Individual Purpose
Like many things in life meaning, purpose and transcendence can develop and grow in a life over time. Consciousness and awareness of these realities within life is a developmental and natural evolution. Many, it seems, can only see these meaningful realities on the outside or in collective beliefs and dogma, sometimes infused with real or pseudo religious feeling, about what is or is not meaningful reality. Individual conception of these things, a personal experience of the mystery within life, are not gained with out a hard-fought battle and personal emancipation from collective thinking and collective expectations.
When I recently watched the President’s address to congress, I was struck by the praise, fanaticism and total adherence that was being demonstrated in mob- like fashion to party dogma that was being preached. The republican’s rose and chanted USA, USA, with fists pumped and arms waving in unison. It resembled a high school sporting event or rally, or even more accurately, it resembled some kind of religious revival. I thought this is the ruling party of my country as I looked at the congregation cheering the president as he told us his administration had done so well in the first opening weeks, that they/he had even surpassed George Washington’s as the greatest administration ever. One hat declared,” Trump was right about everything”, proclaiming the president’s obvious infallibility.
That is religious devotion. It is an extreme collective belief system that seems devoid of grounding. It appears very much like a collective psychosis that has, evidently, overwhelmed a large swath of the masses. Even though many lies were spread, many falsehoods preached, it seems to go unnoticed. That is a big symptom of powerful collective movements. No one caught up seems to self-reflect or examine what is happening. In discussing this reality, Jung writes,” the policy of the state is exalted to a creed, the leader or party boss becomes a demigod beyond good and evil… there is only one truth and beyond it no other”. This appears to be exactly what is threatening us today.
We can all be infected. Collective beliefs and energies are powerful things. It is easy to be swept up in a movement, a cause, or even a “crusade”. Our sense of self, our individual spark can easily be part of igniting a much larger destructive fire. These fires tend to have a life of their own and when they are let loose, they can ravage and destroy many a life. Just because someone is afraid of something new or different does not mean they should be reduced and steamrolled into submission by the latest “correct” wave of understanding.
Mental and spiritual health, it seems to me, is to find and live from the unique self that we all are and connect that self in meaningful ways to the life that we are called to live. Emerson said, “Envy is ignorance, Imitation is suicide, and we must till the plot of land we are given to till”. We all have our plot of land to till. It is different for everyone. It is a journey to work our “land”. It is a process and often a struggle, but it is a very noble undertaking, and one very needed in our suffering world. This is, to me, the antidote to the collective drowning that is threatening many lives. This is where meaningful, transcendent connection to life is found. It is not found in a herd mentality but in core, transcendent reality within all lives.