Specialism of thinking, bureaucracy and alienation

If primary thinking is our unbounded scope, the opposite applies to the thought-world we inhabit in modern society.

It began with Law - which sampled from infinite reality just a few aspects for attention, and dealt with them according to standard procedures. When one is operating within Law, within the legal 'system' - and if one is competent - one is alienated from reality and from the processes of Life.

Law deals with a biased and ultra-simplified model of life - thinking as a lawyer is to think within this simple model and using only this simple model.

The same applies to all other professional discourses - medicine, the military, science (and all the sub-sciences); but the major alienating system nowadays is bureaucracy.

All bureaucracies - by their operational definitions and standard procedures - are and impose simplified and biased models of reality.  And bureaucracies have extended into ever-more of life - and the different bureaucracies have linked-up via a huge increase in laws, regulations, subsidies, taxes, grants, monitoring, auditing etc. etc.

So the modern condition is to inhabit, and to think within and by the rules of, an almost-total bureaucracy - which has specialised sub-branches (such as law, medicine, science, the police, the branches of government, the mass media) - but which is incrementally converging into a single system, with a single set of master-priorities.

In a formal sense this convergence on master-priorities is not a bad thing - indeed it is a good thing: after all, the ideal is that all social systems be permeated and controlled by the master priority of Christianity (leaving-aside what specifically that would entail).

What is bad is that is two-fold:

Firstly and most obviously, the master priorities are evil. they are negative, destructive and ultimately inverting of Good.

But secondly they are simplified models of reality - and thus necessarily false and inadequate.

My focus on Primary Thinking is to emphasise that with primary thinking is a way of knowing the world that is unbounded and works by spontaneous, satisfying and intrinsically-valid processes.

Primary thinking ought to be the master priority - an un-alienated, participating way of thinking; not limited by professional or expedient boundaries - but inclusive of everything that is relevant and true; and - although limited in scope and precision - and in expression; intrinsically-valid within those bounds.

In sum: Bureaucracy is alienation; increase in bureaucracy is increase in alienation - consequently modernity is (from this reason alone - although there are others) already highly-alienated and becoming ever-more-so.

Was is more, the alienation is inescapable. The linked-unified bureaucracy is becoming ever harder to escape, as it absorbs ever-more of life - but even when it is escaped, the alternative thought worlds are almost-always narrow, partial, tightly defined, standardised in procedure and process...

Thus social media is not an escape from alienation, it is merely a different species of alienation. And that is the best we can manage - in modernity we take a break from one type of alienation by engaging in a different type of alienation - but the fact of alienation is constant. 

Only if we practise an unalienated way of being - that is participation - can we escape alienation even for a moment. The first escape is into unconsciousness (sleep, trance, intoxication...) - but that is to cease to be fully-human (and anyway when we are truly unconscious, we do not know we have escaped alienation).

The importance of primary thinking is that in-it we escape alienation, and we enter and participate-in a world of unbounded scope and reality; we do not think within definitions nor according to procedures, but whatever is thought is spontaneous and true.

(Expressing the insights of primary thinking is, however, neither spontaneous nor true! On the contrary, it must be another model.)

Primary thinking is therefore intrinsically-gratifying, and self-reinforcing. It is also intrinsically self-validating - if we allow it to be.

The question each of us ought to examine is whether (and, related, why) such thinking is indeed to be considered as real.

Alienation, not-thinking and animism

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The characteristically modern malaise is alienation - detachment from the world, lack of a sense of involvement with life, a sense of unreality.

This has replaced the conviction of sin which dominated though most of recorded human history, and still dominates most of the world.

Modernity has escaped from guilt into meaninglessness.

*

To escape from alienation is difficult, since it is not a misunderstanding of the modern world, but on the contrary a realization of the actuality of the modern perspective, following it through to its correct implications.

So alienation is commonest among the most thoughtful, most reflective people - not so much among the ignorant or instinctive.

Alienation is therefore an aspect or attribute of the nihilism of modernity.

*

In a society which regards the soul as a fiction, which regards the individual as radically isolated (and where solipsism seems as irrefutable reality to many - that humans have nothing to do with each other except at a crudely material level of satisfying or frustrating desires) - the compelling urge to escape from alienation seems to dominate everywhere and in everything.

*

There is only one way to escape from alienation while continuing to embrace modernity (atheism, soul denial, humanism, materialism etc) - and that is not to think about it.

The first is to learn not to think about it, to be unreflective, to become immersed in busyness at work or in the home, in the media - news, sport, soaps, fashion - in the minutiae of life, absorbed in hopes and plans for the future, absorbed in powerful emotions such as hatred or lust, absorbed perhaps in arts or crafts or science or maybe even creativity of some kind.

Or when immersion is impossible; to use analgesia, pain killing maneuvers - principally serial distraction, to hyperstimulate oneself and to become (deliberately) addicted to this hyper stimulation - to make oneself (deliberately) a hyper-stimulation junkie - such that life is a matter of seeking and finding, and planning to seek and find, situations where the pressure of stimulus is such as to displace alienation. These situations may themselves be unpleasant - like arguments, abuse, violence, self-harm, nasty drugs that make you feel bad - but they prevent the boredom which leads to alienation.
 
Another method is to obliterate the type of thinking which leads to alienation - to become and remain intoxicated, in one form or another.

Another is to train oneself in unemotionality; to be (or aim to be) cool, cold, indifferent - psychopathic. Such that intellectual or analytic perceptions do not trigger emotional responses. To look upon the world with a hard eye - invulnerable.

*

Another is to 'regress' - to adopt (in actuality, or much more often in imagination) the unalienated state of childhood or some imagined simpler society - a world of animism.

This is how the world was for almost everyone before they were spoiled by nihilism - a world when we had an immortal soul, and so did our toys and trees, a world of bogeymen and ghosts, a world where our parents knew what we were doing and thinking even from afar - a world of proximate terrors (often) yet ultimate coherence. A world focused around ourselves yet not solipsistic because it seemed that everybody knew who we were and everything was somehow related to us and we were part of some kind of plan (a world, that is, of paranoia - it its technical sense).

An animistic world in which we were engaged - where there was real joy and real misery, and always meaning and purpose.

Yet to embrace animism is to reject modernity.

If animism is real then we have left modernity; if animism is imaginative we have encapsulated imagination from socio-political life and made it irrelevant to life - at best a recreation or escape (and that indeed may be valuable - even vital).

*

So - alienation is an inevitable and rational consequence of modernity and its soul-denial, its nihilism.

And - given the assumptions of secular humanism - there are no escapes from alienation except these two: not-thinking about it, or 'regressive' animism.

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Converting modern Man. Which comes first: Christianity or re-enchantment? (Or, the synergistic twin evils of nihilism and alienation)

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Owen Barfield (slightly edited from an interview with Schenkel):

My book Saving the Appearances (1957) was intended as a contribution to the healing, in the general mind, of the universally presumed Cartesian split between matter and mind - a paradigm-shift which I feel must precede the restoration of any spiritual dimension to the social structures of the West.

*

The two great problems of modern Western Man are nihilism and alienation.

Nihilism comes from the death of God, specifically the loss of Christian faith - so that life has lost objective reality, and has no purpose - therefore his life lacks direction and adds-up to nothing; the whole thing feels meaningless.

Alienation comes from the abstraction and literalism of modern thought; so that each Man feels solipsistically-isolated inside his own head - detached from public discourse, detached even from his own thoughts and feelings; which seems arbitrary, distant and irrelevant from the objective public world. Alienated modern Man does not participate; he is cut-off from the world; the world is lifeless, mechanical, deeply boring.

*

The Nihilism stands in the path of re-enchantment of the world; prevents a restoration of child-like participation in reality - because all meanings seem like arbitrary fantasies, and any healing seems as if based on make-believe. When nothing is really real, then modern Man cannot re-establish contact with reality. The death of God means that we cannot cure alienation.

*

And alienation blocks the path to Christian renewal - because when Christianity is conceptualized in the modern, alienated mode of thinking; Christianity becomes meaningless. To modern Man, even if Christianity is true, it seems irrelevant to the alienated soul. When the world is regarded as dead clockwork, the Gospels are just another story, just another set of rules, just another bunch of threats and promises.

*

This is the predicament of modern Man - he is caught in a pincer-grip: he cannot be saved by Christianity, because he is doomed by alienation; he cannot be saved from alienation because he is in despair from lack of Christianity.

So which comes first: the objective reality of Christianity or restored animism and re-enchantment?

Barfield says the first priority - even before Christianity - should be healing our state of alienation (or, the Cartesian split, as he calls it) - and I believe he is correct, for the following reasons...

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Christianity comes from a pre-modern world, which simply takes for granted aliveness and the meaningfulness of the non-human. But Christianity in a world of scientism, a world of bureaucratic and legalistic discourse, cannot feed our starving souls in the way that it should.

To the typical modern Man, Christianity is perceived as the same kind of thing as the legal system, or a state office, or an NGO. It is a structure, a system, an establishment, a rulebook and a code of conduct. If modern man simply becomes a normal Christian, he will find that the moment-by-moment experience, the texture of his living, has not changed.

He will be the same-old alienated self, leading the same-old dull, un-engaged, life-at-a-distance.

*

The answer is that the healing of alienation should come first, but must be regarded as only a means to the end of a proper Christianity.

From the Romantic and Transcendentalist poets and essayists, through Jung, through neo-paganism, through Joseph Campbell, to some of today's Positive Psychologists; there has been no shortage of non-Christians who offer to cure alienation and re-enchant the world. But even if they delivered everything they claim, the fundamental problems of modern life - its nihilism - would be unaffected.

We might feel alive; but we would regard this feeling as arbitrary, merely subjective, a delusion - a temporary psychological state soon to be terminated by circumstances, disease, age or death.

However, if (instead of being the program of non- or anti-Christians) this re-enchantment was embarked-upon explicitly and purposively as a seamless preliminary leading directly into Christianity; then the synergy of mutual destructiveness between nihilism and alienation would be thwarted.

*

If this analysis is correct, then it highlights the futility - or at least extreme difficultly - of attempting to convert a typical modern Man directly to Christianity; because a single step conversion process cannot overcome the dual-blockage of alienation and nihilism.

What is needed is a double-stage conversion process, which addresses both aspects of the problem.

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Seeking an external, socio-political, cure for modern alienation

Like many people I began to feel alienated, cut-off, "trapped inside my head", from other people and from nature, at the onset of adolescence. 

And I sought some, at least theoretical, way of relieving this chronic state of dysphoria. Something better situation that I could look forward to. 

Up to the age of about nineteen, I pinned my hopes on socio-political change. 

It was Karl Marx who seemed to have popularized this idea of alienation as a socio-political phenomenon; due, ultimately, to class economic disempowerment. And the idea that alienation both could and should be cured by wholesale communist revolutionary societal change.  

As an adolescent; I implicitly agreed with this basic analysis. I saw the problem in The World (not myself). However, I was never a revolutionary communist. 

Nonetheless I saw the answer in socialism: either in a gradualistic Fabian socialism that would free everyone by abolishing poverty and providing universally decent and stimulating conditions. Or, more deeply, in a socialism of the William Morris type - a medievalism that fitted with my yearnings for Middle Earth, and what seemed like the paradisal societies there depicted. 

In sum - I looked outside myself and to society at large for the answer to my personal alienation. My implicit idea was that if society in general could be set right, then I personally would feel engaged with "the world" in the ways that I most hoped for. 

My impression is that this external and socio-political solution is where most people stand on the issue of alienation, most of the time; in so far as they are at all aware of it in themselves.

(This is, indeed, a deep reason why so many people are so engaged by politics; why for so many politics provides their bottom-line motivation; why ideology has replaced religion in The West. People are not just seeking different social arrangements, but more profoundly there is a hope that such arrangements will alleviate their post-adolescent estrangement and assuage their yearnings to participate in reality.) 

I mean that most people never get further than seeking a cure for their inner malaise in some hoped-for societal reform or revolution. 

But aged nineteen I changed my perspective; and changed it to one that saw the answer in terms of my own consciousness; my attitude to the world; how I understood reality, framed it, my aspirations and attitudes. 

This perspective I adopted is one that seems to have been initiated partly by the failure of politics; and then by reading several key books -- including Michael Tippet's Moving into Aquarius (which led onto CG Jung), Colin Wilson's The Outsider, and the early few chapters (written or much influenced by Wilson) of William Arkle's A Geography of Consciousness. 

Over the following years this led onto all sorts of other books of a very broadly "New Age" kind - but it is important to note that I remained an atheist (as I had been since age six); or at most perhaps an abstract kind of pantheist. 

In particular, I did not believe this reality was created - and especially not by a personal God. 

So, in practice, my perspective throughout "young" adult life was - at its bottom line - psychological; in other words the desired change of consciousness was something that needed to come from physical/ material changes in the minds and brains of myself and (plus/minus) other human beings.  

In sum, and in terms of an answer to alienation; aged about nineteen, I moved from seeking a bottom-line societal, to seeking a bottom-line psychological answer to this problem. 

And the answer was necessarily understood in terms of improving my own "happiness" primarily, the happiness of others I cared about secondarily, within the span of this mortal life - because mortal life was all that really-is.  

After a few years of approaching and circling the matter; it was only at the age of forty-nine that I fully began to seek the answer to alienation in spiritual and other-worldly terms; made possible after becoming convinced that reality was created by a personal God. 

In seeking a cure for alienation in the assumption of an individually-relevant purpose and meaning in life; I came to see that this made objective sense (that is a sense that rises above the subjective level of wishful thinking or delusion) - in a universe created by a personal and loving God. 

It is within that context I now sought a cure for alienation - and eventually found it in the resurrection promise of Jesus Christ. 

My current understanding is (ultimately) neither socio-political nor psychological but instead spiritual. 

I believe that alienation is part of the human condition in this mortal life; which life God intends to be a transitional and learning stage of our eternal existence, a phase en route to Heaven. 

We cannot escape this-worldly alienation in this mortal life, except partially and temporarily, because this is the primary creation in which entropy and evil are mixed, and permeate our-selves.

In that sense this mortal life on earth is by its nature (and considered alone, as if free-standing) something of a tragedy, that cannot be cured within its own limits. And that is why decades of seeking and striving failed to fin an answer. The was no answer to be had. 

But because I regard mortal life as a temporary phase; I can confidently look forward to a complete answer to my alienation - which answer is that full, active and conscious participation in the divine work, in context of mutual love untainted by death and evil - on the other side of death; in the Second Creation of Jesus Christ. 

Alienation, to some minimal degree, is always a part of the mortal human condition

By William Arkle 

http://www.billarkle.co.uk/greatgift/pictureseq/fset033.html

If we consider the relationship between human consciousness and the spiritual or divine consciousness - then mortal Man is alienated from the divine to some - very varied - degree; in the sense that there is always a sense of separation that must be overcome.

Even in the most spiritual societies, there is a need for some act of will or, more often, ritual process, in order to overcome this alienation.

Among animistic hunter gatherers, the shamans will undergo fasting, or prolonged dancing, or drumming, or something like lucid dreaming - in order to reach a state of transformed consciousness in which the spiritual realm may be contacted. In ancient Egypt, there was a prolonged and elite training, and many symbols, talismans and rituals, to bridge the gap between the mundane and the divine.

Among Hindus there is the discipline of yoga, among Zen Buddhists there is the prolonged training of sitting, and monastic disciplines.

Among Christians there are the monastic traditions, rules and supervisions of Eastern and Western Catholicism - fasting, vigils (prolonged wakefulness), sustained and repeated prayer, and other ascetic practises.

Modern man is, of course, far more alienated than any of these. Indeed, it seems that some Men are wholly alienated - and never at any times in their waking life achieve a bridging of the gap between human consciousness and the spiritual realm (and they regard dream consciousness as a mere delusional epiphenomenon).

So severe is modern alienation that I regard it as the most subjectively obvious of spiritual pathologies - modern Man's existential aloneness, his sense of being cut-off from the spiritual and the divine is probably more acutely painful than his lack of meaning and purpose in life. Modern man's alienation is, indeed, apparently so severe that he feels dead-inside.

Alienation can be solved by a fundamental change in conscious attitude - but to be effective this change must be accompanied by a new metaphysical system that regards the new consciousness as potentially real (therefore not merely a delusion, not just wishful thinking).

But the Christian needs to know that alienation is not all bad! In the sense that our aim is a relationship with God the Father, Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost - and relationship entails separation.

Our goal is not an obliteration of our consciousness, not a fusion with the divine nor an absorption into the divine - not a loss of self - instead a loss of false selves and a living from our real self in a loving relationship.

What of those who do not want to retain the self, but who do want to become One with the divine? My understanding is that this is allowed by God - although it is not what he most wants for us and from us. Since it was God who (necessarily) unilaterally gifted us with consciousness, He is aware that there are some who prefer not to accept this gift - and it is a gift which must be accepted voluntarily, without coercion. So we can take back this gift and return to the primordial state of non-consciousness (in a state of eternal bliss in the present).

But for Christians we should not crave such a state, because we have Love as our primary value, which entails relationships, which entails consciousness. There is always therefore some barrier, some line between our-self and other-selves - some element which could be termed alienation.

What we need is to be able to cross this line more easily and more often - to the degree of becoming aware of, communicating with, the spiritual and divine realms. 

This is a secret world - consider Arkle's businessman painting above. The man is in the loving, caring embrace of a spiritual being - is he aware of the fact, or is his awareness turned away? The picture is enigmatic, and we would have no way of knowing how the man is experiencing the situation.

But the benign divine and spiritual realm is always there, waiting for our attention, hoping for our communication, yearning for acknowledgement of the loving relationship.

Happy Christmas.

We Are Not Alone, objectively - but subjectively, we are alienated

The alien Marvin (the Martian), asserts objective reality 

Modern alienation is a very real thing: which is to say the experience of being cut-off from God, reality, this world, other people... is inescapable as a subjective experience, and this has profound religious, social and political consequences. 

Yet alienation is an inwardly-caused phenomenon. Alienation is not a reality imposed by the external nature of things.

We were all spontaneously and involuntarily (and most unconsciously) immersed in "everything else" at the early phases of our existence - and that is the primary reality of divine creation. 

It could be called a complete web of "interconnectedness" - except that "connect" assumes that we begin as separate, and must overcome separateness by connecting. The reality is the opposite - we begin as only partially separated in our awareness from the oneness of divine creation. That is the baseline.  

We modern Men are now alienated because in the course of human development we have each cut ourselves off from that spontaneous immersion in "everything else": the barrier arises from within us. 

That barrier which cuts-off modern adults can be, and is at times, dissolved (or demolished); for instance by dreaming sleep, mental illness and brain disease, intoxication - or sometimes by meditation.

But all of these make us dysfunctional, and none of them succeed in restoring the natural spontaneity of an earlier phase of consciousness.

The earlier phase of spontaneous immersive consciousness is like the childhood phase of development - such that once an individual has developed beyond childhood, childhood can never wholly or healthily be re-established.

In other words; we should take the cut-offness of modern alienation as a fact-of-life and the basis for further developments - yet we also need to bear in mind that the ultimate reality is, as it always was, one in which we are naturally and inescapably immersed in reality - including the reality of the divine, of the universe, of other people. 

Therefore we do not need to "re-connect" because dis-connection is not the problem. 

Instead; the problem is in our own consciousness - which is "stuck" in a phase that denies the reality of its immersion in the whole of divine creation. 

What we need to work-on is our own personal consciousness of reality: we need to become conscious of that we we are currently not conscious. 

Modern Man usually denies the reality of that of which he is not spontaneously conscious - such as the divine. (That is: we deny the reality of God because we Moderns are no longer spontaneously and continuously aware of God, as was once the case.) 

I am saying that we need, instead, to acknowledge the reality of our connectedness-to/ immersion-in the divine; and from that conviction strive to become conscious of the actuality of this link.

Acknowledge reality: then strive for awareness of that reality...

To put it differently; we Modern men have (under God's will) developed alienation, which is an increasing individual independence from the whole - and this development has happened because this is also a greater freedom and agency*. 

In other words; the "universal" awareness that was once spontaneous and inescapable, is now voluntary and chosen.

What is needed is not a return but a development. So, this voluntary and chosen acknowledgement of connectedness to other people/ the world/ God is a new thing - a deliberate step forward - not a surrender or relaxation backwards..

A doing, not an undoing.

Because new, the needful awareness is subjectively experienced differently from the old childhood or child-like consciousness - we need to be self-aware, aware of our own awareness. 

This is not under compulsion nor necessity; this is something that we are aware that we have-chosen (and that it could have been, could be, otherwise). 

From such a perspective, all looks different. We know what we know via our subjectivity - that is; our subjectivity is part of all possibilities of knowing. 

Subjectivity makes everything possible, and a change in the nature of our subjectivity affects everything. 

So a deliberate attention to developing consciousness makes a profound difference to everything - including our experience of Christianity.   

**

*Modern alienation is therefore meant-to-be just a phase; en route to a higher - more developed, indeed more divine - form of consciousness. 

Our world of alienation

Alienation

The main problem now, and for a couple of hundred years, is alienation. It is more obvious now than ever before, because so many people have led lives of peace, comfort, convenience and prosperity – lives that might have seemed paradisal to those in the past. Yet people are deeply discontented; and indeed expend great time and effort on distracting themselves and in blotting out consciousness with intoxication.

Materialism says we ought to be happy and fulfilled; but daily, hourly experience is of emptiness, meaninglessness, purposelessness and disconnection. Modern people are lonely from simple lack of human contact with those (mostly family) who love them; but modern people are also existentially lonely in the deep sense that even when surrounded by others, they feel cut-off – even when surrounded by pleasures and comforts, they are pressed-upon by a horrible recognition that it is all arbitrary, futile, temporary…

Some of us can remember times in our childhood when this was not so; when everything around us was alive, conscious – we were part of the world and the world was extended from us. Life might be pleasurable or miserable; but it meant something, and it was going somewhere – and we were immersed in this process, an integral part of it.

This childhood relation to reality was not, of course, an explicit awareness – indeed that was a vital part of its reality. Our lack of awareness of our selves as separate was the reason why we experienced life as an undivided whole. And it was the incremental increase in self-awareness which caused us to become cut-off from the world: which led to us regarding the rest of the world as things rather than beings.

Indeed, so extreme is the alienation of the modern world that not only do we regard the rest of reality as things – we even regard ourselves as things. In public discourse it is normal, in a sense compulsory (if you don’t want to be seen as crazy) to speak of humans as accidental products of contingent evolutionary processes, as passive ‘victims’ of our childhood experiences; and of personality and ability and uniqueness as being the kind of information pattern that could n principle be downloaded into a computer, or transferred to another person.

In fact we are even alienated from our own thoughts - which means that we don't trust the content of our own minds. This is common nowadays, indeed regarded as sophisticated. Yet - in a world-historical perspective - this is a quite extraordinary situation. And, unless the intrinsic absurdity and nihilism is explicitly recognised, it is a hellish trap from which we cannot ever escape, because we do not perceive that we are trapped.

The expression ‘meat robot’ encapsulates this mainstream world view – the view underpinning the mass media; the single, linked mega-bureaucracy of the modern state; the world of mainstream arts and ideas… it is constantly pressing upon us as an underlying and mostly explicitly-denied anti-reality.

Our thought world is one in which everything solid and objective points to the meaninglessness, purposelessness and isolation of life – that our life is indeed an illusion, a self-deception – and at the same time all this is being implicitly denied by the demands for our compassion, generosity, hard work, good behaviour… and all the idealisms of mainstream politics which must be taken with the utmost seriousness – egalitarianism, anti-sexism, anti-racism… all that socio-political stuff we ‘meat robots’ are supposed to be committed to, to sacrifice our livelihoods and futures to…

Alienation is a nightmare – a self-contradictory state which imposes itself and denies itself simultaneously. We are blamed for not being contented with materialism, and it is demanded that we feel and express ‘concern’ for vague ideals; we are manipulated and pressured into the shallowest consumerism and slavish fashion-following and mocked for it. Alienation is a nightmare because all possibilities within that world are bad, incoherent, and purposeless – according to the world of the nightmare there is nowhere to escape from the nightmare – the nightmare is everything and everywhere because it is metaphysical. We have been trapped by our assumptions.  

But change the assumptions and we are free.

Vampirism - specific instance of the characteristic behaviour of modernity

The popular culture obsession with vampires is obvious - I believe that this fascination arises because vampires represent, in a mythological form, the characteristic behavioural response of moderns when experiencing the major spiritual malaise of our era: alienation.

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Alienation is feeling cut-off from 'life' - an isolated consciousness in a dead world - and of life having no meaning or purpose.

Modern life is seen as a matter of meaningless bureaucracy, of imposed duties, of mere exixtence followed by pointless death and being forgotten.

This is a near universal, but especially common among those who think most abstractly - those of higher intelligence and education.

*

There is no full solution to alienation in modernity - but temporary solutions include intoxication; 'losing-onself' in virtual realities such as books, movies and TV; making one's life into an absorbing/ distracting emotional war-zone or psychodrama - and vampirism.

The vampire drains vitality from those with whom it come into contact. The surge in vitality is gratifying and energizing, and cures alienation - purpose is recovered in the search for victims.

Exploitative sexual relations (or implicit/ potential sexual relations) are one obvious example; but vampirism also includes draining love and affection from friends and collagues, draining their energy and cheerfulness, or diverting their purposefulness.

*

Since alienation is a basic problem which cannot be solved in a secular and worldly context, the primary response is to lead a life of 'seeking' - specifically seeking vitality, contact with reality, relationships.

But having sought and found, we are up-against the biological universal of habituation - such that repeated stimuli lose their effect.

So seeking never ends, but overcoming habituation requires either serial change, refreshment - in a word novelty; or else increasingly-strong stimuli.

The stimuli may be media or technological (i.e. 'whatever works') - but for humans (as 'social animals' in origin) - the strongest stimuli, which work-best, are often other people.

*

So the vampiric seeker moves through the world, seeking energy-releasing stimuli (i.e. 'victims' ).

When a suitable victim is found, the vampire will drain vitality from the encounter - energy which is diverted into sense of connecting with life, of motivation, and the meaningfulness of life.

But this gratification is temporary.

These positive feelings fade - later or (usually) sooner - and the vampiric seeker must seek a new victim, serially zig-zagging through life after new stimuli, some novelty which 'works for them'.

*

By this account, human modern secular social life is divided into vampires and victims, the powerful and the weak, the exploiters and the exploited.

For the vampires there is pride, mastery, power. This is the all-absorbing purpose of life, validated by primal gratification; complete, explicit, shameless, self-glorifying self-sufficiency in self-regard.

The ideal life is seen as one of dominating, utterly-draining and then discarding multiple serial victims; a compromize is to live off one or a few people who are partially-drained then allowed to recover until suitable for further vampirism.

*

For the victims - the weak and exploited - there is the adoption of victim status (either by deliberate choice, or simply by habit); the finding of sequential temporary meanings and purposes in being-used.

Life becomes a process of serial submission, recovery and regeneration; with the implicit aim of offering one's vitality to the most prideful, masterful, and powerful vampire possible.

The ultimate goal is that of voluntary and vicarious self-sacrifice to the vampire - to be so utterly dedicated and drained as actually to die in submission.

*

This dark and deadly, nihilistic, vision of life as a war between potential exploiters - with the only opt-out being suicide - is what underlies the contemporary cultural fascination with vampires: vampirism is modernity recognizing-itself in myth.

  

Thinking is the problem - Not-thinking is to become unhuman - Thinking is the solution and way forwards

By the very process of thinking, of 'cognition', we create alienation: we create a reality in which there are 'things out there' and 'me in here'.

We then make the mistake of believing that what we have actually created by our thinking is true reality.

We then then alienated - either we assume that the things out-there are real and our inner life a subjective illusion (i.e. mainstream modern 'scientist' materialism); or, sometimes, that the inner me is real and the outside world an illusion, a creation of the mind (i.e. idealism or solipsism).

Alienation is an intolerable situation - so we seek escape in trying to stop our awareness of the consequences of thinking - by various means: we can try and stop thinking, perhaps by intoxication or ultimately by death; stop ourselves being aware of the alienated consequences of thinking, by distraction (compulsive socialising, mass media, novelty etc).

Sometimes, occasionally, someone confronts alienation - and tries to solve it.

And it can be solved, indeed it is solved - if we allow it. Because what thinking takes-away, thinking can also restore...

Thinking breaks the world into out-there and in-here; and then recombines the two into more thinking. That is, indeed, what most of our thinking is.

If we stop supposing that the splitting caused by thinking represents reality; and instead suppose that the recombined outer-inner world of our actual thoughts is actually a restoration of the wholeness of the world - then the problem of alienation is solved.

What this entails is that primary reality is in thinking.

Primary reality is not 'out there' - it is in thinking. Thinking is what re-combines reality into unity - it is both objective (out-there) and subjective (in-here) - thinking is the whole-thing.

Thinking is therefore the real world - and as such it is not merely-subjective but thinking is instead objective and universal.

Ultimately, it implies that human thinking is part of the divine plan- that our actual thinking (yours and mine) is potentially a co-creation of reality...

(Potentially because our minds are typically clogged with false thinking, pseudo-thinking, self-contradicting-thinking, automatic 'mental processes' into which we are trained and duped... the purpose is to think properly, do by aiming-at-it deliberately what we were intended to do spontaneously but have self-sabotaged.)

At any rate - the answer to alienation is in our own hand - or rather in our own minds; and at some level and however imperfectly we already do it. It is a matter of recognising, becoming more aware of, clarifying, strengthening making habitual what we already spontaneously are doing.

(Note - the above is a re-explanation of Rudolf Steiner's primary insight found in his early philosophical books - leading-up-to The Philosophy of Freedom - 1894.)

The three existential problems of life: alienation, meaninglessness and purposelessness

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Christianity is, so far as I know, the only system on offer which claims to solve all the three main existential problems of life:

1. Alienation - feeling detached from the world, that the world is just objective fact and that I have no relationship with the sun, moon, stars, plants, animals, landscape or anything else.

2. Meaninglessness - that the decisions and occurrences of life are devoid of any real significance - any sensation of meaning being at most a useful delusion.

3. Purposelessness - that there is no direction or goal in life, that life is just one thing after another and then death (and oblivion, or misery).

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1. Alienation is not a problem for hunter-gatherer animists, nor for young children - who are 'animists' and see nature as alive, and they are in communication an in relationship with it.

However, there is no real significance or goal to life for animists: life simply cycles round-and-round, transforming, but in total the same forever. Individuality is transformed into something else, or reabsorbed into the energies of the universe. This is common to most or all types of animism, totemism, paganism.

Christianity solves alienation by adoption of the believer into the family of God and by awareness of the presence of unseen intelligences (angels and demons) peopling this world.

*

2. Pure monotheisms offer a weighty sense of the significance of behaviours and occurrences in this world - these are all known and 'recorded' by the one God. There is also the presence of angels and demons - so Man is not alone.

However,of monotheisms, only Trinitarian Christianity also addresses the alienation problem - only Christianity promises that the believer becomes a Son of God via death, purification and resurrection in the perfection of 'a god' (infinitely below the one creator God, but above the angels).

*

3. Purposelessness. To my understanding, all religions except Christianity lack a sense of purpose; since impersonal participation in the energies of the universe, or some cyclical process is not purpose; neither is endlessly-more-of-the-same-kind-of-stuff  but only including the pleasures (i.e. eternity in 'paradise') any real answer to anything.

Paradise it is merely an eternity of euphoria - much the same as a permanent orgasm, drug trip, or a good dream. This is indistinguishable from a state of cheerful delusion; and in fact a species of nihilism. The promise of eternity in paradise is actually an horrific threat.

By contrast, Christianity promises a future state in which - on the one hand - we retain our individuality, our personality, our distinctiveness: we are still ourselves. Yet on the other hand this self is purified and perfected (resurrected) and in the best imaginable situation of living in the presence of Christ.

This is not, of course, an exact or comprehensible promise (at least not to normal everyday consciousness); but my point is that Christianity recognizes that any future which involves annihilation, destruction of the self, or eternity of our unchanged selves is nothing more than a nightmare.

Christianity alone recognizes what sort of circumstances would need to prevail for eternity to be not just bearable but blissful.

*

The greatest recent triumph of Satan has perhaps been to obscure this fact from the mass of people; the fact that if we believe Christianity to be true, then Christianity is not merely the best offer on the table: it is the only offer on the table that is not in reality some kind of nihilistic horror or everlasting nightmare - even if the horrors and nightmares be disguised with a sugar-coating.

Indeed, more than this, Christianity represents (so far as I know) the only desirable interpretation of the world which takes into account the reality of the world as we experience it, the only one which denies nothing.

It is Christianity or nothing: it is our only hope. And this is not a matter of opinion, but a matter of whether you know enough to understand and understand enough to acknowledge.

*

You may think Christianity is false, or be uncertain whether it is true - that is a different matter.

But you ought to recognize, to acknowledge, that Christianity is the only religion which you would both want to be true and which could in principle be true.

If you have not yet reached that point, you have work to do.

*

Alienation, purposelessness, meaninglessness and Christian conversion

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Although the only reason for becoming a Christian is that it is the truth, that it is reality; nonetheless, since we humans are weak and corrupt there also needs to be at least some short-term reward for conversion.

There needs to be some therapeutic aspect to conversion.

And that which requires therapy is modern secular life; which (whether pleasurable or miserable on average) is perceived as ultimately alienated, purposeless, meaningless.

*

Alienation, detachment, alone-ness, lack of any connection or relation to the world - is pervasive in modernity.

Alienation can be solved with animism, with paganism; it can be solved in fantasy and sometimes in art; it can be solved in human love (of spouse, of family).

And alienation can also be solved by Christianity which affirms a continuous personal relationship with God (specifically Jesus Christ) so that we are never truly alone.

Also, for a Christian there is the continual reality of Unseen Warfare, of the struggle for salvation affected by angels and demons (which are Christian interpretations of the conscious natural entities of animism or the gods and goddesses of paganism).

Since the Christian is never alone, and always the object of attention; alienation is a temporary illusion - not a permanent reality.

Furthermore, for a Christian the unity of Man is not a mere aspiration, but a fact. We are - whether we like it or not - all in it together; and what we think and do affects not just ourselves but everybody.

No Man is an island: not even in his 'private' thoughts; humans are necessarily social even in solitude. Hence the divisions between practical and personal, work and prayer, contemplation and labour are abolished. A desert-dwelling hermit may exemplify the fullest membership of humankind.

*

Purposelessness is a feature of modernity where life is specialized, each specialism exists only to serve other specialisms, yet each specialism is narrow, literal and un-engaging.

Everything feels trivial because it is going nowhere for no reason.

Some moderns 'lose themselves' in work or human relationships, others in whatever happens to provide temporary distraction or relief from consciousness (e.g. intoxication, busyness, serial pleasure-seeking). But these are merely means to an end which is left blank by modernity.

For the Christian, however, there is an underpinning purpose to life: which is salvation. All our choices lead either toward, or away from, salvation.

Properly understood, there is also the possibility of increasing holiness - which is termed theosis - i.e progress in this life towards God-like-ness. The success of theosis is Sainthood - a Saint being understood as one who lives partly in Heaven while still on earth.

So, for a Christian, nothing is trivial: everything is goal-directed.

*

Meaninglessness is the sense that nothing matters in an indifferent universe. The secular materialist looks up at the stars and feels infinitely insignificant.

By contrast, Christianity states that on the contrary everything is significant.

It offers a cosmology, a description of reality, which encompasses this life, the reality of the soul and its survival of death, the nature of the next world into which the soul survives, the existence of beings intermediate between Man and God - namely angels and demons.

When a Christian looks up at the stars he become partially aware of (is glimpsing) spiritual reality: a universe of life, meaning, struggle - the field of transcendent truth, beauty and virtue - and a reality in which his own soul is a focus of vital importance.

*

So that although Christianity is not about 'being happy' (rather it is a struggle until death, an unseen warfare); and although Christianity is not about re-making the world in accordance with our subjective desires (not about lets-pretend or wishful-thinking  - but rather about fitting oneself to reality); nonetheless adopting the Christian perspective does offer some immediate and profound psychological rewards.

For a Christian things matter: choices matter, what we do has meaning and purpose; and the universe is in personal relation to the perceiving soul.

What happens in life is never lost in time and space - but (for better or worse) is a permanent reality of the soul.

*

Wholeness, weight and significance are restored to life; there is no longer reason to live wholly for distractions.

So although wholeness, weight and significance bring a new set of problems for the convert - Christian conversion is not entirely a matter of struggle, trial and tribulation; it does have immediate rewards.

Conversion to Christianity means reality is real and has our human experience at the centre of things; there is no longer need to live by strategic evasion of consciousness and systematic suppression of thinking.

*

Hopelessness and alienation - brought-up against the one true story of Christianity

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There are three broad categories of dissatisfaction with the mainstream secular world view:

1. The self-refuting nature of relativism.

2. The arbitrariness of ethics without religion.

3. Hopelessness and alienation.

*

Hopelessness and alienation are the hardest to identify and pin down, and are always deniable - but maybe they are the most damaging aspect of the modern malaise because - on the one hand -  they render the individual unable to stand firm and make an effort to escape their situation; while - on the other hand - they lead the sufferer to escape his existential loneliness into distractions and intoxications (especially sexual) which take him further and further from the truth and from virtue.

*

Christianity solves all these problems; and that should be enough to recommend it conclusively when someone has nothing coherent or motivating to offer as an alternative - yet clearly this seldom happens, and conversion is typically a drawn-out process that is easily derailed (certainly it was for me).

What happens is that each Christian solution to each class of problem is met by a change of ground and criticized from a different perspective - so that the cure of alienation is met by the charge that Christianity is a made-up fairy story, while the cure of Christianity offering a coherent truth is met by objections that this system is immoral (according to modern secular norms); yet the grounded ethical system of Christianity is said to be arbitrary or alienating.

Such objections can go round and round without termination for weeks, years, decades...

*

It seems very difficult, in a world in of cognitive fragmentation/ specialization, to bring matters to a point - to force a total-world-view confrontation between Christianity and mainstream secular Leftism - a confrontation which Christianity would immediately and easily win.

Modern mass media culture, the partial professional cultures (e.g. politics, law, science, the arts), the weakness and wickedness of the human heart, and the cumulative corruptions of purposive evil at work around us all conspire to prevent such a confrontation.

But this is the great latent strength of Christianity. If, or when, a person brings themselves or is brought by circumstance to the point of balancing Christianity against secular modernity - and can hold themselves or be held at that point for more than a moment - then there is no doubt of the outcome.

*

What CG Jung does, and doesn't, do...

I have often written about CG Jung on this blog; because he was a significant (albeit on and off) influence over a period of some thirty years, from my young adult life through to becoming a Christian. 

Jung is something of a help for atheists who experience alienation and 'division' very sharply - as I did (and do). Alienation is the awareness of being cut-off from 'the world' including human society - cut-off in a world of abstractions, thinking, un-naturalness - while division is the awareness that we live in separate worlds that do not join up: e.g. the worlds of solitude, family, education, the workplace, crowds, authority, mass media, the arts, science and technology...

The Jungian approach is to treat alienation and division as 'dis-ease'; as a therapeutic problem. In other words, the idea is to alleviate the misery, depression, hope-less-ness of this experience of being a compartmentalized and cut-off subjectivity. 

This Jungian 'therapy' might be actual psychotherapy with a therapist in 'Analytic Psychology' - or, much more often, a kind of self-help, or self-therapy; based on reading and understanding Jung's ideas - or at least some secondhand (and more accessible) account of them. This latter was my own approach - I read a great deal by and about Jung, thought deeply about it, and tried hard to live by it. 

But the idea was not wholly 'therapeutic', because the way I encountered Jung was in a context of artistic creativity. I think it may initially have been (age 19) via reading Michael Tippett's essays published in Moving into Aquarius; then various bits of actual Jung, an short book by Anthony Storr, and a Jungian analysis of Wagner's Ring (and Mozart's Magic Flute) by Robert Donington. 

At any rate; Jung came to me as both a way of feeling-better, and as a way of artistic creation - a way in which the artist might on the one hand integrate the warring elements of his personality and simultaneously re-connect with 'the public' or 'the audience' by reference to the shared archetypes of the collective unconscious. 

This was explicitly the case with Michael Tippett - whose best work (from the late 1930s and for about a decade), which is maybe the best English classical music of the twentieth century, was written under the impact of Jung. It was also argued (by Donington and others) to be the explanation for the uncanny power of many other artistic works, especially those that had reference to 'mythic' elements.

So the promise of Jung was alluring: that one might both heal that misery of personal alienation so characteristic of twentieth century life and beyond; and also deepen the capacity creatively to connect with other people. 

The difficulty is, however, that of having psychology at the bottom line; because when psychology provides the ultimate justification then life becomes a matter of subjective 'feels'. And it turns out that - in practice - the Jungian therapeutic strategies don't work very well. 

This is not surprising because they do not address causes, but only effects. There was, perhaps, a hope that integrated Men conscious of collective archetypes might 'make the world a better place'. But the problems are actually intrinsic to mortal life (and the ancients realized); secondly to human consciousness - as it now is; and thirdly to the nature of modern 'industrial', mass, bureaucratic society - which has only become worse over the past century. 

Jungian strategies do help a bit, especially at first; but the effect is neither profound nor lasting; and sooner or later, the Jungian perspective dissolves into a corrosive, 'relativistic', subjectivism - which devolves towards short-termist selfish hedonism. 

This is because psychology is not anchored, and goes nowhere - except to death. 

So Jungian ideas take their place among the failed promises of a this-world utopia; and we are set back to the ancient realization that mortal life in this world cannot satisfy our deepest needs; and even the satisfaction of our superficial, here-and-now desires turns out to be very temporary and/or partial.

Also, the Jungian perspective lacks ultimate purpose. Even if Jungian techniques really worked; they would only restore 'dis-ease' to 'ease'. The Jungian basis for creativity may explain why things are emotionally powerful; but do not provide a reason for creativity per se; do not provide a purpose for creativity any more profound than that of an analgesic or stimulant drug. 

One a man, or Mankind, has been healed - then what does he actually do? Once men are united by their awareness of the collective unconscious... what then? 

The aimed at situation is a state-of being and there is no purpose, no dynamic. Which may be why Jungians tend to adopt 'Eastern' types of spirituality derived from Hinduism or Buddhism - in which (for Westerners) the hope is of a permanent state of unchanging bliss, without awareness of any separate self - assimilated into oneness...

By contrast, the Christianity I have arrived at sees this mortal life as purposive, and a preparation for immortality as a separate self - not assimilated into oneness but instead many persons whose purposes are harmonized by love. 

I see creativity not as the removal of divisions; but instead as the overflowing of love between persons, between beings - by a close analogy of the way that an ideal (eternal) family operates, in which the individual family members are continually experiencing, learning and developing.  

From a this-worldly perspective this looks like an attempt to ignore the problems of this mortal life and instead yearn for another world; but properly it should be understood as the only way in which this mortal life can be made more than mere, temporary, psychological states.  

When we look forward to eternal resurrected life in Heaven; then the experiences of this mortal life are given permanent relevance. When this eternal life is loving, personal, familial and everlastingly creative - then there is a real, objective, permanent value for the things we do here and now... including creative work such as writing, music and art. 

It turns-out - contrary to mainstream expectation - that Jungianism is unattainable because this-worldly - hence subject to 'entropy' (the worldly tendency towards change; disease, degeneration, death); whereas Christianity is practical and realistic for everybody because rooted in the eternal love and creativity of Heaven. 

(Creation can be understood as the true opposite of entropy.)

No matter our situation or past; we can all participate in the making and enhancing of future Heaven. 

The good (loving, creative) things that happen in this life can (if detected, discerned and valued) be carried forward into Heaven...

While bad things can (when acknowledged) teach us about sin and the need for repentance; so we can repudiate and leave these behind at the time of resurrection - because Heaven, to be Heaven, must be a place of love only. 

Whatever happens to a Christian can be regarded as grist to the mill for experiencing and learning; and that in itself is therapeutic in a way that goes beyond psychology. 

Ultimate Outsiders - willingly so

In the sixty years since Colin Wilson published The Outsider - describing the state of sociological, psychological and spiritual alienation characteristic of the past couple of centuries - the situation has changed.

In 1956 it was possible to regard the Outsider as being rescued from his predicament by external change - but now he can only rescue himself. 

The current Outsider has only one place to look for help: within himself.

Thus - in politics and sociology there are no utopias, and all large institutions are thoroughly corrupted including the main churches. The intellectual elites are dishonest and incompetent. Science in 1956 was overwhelmingly successful - but has become a careerist bureaucracy. The universities seemed like a haven of privilege and leisure; but they are now the habitus of petty officials, dishonest spinners and box tickers.

We have no leaders - only middle managers and psychopaths - therefore, we must rely on ourselves. 

There is nobody else to turn-to. We must find what we need in our-selves - because it will not be supplied by any person or institution.

We, here and now, are the ultimate Outsiders because we have nowhere to turn - indeed, there are very few other people even to talk with about such matters. We are fortunate indeed if we have a marriage and family to sustain us - because these too have been destroyed over the past 60 years.

We we cannot trust anybody, we must trust ourselves. We are forced either to seek oblivion in distraction and intoxication or suicide - to escape alienation by escaping consciousness; or else to look within. 

But looking within is the answer! It always was - if only the Outsider allows himself to acknowledge the reality of God!

When we look within, and begin to dismantle the false selves and automatic thinking, we find God.

The old Outsiders such as Nietzsche regarded the God-within (the Self) as an alternative to God; but we know that the God within is God. 

Since we are God's children we ourselves are divine (Christians know this - or should), which means we have 'inherited' divinity. God is within us as well as without - the external God is denied us but God within is undeniable.

We can, should and will find Christianity within us - we can find Christianity despite being denied true and valid scriptures, tradition, legitimate religious teaching, rituals... we can find Christianity within us with total confidence because we know our loving God who created and sustains reality would not leave us unprovided for.

If within is the only place left to us; then within will suffice - we will find there everything we need.

We will find faith, courage, and motivation; we will find love.

We are in a situation where - if we honestly seek to answer the condition of alienation, nihilism and despair - there is no alternative to doing what we should anyway be doing: looking within - to find not only our true selves, but God and all the necessities that only God can provide.

We have the possibility of a degree of spiritual agency, freedom and autonomy seldom seen in the history of the world. And everything is channelling us towards exactly that.

We are fated to be the Ultimate Outsiders - like it or not. 

But we can solve the problem of alienation by willingly becoming the Ultimate Outsiders... By embracing, rather than avoiding, reality - we can become free, true and live from our divinity (albeit partially, with frequent errors and sins - but that is enough).

We cannot be made to make the right choice - we might instead continue to choose oblivion and the destruction of consciousness... drugs, social media, transgressive sex - even the destruction of our own persons by transhumanist technologies.

However, that choice is becoming clearer and clearer, more and more conscious - to the point of being unavoidable.

Yes indeed, things have 'come to a point'...


Note: The crux of my point is that God (as Christians understand God: creator, loving, and a personal God - concerned by every individual) would not leave anybody, at any time or in any place, bereft of spiritual necessities. The world, as we actually experience it, from our own point of view, is adequate. Indeed, since life is not a random accident; in some vital sense you and I personally (and everybody else) have been placed into mortal life in a time and at a place at-least-adequately suited to our individual needs for experiencing and learning.

Edited from a post of 18/7/17 - H/T Laeth for the reminder.   

We, here and now, are the ultimate Outsiders - embrace your fate!

In the sixty years since Colin Wilson published The Outsider - describing the state of sociological, psychological and spiritual alienation characteristic of the past couple of centuries - the situation has changed.

In 1956 it was possible to regard the Outsider as being rescued from his predicament by external change - but now he can only rescue himself. The current Outsider has only one place to look for help: within himself.

Thus - in politics and sociology there are no utopias, and all large institutions are thoroughly corrupted including the main churches. The intellectual elites are dishonest and incompetent. Science in 1956 was overwhelmingly successful - but has become a careerist bureaucracy. The universities seemed like a haven of privilege and leisure; but they are now the habitus of petty officials, dishonest spinners and box tickers.

We have no leaders - only middle managers and psychopaths - therefore, we must rely on ourselves. There is nobody else to turn-to. We must find what we need in our-selves - because it will not be supplied by any person or institution.

We, here and now, are the ultimate Outsiders because we have nowhere to turn - indeed, there are very few other people even to talk with about such matters. We are fortunate indeed if we have a marriage and family to sustain us - because these too have been destroyed over the past 60 years.

We are forced either to seek oblivion in distraction and intoxication or suicide - to escape alienation by escaping consciousness; or else to look within. We we cannot trust anybody, we must trust ourselves.

But looking within is the answer! It always was - if only the Outsider had allowed himself to acknowledge the reality of God!

When we look within, and begin to dismantle the false selves and automatic thinking, we find God.

The old Outsiders such as Nietzsche regarded the God-within (the Self) as an alternative to God; but we know that the God within is God. Since we are God's children we ourselves are divine, which means we have 'inherited' divinity. God is within us as well as without - the external God is denied us but God within is undeniable.

We can, should and will find Christianity within us - we can find Christianity despite being denied true and valid scriptures, tradition, legitimate religious teaching, rituals... we can find Christianity within us with total confidence because we know our loving God who created and sustains reality would not leave us unprovided for.

If within is the only place left to us; then within will suffice - we will find there everything we need.

We will find faith, courage, and motivation; we will find love.

We are in a situation where - if we honestly seek to answer the condition of alienation, nihilism and despair - there is no alternative to doing what we should anyway be doing: looking within - to find not only our true selves, but God and all the necessities that only God can provide.

We have the possibility of a degree of spiritual agency, freedom and autonomy seldom seen in the history of the world. And everything is channelling us towards exactly that.

We are fated to be the Ultimate Outsiders - like it or not. But we can solve the problem of alienation by willingly becoming the Ultimate Outsiders indeed! By embracing, rather than avoiding, reality - we can become free, true and live from our divinity (albeit partially, with frequent errors and sins - but that is enough).

We cannot be made to make the right choice - we might instead contiue to choose oblivion and the destruction of consciousness... drugs, social media, transgressive sex - even the destruction of our own persons by transhumanist technologies.

However, that choice is becoming clearer and clearer, more and more conscious - to the point of being unavoidable.

Yes indeed, things are 'coming to a point'...


Note: The crux of my point is that God (as Christians understand God: creator, loving, and a personal God - concerned by every individual) would not leave anybody, at any time or in any place, bereft of spiritual necessities. The world, as we experience it, is adeqaute. Indeed, since life is not a random accident; in some vital sense you and I personally (and everybody else) have been placed into mortal life in a time and at a place suited to our individual needs for experiencing and learning. 

Escaping alienation into Art, or maybe Mythology?

*

I think I first became fully aware of alienation - the meaninglessness, purposelessness, disconnectedness of mainstream modern life - in the summer of 1981 (a very similar summer and in the same place as this one, which is why I am reminded of it) when reading JD Salinger's 'Glass Family' novellas (Raise High the Roof Beam Carpenters, Franny, Zooey, Seymour).

*

What I got from Salinger, was that the escape from alienation was into Art - probably into being an artist (and thus living inside the process of creation); and this became as kind of 'hidden agenda' for me from that time and for many years.

(Salinger also talks much of Eastern Meditative religions and of a Christianity seem through this lens - but these are means to Art, rather than ends in themselves.)

Escape into Art didn't work - and probably it never really has worked^, except maybe with Goethe - although one can be misled into thinking it has worked by artistic recreations of an artist's life.

*

Around 20 years later I engaged with Joseph Campbell and began to re-re-re-read Jung from the perspective that alienated meaninglessness could be cured by escaping into myth - and that myth was actually a representation of humanity's shared inner reality.

Thus myth, heroic journeys and quests; stories from all kinds of places and cultures which seemed to have a special power, breadth, resonance; were perceived as symbolically depicting not merely the escape from misery, or the search for pleasure, nor even the pursuit of assimilating ecstasy... but an adventure or task undertaken for the well-being of other people, of the community.

But this simply kicked the can further down the road.

Because if my life would not be justified - wold not be meaningful or purposeful - by seeking comfort, distraction, and ecstasy - then why should things be different when my life is dedicated to enabling increased comfort, distraction and ecstasy for other people?

Somewhere, there has to be some-thing worthwhile in and of itself.

*

One response to my earlier desire to escape alienation into Art had been to leave medicine for science - which was supposed to sustain and advance medicine; then to leave science for Art, specifically the study and practice of literature - which I supposed to be the 'end' for which medicine and science provided the 'means'.

Yet Art turned out to be just another means, and not an end in itself.

*

What of mythology? I perceived mythology to underlie Art, to be even-more-fundamental than Art - such that the best Art was mythical.

Yet if myth was supposed to move us, I found that sometimes it did and sometimes (more often) it didn't - and although myth was asserted to be universal and powerful (The Power of Myth was the name of Joseph Campbell's popular PBS TV documentary) - in actuality myth often was not powerful, and no myth seemed to be universally powerful - such that most people preferred soap operas, sexual titillation and trashy news stories and never exposed themselves to actual myths or anything approaching such.

So myth turned-out to be as atomic, subjective and variable, and as alienated, as anything else in modern culture - not an answer nor an antidote.

*

Only after I had exhausted medicine, science, art and mythology did I finally turn to religion; and to Christianity, which I had previously always excluded from my search.

And there was the answer - the problem framed, described, its consequences delineated. Staring me in the face.

*

^The Re-enchantment of the World: Art versus Religion, by Gordon Graham

Religions and churches are analogous to Tolkien's Rings of Power

The Rings of Power - but especially the One Ring and the three Elven Rings, seem to describe something profound about reality. 

Sauron infuses much of his native power onto the One Ring; which gives him the ability to dominate the other Rings of Power - and, more generally, dominate the will to power of other beings. 

But, the transfer of power means that, when the One Ring is destroyed, Sauron cannot hold-himself-together anymore; he cannot sustain himself coherently as a functioning "self", but diffuses into a dark spirit of largely-passive malignancy. 

What is often missed by readers of The Lord of the Rings (but which was insightfully described by Paul Kocher more than fifty years ago); is that the Elves did something analogous with their three Rings, with analogous but inverted positive benefits; and similar negative consequences after their power was broken.  

The Elven Rings were made by a transfer of vitality from Elves-generally, into the Three Rings specifically. 

The Rings were apparently intended to focus and strengthen Elvish (or rather, specifically High Elven, Noldorian) characteristics - purity and the preservation of unstained beauty, in the case of Galadriel and Lothlorien; wisdom, learning, and healing, in the case of Elrond and Rivendell. 

(Gandalf's Elf Ring was given him by Cirdan, and thereby seemingly repurposed from its original intent.)

I infer that the Three Rings were made exactly because elvish vitality and power was already declining, as a consequence of prolonged residence in the mortal lands of Middle Earth (which was by will of Eru; who always intended that Elves gradually be replaced by Men). 

The Elven Rings were made, therefore, with the ambivalently-virtuous motivation of stopping the ongoing decline in Elvish vitality. 

And for so long as the One Ring was not being wielded; the Elf Rings worked well; and in Rivendell and Lothlorien, High Elven culture continued for thousands of years longer than anywhere else in Middle Earth - but at the price of being increasingly cut-off, encapsulated.  

But, when the Master Ring was destroyed, all the racial vitality of the Elves that had gone into the making of the Three Rings was dissipated and diffused, much like Sauron's beingness.  

Immediately; the special qualities of Elrond and Rivendell, Galadriel and Lothlorien, began to decline, dwindle, fade...

The High Elves could not longer remain High; but must revert towards the much lesser cultural and intellectual level of the "Silvan" or Wood Elves - or else migrate to the Undying Lands before this declining process could advance too far.  

*

I believe that Tolkien was here expressing a profound and general truth about the benefits and disadvantages of concentrating our innate vitality - our human qualities. 

I think that - across the large timescale of human history - there was a decline in the natural and spontaneous spirituality of humans; a decline in the immersive and passive awareness-of, and participation-in the divine.

In effect: there was an intent to stop this process of spiritual alienation; by concentrating and focusing our "spiritual vitality" into what is called religion: into religions and churches, into abstract systems of rituals and symbols. 

Religion is therefore a "Ring of Power". 

But, it turned-out that the Elven Rings, and church religion, did not stop the decline, but only delayed it. 

Outside of the increasingly encapsulated worlds of serious religion; the decline in human spirituality and Man's alienation from the divine continued... indeed it accelerated; given that the spirituality has been drained from it and poured into the churches. 

By this analogy; the various Christian revivals can be seen as the re-forging of further Rings of Power - further attempts to stop this decline by increasing the focusing and concentration.

These later Rings included (in general terms) greater demands for personal commitment, efforts at training of mental powers by new rituals or more frequent practice, increased exclusion of the secular from the sacred... etc. 

At the same time religions functioned like Rings of Power - achieving a sustained awareness and participation of the divine, in the cut-off context of "churches" and their activities - but at the cost of sucking spiritual vitality and divine awareness from the rest of life, and from humanity in general... 

An unintended cost of religion, was therefore the creation of "the secular" - what was not within the concentrated scope of religion, necessarily became secular. 

And as the underlying trend of human alienation continued; the secular realm expanded, while the divine and spiritual realm of religion shrank.

My main point is that when Man has created religion, and infused his churches with much of Man's native spiritual vitality - this means that when churches are destroyed, this focused and concentrated spiritual power is dissipated. 

Much as Sauron minus the One Ring was weaker than if the Ring had never been made; and as the Elves declined more suddenly and rapidly after the power of the Three Rings was lost than if the Elven Rings had never been...

So, Mankind's alienation from the spiritual and divine is more severe and intractable after the decline of church religion, than it would have been if we had not invested so much of our religious vitality into institutional, symbolic, and ritual forms. 

Thus; many modern people living after the (de facto) death of the churches and religions; experience this institutional loss as fatal to the divine and the spiritual - and without church, they feel that there is and can be no God, no creation. 

Post-religion; experienced-reality has been drained - abruptly and very fully - of purpose and meaning; and therefore of lasting personal significance. 

Although some churches/ religions sometimes did an effective job for many centuries in some places in sustaining contact with the divine and spiritual realms; because the spiritual and divine was thereby concentrated, focused, protected by the structures of church and formal religion - it now seems that when mankind's innate consciousness changed, and these social structures lost their power and integrity - then we are left worse-off than we would have been if churches had never existed. 

The churches functioned, therefore, analogously to the Elf Rings in their intent and effect; and in the consequences after the power of religion first declined and then was destroyed. 

The waning of Original Participation in my life - the later development of Final Participation

Are we doomed to dwell always on the surface of life? 

Looking back, I can now perceive that Original Participation provided an unconscious and spontaneous direct-link with The World, and other people and Beings, until late in my twenty-second year. 

Through childhood, adolescence, and up to that point, there was a baseline (albeit dwindling) sense of 'belonging in the world' that sustained me, and enabled me to connect with nature and life; despite that I had developed extreme atheist and materialistic (scientistic, positivist) philosophical assumptions. 

But from that point I began to feel alienated, cut-off from things, trapped inside my head, unable to 'lose myself', forget myself, or stop thinking; except when intoxicated in one way or another, or passively-immersed in music or literature - which was presumably a temporary illusion... 

At any rate it could not be sustained and was incompatible with the business of mundane living 

My reaction was partly to accept the situation, and adopt an 'hedonic' approach to my life; in hope that continuous pleasurable activities (and maximum freedom from suffering) would suffice. The aim was to live well until, at some point, I died - preferably instantly, without realizing it.   

Life was something to be got-through - as pleasantly as possible. Nothing more.  

But as the years rolled-by, nostalgia for the lost Original Participation became stronger, and I developed a very powerful (including scholarly) interest in the disenchantment of life, alienation - and yearned for the immersive animism I regarded as normal for our ancestral hunter gatherers - as well as young children.

Yet such a state was seldom, and mostly weakly attainable by even my best efforts.  

In the middle of this I became a Christian; however, at first this conversion did not significantly provide an answer to the problem of alienation - because mainstream Christianity barely recognizes, and does not address, the problem. However, it does uniquely provide the potential to do so - if one is prepared to venture beyond the orthodox. 

It was not until about 2014 that I began to be aware that there was another way of organizing my efforts in life. The choice was not only between an immersive and unconscious absorption into living versus the typically modern and alienated detachment... There was also what Barfield Termed Final Participation. 

It took me a while to grasp what this meant; and to do this I needed to tackle the daunting business of reading Rudolf Steiner's early philosophical works focused on a kind of thinking in which Final Participation was (implicitly) achieved. 

I also, by providential synchronicity, rediscovered William Arkle - who approached this same matter from the different angle of levels of consciousness; and the possibility of attaining (for periods) a level of consciousness in which thinking was real and creative. 

And finally came the understanding that this mortal life was a time for learning (learning needed for our for resurrected eternal life); so that what mattered was learning-from experiences - rather than trying to attain and stay-in any particular state. 

The fact that it was impossible to live always (or even mostly) in a state of Final Participation did not detract from the value of those times when FP was possible, and did happen - so long as we learn from them. It is the learning that can be permanent! 

This is where Christianity comes in; because this mortal life is (among other things) a learning phase before eternal resurrected life - and Final Participation is the divine way of thinking and being. 

(That is why it is correctly termed 'Final' - because divine living is what is aimed-at.)  

So to participate 'finally' - in thinking - was both a foretaste and a preparation for Heaven; therefore an extremely important life-experience to learn-from. 

That is - broadly - how matters stand. Romantic Christianity has emerged as a term to describe that Christianity in which participation is regarded as crucial, and taken with primary seriousness. 

In other words, Christians need to acknowledge and overcome alienation; and work to experience the world, other people and Beings directly; in thought. And know that that thinking is reality.  

What I have observed in myself in recent years, is that the surface of thinking - with thoughts rapidly changing and lasting from fractions of seconds to a few seconds - is not much different from what it always was. There is a constant and superficial play of images and ideas - which are heavily influenced by immediate concerns, the environment, and System manipulations. 

The Real Self experiences this level of consciousness as if a pond skater moving across the surface of water that is constantly changing its colours and patterns - but which can never be penetrated; can only be known indirectly and by observation and reasoning...

But as well as this there is a participative thinking, which moves more slowly (minutes, hours, days...). This is like the flow of a stream, and the thinking of Final Participation is not on the surface of, but instead a part of this flowing stream yet capable creating and of adding to the flow - something from itself.  

Final Participation is unimpeded by the surface of the stream; because it operates at the level of consciousness that includes air, surface and water - yet we, as incarnate Beings, remain many and distinct - loving and creative - selves. 

So, although surface alienation remains, moment by moment; there is an underlying direct participation which lies on the edge of my consciousness, and of which I can become aware at (almost) any time; but which, even when not actively attended-to - constitutes a healing of the rift between my-self and the world which opened up some months before my twenty-second birthday.  

There is no such thing as communication, only participation/ identification (or not) - More from Owen Barfield and Rudolf Steiner

For several years in the early 2000s I was working on Niklas Luhmann's Systems Theory, publishing dozens of papers, articles and a book from that perspective - its central tenet was that communications are primary. I now understand that communications don't actually exist - and indeed, that is the conclusion of Systems Theory - although self-awareness of the fact is obscured by paradox.

Systems Theory is a formalisation of the usual view of science - for example that we know about the world via senses which detect signals. The things 'out there' are detected by light, sound (etc.) communications; and in response to these communications our minds make 'representations' of the things.

Systems theory clarifies that communications cannot actually communicate - and our 'knowledge' of things is actually a representation which arises in the mind - and which indirectly interacts with the environment. By this account, we never actually know things, but only our models of things; and these 'internal' models are never more than un-disproven in our interactions with (what we cannot help but regard as) the outside world.

This Systems Theory may sound excessively abstract, but it is merely a formalisation of normal modern Western consciousness - in which modern Man has become paralysed and demotivated by the 'fact' that his communications are unreliable. So, the Bible cannot guide us anymore, nor can the instructions of The Church; because we believe that all communications are partial, biased and prone to misinterpretation without any possible way of achieving objectivity.

*

For instance, we may believe we have understood a communication, but how do we know for sure? - The answer is only by further communications. But each further communication - intended to clarify the first one - is itself equally ambiguous, uncertain...

So we conclude (correctly) that later communications cannot ever (in principle) clarify the meaning of previous communications. All that happens is we get more and more communications!

In other words, once we have accepted the metaphysical scheme that communications are the way we attain knowledge, we realise that communications cannot - in fact - lead to knowledge; but only back to ourselves.

Apparently, we are trapped in our own minds and can never know what lies outside them. In fact it is worse than that because we cannot consciously know even our own minds! - since conscious knowledge is itself a communication about the mind - and therefore prone to all the uncertainties and ambiguities of any other communication.

*

The way 'out' from this is to return to the original understanding that when we know something we do so by participating in it, or by identifying with it - in a literal sense. So when we know another person's mind, or understand the behaviour of an animal, or the properties of a rock, or the lay of a landscape... this is because we share the being of that thing.

So we do not make an inference about the thoughts of another person, but we actually think the same thoughts as that other person - we share in the exact same (and to us both available) thoughts.

Or we understand the animal we are hunting by becoming that animal - not by thinking a copy of that animal's thinking, nor by stopping being ourselves and becoming the animal - but by both the animal and our-self sharing the exact same thinking.

This is (seemingly) the spontaneous and untheorised way that young children think (you may remember thinking this way yourself), and also hunter-gatherers and Men in less complex, more aboriginal societies. They just think this way - to the extent that they do not have the same intuition of separateness - they live 'in' their environment - identified with it. They do not observe their environment, they participate in it, un-self-consciously.

Indeed, their selves are substantially a product of that environment - they do not set their conscious selves against the environment, do not separate their personal purposes from the purposes of the environment.

(This state is what Owen Barfield calls Original Participation.)

*

Now this metaphysical scheme has become very difficult to modern Man because we have a powerful intuition that we ourselves are separate from everything else - that we are cut-off from everything else, that we are observers of the rest of the world and lack direct access to it.

Trapped in the alienated state of our own consciousness, many modern people yearn to return to that state of Original Participation of childhood, or of tribal Man - yet this yearning has been evident form more than 200 years (since the Romantic Movement, especially) and we are further from the goal than ever - clearly we cannot do this, even if it was the right thing to do.

Two centuries of failure to return to Original Participation, and the same period of profound alienation and nihilism as reinforced by the focus on the primacy 'communication' and its implication of the impossibility of communication; is evidence that we can only go forward not back.

It seems that alienation can only be alleviated by a different kind of participation - by a metaphsyic and experience which allows for genuine participation/ identification in a context of the self-aware consciousness. That is, we remain self-aware, we remain located inside our minds - but acknowledge  the possibility and actuality of identification with the environment.

In modern man, identification is no longer the un-self-conscious and spontaneous and uncontrolled thing it was in childhood or tribal Man; but instead identification happens in conscious, self-aware thinking. In other words, when we are thinking - purposively, consciously, in the normal way - we may achieve (and we aim to achieve) an identification with the reality of our environment, and the things in that environment. So that our own thinking is a sharing in the thinking of the environment - the identification is at the level of thinking, not of being.

This is (even if regarded as false) understandable in the case of people - we understand how we might conceivably share the thoughts of another person. But if there is to be a possibility of real knowledge (and not merely of our own 'models' of reality) this must also apply to everything else - not just to people, but to animals and plants, rocks and hills, water and chemicals...

To be crystal clear, we must be able to share the thoughts of animals, plants, rocks, hills, water, chemicals and everything else; which means that (in the first place) these things must have thoughts in order that we may be able to share them.

This explains the necessity for our basic assumptions, our metaphysical framework of reality, to be animistic - if we want to really know about reality, we need not only to regard the whole world as alive, but also as thinking.

If this principle is accepted, then we can move forward to Final Participation; we can cure alienation, can really know about reality, can have human relationships based on truth not illusion, and can feel and be 'at home in the universe'.

*

Of course the secondary question is concerned with how we know when we have achieved Final Participation, and identification of thinking - and are not merely fooling ourselves, or making an error?

Well, that is a secondary question - it does have answers, but such answers themselves depend on the acknowledgement of the possibility of direct participation.

For as long as we persist in regarding everything as communication, we shall always be uncertain about everything, and will only have more and more communications - each as fundamentally uncertain as every other.

So there can be no answers unless and until we move forwards to a metaphysical system, and personal experience, of direct participation, actual identification of thinking - sharing in the thinking of other entities.

At which point we can understand the answers to questions about error, self-deception and accuracy. But from the perspective of Modern Man's current detachment from, alienation from, the world and from his own mind - there are no answers to anything.

We first need to live-by a new metaphysics.