which natural objects or ancestors represent answers to mortal’s quest for meaning. There are nontheistic systems like Buddhism, which are usually called religion although in their original form there is no concept of God. There are purely philosophical systems, like Stoicism, and there are monotheistic religious systems which give an answer to mortal’s quest for meaning in reference to this concept of God. However, whatever their contents, they all respond to mortal’s need to have not only some thought system, but also an object of devotion which gives meaning to one’s existence and to one’s position in the World. #RandolphHarris 4 of 8
Only the analysis of the various forms of religion can show which answers are better and which are worse solutions to mortal’s quest for meaning and devotion, better or worse always considered from the standpoint of mortal’s nature and one’s development. Th courage to be as a part is the courage to affirm one’s own being by participation. One participates in the World to which one belongs and from which one is at the same time separated. However, participating in the World becomes real through participation in those sections are actual with which one is partially identical. The more self-relatedness a being has the more it is able, according to the polar structure of reality, to participate. Mortals as the completely centered being or as a person can participate in everything, but one participates through that section of the World which makes one a person. Only in the continuous encounters with other persons does the person become and remain a person. The place of this encounter is the community. Mortal’s participation in nature is direct, insofar as one is a definite part of nature through one’s bodily existence. One’s participation in nature is indirect and mediate through the community insofar as one transcends nature by knowing and shaping it. #RandolphHarris 5 of 8
Without language there are no universals; without universals no transcending of nature and no relation to it as nature. However, language is communal, not individual. The section of reality in which one participates immediately is the community to which one participates immediately is the community to which one belongs. Though it and only through it participation in the World as a whole and in all its parts is mediated. Therefore, one who has the courage to be as a part has the courage to affirm oneself as a part of the community to which one participates. One’s self-affirmation is a part of the self-affirmation of the social groups which constitute the society to which one belongs. This seems to imply that there is a collective and not only an individual self-affirmation, and that the collective self-affirmation is threatened by nonbeing, producing collective anxiety, which is met by collective courage. One could say that the subject of this anxiety and this courage is a we-self as against the egoselves who parts of it are. However, such an enlargement of the meaning of “self” must be rejected. Self-hood is self-centeredness. Yet there is no center in a group in the sense in which exists in a person. #RandolphHarris 6 of 8
There may be a central power, a king, a queen, a president, an emperor, an empress, or a dictator. One may be able to impose his or her will on the group. However, it is not the group which decides if he or she decides, though the group may follow. Therefore it is neither adequate to speak of a we-self nor useful to employ the terms collective anxiety and collective courage. When describing the three periods of anxiety, we pointed out that masses of people were overtaken by a special type of anxiety-producing situation and because outbreaks of anxiety are always contagious. There is no collective anxiety save an anxiety which has been overtaken many or all members of a group and has been intensified or changed by becoming universal. The same is true of what is wrongly called collective courage. There is no entity we-self as the subject of courage. There are selves who participate in a group and whose character is partly determined by this participation. The assumed we-self is a common quality of ego-selves within a group. The courage to be as a part is like all forms of courage, a quality of individual selves. A collectivist society is one in which the existence and life of the individual are determined by the existence and institutions of the group. In collectivist societies the courage of the individua is the courage to be as a part. #RandolphHarris 7 of 8
Looking at so-collective primitive societies one finds typical forms of anxiety and typical institutions in which courage expresses itself. The individual members of the group develop equal anxieties and fears. And they use the same methods of developing courage and fortitude which are prescribed by traditions and institutions. This courage is the courage which every member of the group is supposed to have. In many tribes the courage to take pain upon oneself is the test of full membership in the group, and the courage to take death upon oneself is a lasting test in the life of most groups. The courage of one who stands these tests is the courage to be as a part. One affirms oneself through the group in which one participates. The potential anxiety of losing oneself in the group is not actualizes, because the identification with the group is complete. I wish I was one of those saints. Maybe that is why I had to write this chapter. However, I am not a saint. And that did not even take five minutes for you to know it, so do not complain. It is just that I cannot forget my passion to be officially canonized. “My God hath been support; he hath led me through mine afflictions s in the wilderness; and he hath prescribed me upon the water of the great deep. He hath filled me with his love, even consuming my flesh. He hath confounded mine enemies, unto the causing them to quake before me,” reports 2 Nephi. 420-23. #RandolphHarris 8 of 8
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Randolph Harris II International Institute 