Might it be time to face a movement challenging to us to face ourselves?
At a party recently, I sat toe-to-toe with a good friend, who told me blankly that we all go alone. Though not physically upset, there was a sense I gathered that he was contemplating the absurdities of life. To be direct, many of us would admit there is the problem of meaning inherent in living life. In the end, our families, our friends, collegeues, lovers, enemies, and people who we made some sort of an impression on…it all amounts to us facing our aloneness.
How do we face a moment of like this? Generally, we refer to it as an ‘existential crisis’, but I think that distances the problem from the very personal nature of existence Our lives often taking a safe ride from moment of safety and familiarity to the next. It is in these moments of loss faith, or maybe awakenings that we take the look around. We all are aware, to some level that our lives may fall short of living up to our grandiose dreams.
I think existentialism gives us a different perspective.
Robert Solomon, recently deceased Austin University professor, has some of the most eloquent and thought-provoking youtube video series I’ve found that expounds on the work by giants of existentialism. These figures include: Camus, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Sartre and Heidegger.
Solomon isn’t interested in dead beliefs, but rather, blows the sand off the scripts and literature of these literary giants. Existentialism I gather, is more then a 1940s literary movement or philosophical reaction.. There are certain attributes that I think are relevant to existentialism: 1) emphasis on the individual 2) truth in subjectivity 3) confronting despair and death and 4) living life passionately.
One thinker that resonates strongly with me is Soren Kierkegaard. Writer of “Fear and Trembling” and “Either/Or”. Kierkegaard was keenly aware of his sovereign journey. Unable to follow the ‘crowd’ or take the presumptions of his culture, he took a path unique to his own, spawning many existential thinkers. Kierkegaard starts with the premise “Truth is subjectivity”, a risky and alienating idea. Like other existentialists, he recognizes that we don’t life according to any noble truths, but rather our personal truth. Our commitments. Our passions. Our meaning. Regardless of how we feel about religion, or politics or any sort of collective feeling, there is a pervasive sense that the meaning we derive from life is one we have to feel it for ourselves.
Kierkegaard talks of the 3 levels that provide individual meaning.
The aesthetic level is the venture. Whether in our party college years or chasing the satisfactions of pleasure in our later years, it is easy to see the way we suit ourselves to a passion. Benign passions like arts, achievement, or status seeking, or more hedonistic pursuits of drugs, drinking and sex…all of which lead to a lack of satisfaction. In the short-term, these aesthetic pleasures feel a void. The question remains. How many games do you have to win, to feel vindicated? How many people do you need approval from to feel secure? The answer for Kieekegaard, and if we look honestly at ourselves, is that these pleasures are temporal. The aesthetic level is not enough.
The ethical level is one of self-development. One where we strive to be the best human being that we can be. There is a satisfaction here, one in which we are meeting the criteria of our society and trying to live a life according to our cultural scripts. Through these efforts we improve ourselves – kindness, ability, openness, honesty. All of which Kierkegaard would say is a positive step up from the empty pursuit of pleasure. Again we are faced with the existential dread of our finality. The ethical level, improves the individual, and perhaps separates the individual from the ‘herd mentality’. But the elevation is still man-made.
Kierkegaard takes the leap-of-faith. For him, this i a commitment wholly to something he can live and die for. For Kierkegaard, the answer is an individual commitment to Christ. He professed, even if there were no other Christians, it would be the right leap forward. Even if the religion were proved a lie, it is the right step forward. Again, the emphasis is not on a rational logical answser, but rather the subjective truth that makes the purpose meaningful.
Kierkegaard, the father of existentialism, an intense individual by all accounts, gives us an answer which at once has us face despair, but gives us a vision toward a higher calling. The vision is unique to Kierkegaard, one he recognizes as having a meaning only to him. Many existentialists have had different visions: Nietzsche a reactionary, Sarte a Marxist, Camus an atheist, and Heidigger a fascist. The thread that binds these thinkers is the sense of personal commitment, and personal meaning.
Existentialism may offer, and I believe does offer us a compelling vision for our own lives. It is not an ordained or always appreciated viewpoint; but the message is one that we are responsible for our lives, and further responsible for our destinies. What the answer is, one gathers, really is not the point. The point is that the passions in life not only give us a sense of identity, but can give us the foundation for which to live our life.
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