The more a man’s life is shaped by the collective norm, the greater is his individual immorality.
~ Carl Jung
I’ve been writing about patterns in our lives that lead us away from individuation—becoming who we were meant to be—and bog us down into a quagmire of inheritances, habits, “shoulds” and other types of collective thinking that can never lead us to wholeness.
As an example, I began writing about what I learned this Thanksgiving week, when I realized that I had been re-enacting with my children a pattern that originated in my relationship with my mother. Though I saw what was happening mid-stride, reading it, too, on my daughters’ faces, even in that moment I did not yet have the picture I needed in order to free myself and continue on my individual path.
The picture I needed came later that night, as I dreamed. The dream I dreamed showed my dream ego in conflict with my husband, who represented my male side, or my animus. The action of the dream required me to finally break away from him in the most unlikely of circumstances, so that I could “get home” in the dream. Though I ended up going home by walking for hours in my pajamas and house slippers, I made it there and found myself in surprising surroundings with much work to do at the end. The dream also indicated that, in order to be free, I would have to overcome my inner, nice, obedient, good 13-year-old, and that I would need to do some work on my inner child of around six to eight years old.
Now, that’s a lot of information to get from one dream. But after I woke up and journaled the dream, I found myself weeping for my loss of freedom as a child, and over the fear of my mother I’d felt for so many years, even for years after I’d given up the fantasy that some day I’d be close to her.
Later that day, my brother came to pick up my nephews. As we re-hashed our Thanksgiving with our parents, I made an offhand (but unconsciously fruitful) comment about Mother. He playfully chided me for my little snipe, turned to my children and said, “Now, kids, don’t let your mom talk bad about Grandma. Grandma is old and we have to be nice to her, so make your mom Be Nice.”
My brother is one of my favorite people in the world, and that moment was no time to discuss family of origin issues, for he was on his way out the door. So I smiled inwardly and remained silent as my children looked at him, wide-eyed, knowing what my real response would have been, had I opened my mouth. And my real response—the one that’s true and that will lead me to the wholeness for which I’m intended—is this:
The more a man’s life is shaped by the collective norm, the greater is his individual immorality.
This is what Jung wrote. Put another way, King Solomon wrote that “bad company corrupts good morals.” One’s own individual way is easily lost through the influence of the collective, which is perhaps the biggest obstacle to the individual’s psychological health. The way to wholeness comes first from being prepared to live with the collective in healthy ways by having been raised in a healthy, loving, nurturing, accepting family. One then launches in a healthy, loving, nurturing, accepting way and goes out to live a healthy, loving, nurturing, accepting life by individuating—”leaving and cleaving,” as the Bible puts it—by becoming one. I do not speak with regard to marriage, here, but with regard to the Divine Marriage, the hieros gamos, the Holy Marriage. This is how life works at its best, if we have been loved.
If we have not been loved at all, or if we have been loved in part but wounded in part, we enter adulthood confused, believing that our actual marriage to a spouse will cause oneness and wholeness, and spending 20 or 30 years discovering what a bitterly wrong idea that was. We think that having children and houses and all the right clothes, possessions, activities, and friends will get us there, too. But they don’t. Twenty or thirty years in churches, at the job, or anywhere involving other people will reveal just how fallen and fragmented we all are, because we’re designed to become one with the Divine and ourselves before we are able to offer anything to the world; but we confuse our obligation to Spirit and we live our lives in the collective. And one year we wake up—some people do only on their death beds—and ask, “What was I thinking?”
The thing is that we can never become individuated while clinging to collective norms. The collective mind tells us how to live, what we should do for a living, how we should dress, what cars we should drive, what neighborhoods we should live in. Be responsible, do the right thing, do things in order; don’t push, don’t be rude, don’t be mean; respect your elders. “Don’t talk bad about Grandma; she’s old; we have to be nice to her; Be Nice.” When young people launch from the childhood home into a collective that looks as perfectly typecast as actors in a serialized drama or comedy, one can be sure that they are just as trapped as they were in their childhood homes. By the time they are 35 or 40 and have their two children and their so-called dream home that gives them all the right feelings, they will be filled with all the wrong feelings because the collective mind is corrupting and evil in the sense that it numbs people and leads them away from what only they can offer the world: their own selves.
And isn’t that what Mother or Father tried to snuff out in the first place, if they did—the Real Self? Isn’t that the design of public education and collective education and collectives of all other varieties? And yet we most admire the individual who rises above collectives by breaking free of them, and who thinks original thoughts, paints original paintings, writes original songs, pens poems that transport us out of the mire we’re in.
Individuation is a crime against collective values, Jung wrote, because we have to snub our noses at the group and walk away in order to go on the path that arises from the call to adventure and do what only we can do. Every step a person makes to integrate what has been unconsciously denied, therefore, has a healing effect and restores yet another part of the individual. And every step a person makes toward the collective leads him away again, or as Jung wrote “through his contamination with others, he falls into situations and commits actions which bring him into disharmony with himself” (CW 7:373).
And yet we hesitate to act in harmony with our own selves, for it was our earliest influences who taught most of us that our selves were to be rejected. Whether the collective was the family or the kindergarten class, we had to get in line and cooperate, and all too often “getting in line” meant giving up our true selves.
Lest the non-traditional types among us pat yourselves on the back because you resisted collective living and wear different clothes or refuse to shop at Abercrombie, would never buy Chanel or do not use that sort of education for your children, just stop a moment and consider your social network. We all collectivize. We can hardly stop ourselves. As an example, I had to smile recently when young missionary friends sent us photos of their evangelization team in the country where they live. Everyone on the team was dressed similarly, with similar hair styles, similar piercings, similar lifestyles. If you passed any single one of them in an aisle at the grocery store, you’d think to yourself, “Ah, now there’s someone who’s different!” But in fact, there’s nothing different about our friends at all. They are still part of a collective that is full of “shoulds” and “oughts” and shows them by example how to live. They are beloved, vibrant, self-sacrificing, wonderful human beings, but they are not much individuated, for there is not one person in the group who has anything original or different to say, when compared with their group. And, in fact, if one were to quit that group and become a Banana Republic-wearing financial planner, the rest of the group would say, “Ah, too bad; he sold out.”
That’s a collective. A collective is a group mind from which one cannot be free, out of which one cannot possibly become a self. One becomes a self by leaving the collective first, and only afterward by providing his or her own individual part in that great collective. The only way one can provide oneself is by supplying, as Saint Paul wrote, what each individual part supplies. Individual, meaning “each one part.” The “one” there, in the Greek, means one, a primary number.
It means every single one.
14 responses so far ↓
davidrochester // December 7, 2008 at 9:06 PM |
This raises some inarticulate questions for me regarding how to differentiate the value of community from the demoralizing (in a very literal sense) effect of the collective. Maybe I’ll figure out later what the questions are. Or maybe that really is the question … how one tells the difference between those two things, or perhaps more importantly, how one is to tell the difference between being a functional contributor to a community, or, um, a sheep in the herd (even if all of the sheep are creatively dyed green, therefore seeming to be different from the other sheep).
This topic has been somewhat on my mind lately, as I contemplate the pattern of my own life … I never fit into a group until I hand-picked a collection of people to normalize me because I couldn’t stand it any more. These people are my writer’s group, and I exercise over them a benevolent dictatorship of editorial and critical generosity, but the real reason for the existence of the group is to allow me to fit in somewhere. It isn’t possible for me to be the dissenting voice in this group, because it is under my authority, and while the group is composed of highly intelligent and sensitive people, they submit to me, and when they are no longer willing to do that, they leave the group.
Now, what’s interesting to me is the fact that in order to normalize myself with in a group, I had to have it under my complete control. Luckily, my intentions toward the other members of the group are genuinely benevolent; I care about them, even while recognizing that I have selected them for the express purpose of normalizing me. But if I were a different kind of person, and if my intentions were less honorable, and if I ever overcame my stage fright enough to be the powerful public speaker I used to be when I was a teenager, then good God, I could wreak a lot of havoc.
And so I observe myself, and find myself wondering whether very evil people are the product of individuation gone wrong, who never fit into a group well enough to detach themselves from it in a healthy way, and who became so desperate to be normalized that they did, on a much larger scale, what I have done, out of sheer desperation to be accepted despite a propensity to stand out wherever they went.
Eve replies:
David, your musings don’t seem so very inarticulate to me. They seem to include questions about how to discern between helpful and hurtful groups and group participation, particularly as leaders. For non-leaders, maybe the issue is about the energy happening in the group: are they there to serve, or there to suck? Is there both giving and receiving in the group? What end result did they have in mind when they joined the group, or what hope or expectation? And so on.
Theoretically (writing from a Jungian perspective, anyway), one can’t become evil out of individuation gone wrong. The essence of individuation is both to become one’s own true self and to give one’s own true self as a gift. Ultimately, the test of one’s giving involves others, too, who judge whether the gift is good or not. This is putting it in simplistic terms, with a lot left out (I’m sure).
You bring up the point of benign dictators, which I find interesting because (as you know) I’ve just finished re-reading M. Scott Peck’s, “People of the Lie.” He has a chapter on the Mylai massacre and in it he says that “the role of follower is the role of child. The individual adult as individual is master of his own ship, director of his destiny. But when he assumes the role of follower he hands over to the leader his power; his authority over himself and his maturity as decision-maker. He becomes psychologically dependent on the leader as a child is dependent on its parents. In this way, there is a profound tendency for the average individual to emotionally regress as soon as he becomes a group member.”
You’re rightly concerned about groups that so willingly allow themselves to be led, because if leaders are not as well-intentioned as you, it’s likely that the entire group may be led astray by the leader’s own unconscious (or conscious) needs. Peck notes that the surest way to group unity is through establishment of an “out” group or the Other, those folks who are not us and who are therefore less than–and even “wrong” or “bad.” Since unhealthy groups and individuals need to externalize their shadows rather than own them, it’s highly likely that these shadowy contents will remain externalized, namely because “evil individuals will flee self-examination and guilt by blaming and attempting to destroy whatever or whoever highlights their deficiencies.” It’s a Biblical principle from Genesis to Revelation that humble folks are willing to receive correction. All our psychological theory has not managed to overturn this simple character rule.
Peck continues, “From this it should be obvious that the failing group is the one likely to behave most evilly. Failure wounds our pride, and it is the wounded animal who is vicious. In the healthy organism failure will be a stimulus to self-examination and criticism. But since the evil individual cannot tolerate self-criticism, it is in time of failure that he or she will inevitably lash out one way or another. And so it is with groups. Group failure and the stimulation of group self-criticism act to damage group pride and cohesiveness. Group leaders in all places and ages have therefore routinely bolstered group cohesion in times of failure by whipping the group’s hatred for foreigners or the ‘enemy.’”
The individuated person can stand alone, and knows when to choose to separate. It’s a choice, eh? The non-individuated and unconscious don’t know what they’re doing, don’t recall what their goals are (usually don’t have any); have goals but no clue about what the required steps toward reaching them are, or undermine themselves as they go along the way; and generally succumb to group or outside pressure rather than letting their own deeply held values and relationship to the Divine to guide their steps.
You mentioned the person who attaches himself to a group in order to normalize but who never fit into groups well. Generally, in my experience, the group takes care of that. People who are not ‘normal’ can’t pass for normal in normal groups. Whether it’s a ‘good’ thing to be accepted in the average group or not is a different topic! LOL. Still, I don’t worry much about whether oddballs in groups are going to have problems that negatively impact the group or the oddball. Truly non-functional oddballs simply can’t fit in. The don’t fit in anywhere, much, unless they do what it takes to appear normal for whatever group they happen to be in at the time, right? Maybe you can think of an example of a truly anti-social or otherwise personality-disordered person who can “fit” into a group, but I can’t conjure one up at the moment. It doesn’t take long for the person who isn’t ‘right’ to act out.
And then there are the people who have labels but who also have personal integrity. I’m not fooled by labels or the lack of them, nor am I any longer fooled by fools who act and look like they have it all together. I do sometimes like to fool or kid myself, though, and have only myself to blame for that. But I know that a lot of people are fooled by labels on both sides of the “normal” continuum.
henitsirk // December 7, 2008 at 11:08 PM |
I often wonder about this while raising my children. My feeling is that I need to instruct them in our cultural norms so that they can later choose to follow them or not. I think the key is in the manner of instruction — I can’ t recall the author, but I do remember reading in college something about disciplining children, that it is ineffective to be either too strict or too permissive. One must be like the baby bear’s porridge and be “just right”, or else the child will not internalize the lesson you are trying to teach.
I’m waiting for the day when my kids notice that I often exceed the speed limit, or something similar, and how I will explain that in an honorable way, I just don’t know.
And then there’s my son’s desire to have pink sparkly things. I want to indulge him in his love of beauty, but my husband fears that my son will receive too much disapprobation from his peers and will suffer for that. I’m not sure which suffering is worse: being told by your peers that your desires are wrong, or being told that by your parents.
Anyway, I’m rambling, but that’s what came to mind.
Eve replies:
Heni, oh, me too! I do think that mothers (and fathers) can be like tour guides to life by explaining what’s what. What’s the history of it? What’s it used for? Why do we do this or not do this? And so on.
About your son and the pink sparkly things. Some months ago in the Target parking lot, we passed a father and his around 3-year-old son as they walked to their car. The little boy was wearing beautiful red sparkly girl’s shoes—like Dorothy’s ruby slippers. “Oh!” I exclaimed, “I love your shoes!”
The little boy beamed at me, and our girls gushed over them. “I had those same shoes a few years ago,” my 9-year-old said. “They’re great!”
The father looked a little sheepish. I looked him right in the eye, smiled broadly and said, “My son wore dresses all during his third year. Is your son about three?” Yes, he was. The dad was wearing cowboy boots and a belt with a steer on it, every bit the picture of the manly man. “Do you have a little girl, too?” I asked, “a year or two older?” He replied that he did. “Ah, I said. Us, too. It seems to be the way these things work.”
“Well, I’m not worried about it,” the dad said, “and the shoes, they ARE pretty nice.” We both laughed as we got into our cars.
He seemed to understand that when your son is three, the red ruby slippers are as beautiful to your little boy as they are to your little girl. Boys need magic just as badly at that age. They want to be glorious, too, and to wear glory on their feet. I’m sure if they made sparkly red boys’ shoes with wings on them like Mercury’s, that little boy would have been wearing those. But they don’t. Somehow all the gay designers have overlooked yet another generation of boys who like sparklies. And they’re still having to make do with their sister’s things.
When our son was four or five, he outgrew wanting to wear girls’ things. We explained to him that he could wear them, but if he went out dressed in them some other boys might laugh, because in our culture boys wore pants usually, and not dresses. Or when our other son went through his Brave Heart phase, and kept painting himself (this lasted about six months), and wanted to go out bare-chested, we sometimes let him. Other times we explained that church was the place for a dress shirt and slacks, but at the church picnic he could unveil his true identity and run shirtless and painted if he wanted to. And many would probably admire him because he was four years old. But if he were 24 years old and there was no football game, people might look at him funny. And so on.
When my kids have wanted to do unusual things, we’ve asked them what they mean or why they’re doing them or how they feel or think about them. If they have words, they’ll usually explain or have some reason. Then we taught them how to use those words to explain themselves to others. With the explanation, they also sometimes need to be given help with what to do when others ridicule them—as in when the peers tell a kid that his desire to wear sparkly shoes or paint his body blue is wrong. To return to the sparkly shoe example, probably a boy that age isn’t going to be far away from his parents; but if he is, there are ways to explain red sparkly shoes. And if another kid doesn’t like it or is already a bully, then there are words to go with that, too, words that establish boundaries. And when all else fails, one goes to the authority. And mom and dad are the ultimate authorities. I always tell my kids that, because we allow them a lot of freedom of self-expression and they have from time to time been abused by other children and even adults who disapprove of the way we live our lives and allow our children to speak their minds with respect. Some people find speaking one’s mind, even respectfully, to be disrespectful! Hah.
I think that when I was a younger parent, the way I let my kids down was in not explaining enough, because I was afraid of boring them to death. I found that I often didn’t give them enough “tools” for handling life. Rather than waiting til another child or adult attacked my child’s value or mine, I just began to see one of my primary mother roles as one of a teacher. I know you’re wise and knowledgeable, so perhaps your only stumbling block is the cultural idea that we seem to have in America that we’re not allowed to be wise counselors of our children. I may not have put that well, but it feels to me that we have some sort of a taboo in our culture against being wise mothers. I’ll have to try to sort this out and maybe explain better what I mean, because it’s something that bothers me still from time to time in the larger culture. Does this make sense?
renaissanceguy // December 8, 2008 at 6:11 AM |
David’s question is also mine.
I would like to understand how one can live in community without being sucked in to a collective mind set. You’ve read my blog long enough to know how anti-collective I am concerning government. I’d like to think I live that way in my daily life. I’d like to think that I’m already fully individuated.
Eve replies:
RG, I’d like to think that I’m already fully individuated, too! I think it a lot. Whether I am or not, I like to think it.
As far as I know, the only people competent to judge our own individuation is us. Our dreams show us, and the level if dis-ease in our lives can show us, too. From my vantage points, you’ve seemed to me to be a healthy individual who is aware of his strengths and weaknesses and uses his gifts and all that. So I don’t disagree. I’m playing with you when I tell you what I’d like to think (as opposed to what I think! haha).
Government. Sigh. What a big, ungainly, mindless beast. Yes, I know your ideas on that. With government and other large groups, less is truly more. When I read our founding fathers, I see so many men who seemed individuated enough to be able to rebel against the status quo. It was their ideals that built our country, and not all of them agreed on religion, politics, how a nation ought to be run etc. But they did agree on individual liberty and less government. And yet, government has only grown. My personal theory about this is that people need and seek leadership and will parentify their leaders whenever they do not want to take personal responsibility to figure out and solve problems, and also when they don’t want to suffer or learn from their mistakes or their suffering. This is the eternal child, isn’t it? I believe we live in a nation full of them, and why not? This is all we work to produce through public education, which ought to be called public appeasement and enabling by this time. I see little, overall, to recommend America’s educational system as something that helps young people to individuate.
But I digress.
Let’s think about the issue of community versus group think and dumbing down. These are different. One has to become fully oneself in order to contribute to the community; this is different than being absorbed by the community or melting away in it. One body, many individual members, or e pluribus unum; “out of many, one.” I think that says it all.
Gerry Forde // December 8, 2008 at 9:59 PM |
Some profound questions dave and renaissanceguy. On the one hand, you do feel yourself sucked into the collective mode of action and then you catch yourself being destructive and wonder how did I get like this? Yet the modern trend to find a community on the web that agrees with everything you say can have the effect of mutual massage and be equally stifling to growth. Whatever we dislike and whatever we fear has a message for us. The very dislike of authority in community could indicate a negative father complex; the pragmatism and living for the moment of the materialist world could be a counterbalance to our excessive intuition and farsight. Most of all, the close relationship with the person who has the greatest propensity to disagree with us and challenge us to the core – blandly called our partner – is ironically our greatest opportunity to growth. Everything has to be examined because our true soul can be buried under layers of conformity and reaction to conformity. For the day when our conscious life and our unconscious life are flowing in the same circuitous direction!
Eve replies:
Gerry, howdy do! I’m glad you came by and appreciate your comment. I visited your web site and watched the video, by the way. Funny! What a lot of positive, fun energy in that group!
I particularly liked that you said that finding a web community to agree with everything you say “can have the effect of mutual massage and be equally stifling to growth. Whatever we dislike and whatever we fear has a message for us.”
And then this: “Everything has to be examined.” Which takes a lot of work. A LOT of work.
Scott Erb // December 8, 2008 at 11:11 PM |
Excellent post. I’ve always made it a point in my teaching to try to convince students that it is possible to live a life, but not live ones’ own life. If you let society shape and guide your wants, desires, definitions of success, and way of thinking, you’re giving up the very special and profound thing called “life.” Yet, we are never totally free of our culture. If we had been born in Cairo we’d be Muslims living with very different norms. I think the only way to be able to break free from ones’ cultural norms is to understand them. To understand ones’ own culture, how it looks from other cultures, and give up the idea that “we are better” or that “they are bad.” We need to see that we are part of a socially constructed culture with shared and contested beliefs. Only then can we really critique those deeply held cultural ideals and beliefs. We can’t escape them; part of our psyche is shaped by them. But we can try to recognize them and self-critique.
I can really relate to Heniksirt’s thoughts on raising children. I’ve got two really rambunctious, laughing alot but sometimes out of control boys aged 5 and almost 3. I try to really engage the imagination. Tell stories, let them guide my stories, and no matter how bizarre, go with it. Imagination and laughter — I think those are really important ways to help gird children for confronting the demons of collective thought processes.
Scott Erb // December 8, 2008 at 11:27 PM |
One other bit: In his book “War is a Force that Gives us Meaning” by Chris Hedges, a NY Times Pulitzer prize winning war reporter, he tells the story of a Bosnian Muslim farmer. In a village dominated by Muslims, a Serb couple had a baby. They could not feed it. To the ridicule of others, who pointed out how the Serbs were committing atrocities against Muslims and could not be trusted, this farmer daily for over a year brought precious milk from his cow to this baby. He was threatened. But he continued until the Serb family moved away. He was dirt poor, illiterate, and later when Hedges caught up with him after hearing the story from the Serb couple, had his face light up as he found out the child was OK.
That’s defying the collective. That’s seeing the humanity of a child in need, and pushing aside all the rhetoric, hatred and anger of a war. That’s risking ones’ meager possessions and doing the right thing. In a word, that’s love.
Eve replies:
I love it when I am about to write something as I read through a thread of comments, and then a reader says it. This happens again and again, and somehow you guys have a way of weaving this strand that becomes part of something bigger, and makes something of substance.
Scotty, you’re a gem. “In a word, that’s love.” Love… or as Paul said (you know I just love to quote the Bible!), “…the greatest of these is love.” It really is the tell-all. If we see love in it, it is a good thing. If we don’t, no matter how loudly it proclaims itself, it’s not. It’s just that simple.
The story you told reminds me of the story of the Good Samaritan. That man defied the collective in order to be true to love. Marvelous.
Irene // December 9, 2008 at 1:58 AM |
Everything here and over the last week is making me teary. Tears well up because of love, despair, difference, and incredible, beautiful insight from you and all these people here. And I loved reading about your experience with your Mother, Eve, thank you. I wanted to comment but I came to it a bit late. It brought up my relationship with my Father more so than my mum. And may I say how much I wish I was at your gathering of convivial women, cooking and talking. It seemed to surrounded you like a really warm hug!
And to David, I wanted to say your last insight here really blew me away – I really get it. It actually gives avenue to compassion for such an individual. Which freaked me out a bit.
Talking about the collective, just this week gone, I put up a show of recent paintings at a rental gallery here. I had not been working specifically towards it, but the opportunity fell into my lap a month ago, and I went for it. Now, the conflict is in the private doing, and the public showing, and the pressure of opinion (what makes ‘good’ art) – from friends, and strangers, and critics (maybe). All my life, I have tried to find my own voice in the paint I put down, but being a bit of a chameleon, I was too ready to try on the colours of other painters or others whose opinions I thought mattered (okay for the immature artist, I suppose). I know that sometimes you do have to listen to others to grow, and be challenged, as Gerry indicated – but it is something I have been all too ready to do. Unfortunately, it has often caused me to waiver (there’s that woman on the fence again) like a really bendy reed. Collective opinions even in smaller worlds like the art world here are pushy only because I want to be accepted as having value as an artist.
With this current work, I have allowed a lot more fragmentation or gaps to appear in the way I am using the paint, so it has changed the appearance of my work from previous times – meaning not so ‘realistic’. But this breaking apart, and my permission to myself to do whatever was necessary has been really important to me. The paint has become a language in itself reflecting my process of attempting individuation, alongside what the painting is about. But still, it was a starting point influenced by two other famous international artists I am in awe of. I took courage from what I resonated with in their work, and tried to make it my own.
But have I made it my own? Will I be swayed by the opinions of those informed people who respond honestly and whom I respect? How do I flow in the collective and still speak my own language without being threatened by different opinions, and yet listen enough to learn and develop? And how far do I cut myself off ? Actually, that would be an incredible relief. Maybe their opinions are ‘right’ – but now I hear myself saying “maybe I am right too”. I want to feel, in that rock solid place inside, that what I am doing is true to me and worthwhile regardless of potential dealer pressure and market forces (my last gallery dumped me because I didn’t ‘fit in’).
Now I see an image of a dog doing the wet-doggy-shake. I want to do that!
I love the timing of your having written about this right now, Eve. Its a crucial point for me here and now in the studio, apart from the more subtle pressures around of life in general. I tend to be a Nice Girl, too, in regards to family obligations, and with people in general, which doesn’t help. I know I said it before, but… time again to do that wet-doggy-shake!
That’s better.
Eve replies:
Irene, oh, this is big. A show is monumental. A show shows just how courageous artists are. A show is like a poetry reading. Or maybe like a one-man musical show for a non-captive audience (say, in a coffee shop or other venue in which people can just walk away). It can show what liars people can be, how “nice.” And it can be so helpful when people are honest, whether that honest feels good or bad or in between.
We were at the book store last week, standing in line, and there were sets of note cards for sale near the register (at Barnes and Noble). One set featured some of Picasso’s works. One child said, “Oh, Picasso. I really don’t like him.” I said that I could see why, as I had never really appreciated his work either, until learning more about him. Then, I said, I’d changed my mind.
“Why?” my daughter asked. “What made you change your mind?” Oh, the question I live for! And wait for, because I know that only healthy people have curiosity and health and can listen for answers and hear contrary viewpoints without disintegrating. So I told her what I’d learned about Picasso and how he had changed, and what he said about his most profound changes as an artist. I advised her to look him up when she got home and look at his early and late work. As with so many other artists, he began traditionally and soon became himself as an artist.
It reminded me of how the masters all had to be able to draw like someone else. They did this in that style; they did that in that other style. As they mastered the paint or the medium, they improvised and innovated. Things happened to change them and to break them open as artists. They played and experimented and finally one day, BOOM, that bud broke through the earth and there was the artist, ready to grow up into full bloom.
I think it is OK to listen to people and to play with their ideas. It is just play as long as you’re aware. Even if I, as a writer, hire myself out and write in another voice, or ghost write something (which I have done) because I want the money or I want the experience of doing something in a different way or style or voice, who cares? It’s only a problem if I react and do it out of fear of losing love or losing something else that I want more than I want my true self. If it doesn’t require giving up my true self or some fragment of it, what is it to me or anyone else if I do it? See what I mean?
So if you waver like a bendy reed, that isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as long as you are still the same reed. The wind blows, the reed bends. The reed has its reasons. I suppose at some point, the wind or environment may be so forceful that the only chance for the reed to remain a reed is for it to be utterly uprooted—but still a reed. In that case, it still has its integrity. It never tried to be anything but what it was.
I think that if I tried writing fiction because my dad wants me to write fiction, I could do it now just to try it. I do think about it from time to time, but what prevents me is that I read a lot of fiction writer’s blogs and their lives are so tortured as writers that I fear I don’t have the fortitude to go with the absence of giftedness that they have and that I don’t think I do have. But if I had a good idea, I’d do it. In fact, even today I was musing to myself, “You know, if you got an idea or it just came to you and it felt right, you would write fiction. You would do what J. K. Rowling did, too, if the idea possessed you to that degree. You would recognize it and honor it, wouldn’t you? Yes, I replied. Yes, I would.” But, absent that inspiration, I won’t even try.
My point is that I think you know yourself well enough as an artist and yet you are a reed. I think you’re OK and it’s OK and you’ll be fine. Probably the main pitfall you may have is The Ghost of Father Past showing up and talking about your art (your dad’s voice, in other words), which could send you tripping. But not for long. Worst case scenario is that you may temporarily take some fool’s word seriously and later come to your senses.
I love your art. It is still something I aspire to own. I know I’m a weirdo, so obviously your art will appear to weirdos. But there are enough of us in the world that I think you could at least aspire to be a starving artist on work you sell to weirdos. ;o)
Let us all know how your show goes.
davidrochester // December 9, 2008 at 9:47 AM |
Irene — I was transfixed by your description of your using your paints differently, and by your musings regarding the artist’s struggle to individuate and to create something original and true to yourself while being able to accept constructive criticism … because I think it’s true that creative expression often undergoes a refining to make it “palatable” to a broad audience.
I sometimes wonder whether it makes sense for artists to have two completely separate artistic lives … a life in which they fully self-express, and then just let it go, and if someone likes it, great, and if they don’t, then that’s fine too … and a second life in which the art is shaped by input from others, with the recognition that the art may be changed, but that it’s voluntary for the specific purpose of reaching a broader audience.
I’ve done this sometimes with writers I’ve coached who have been blocked … suggested that they have writing shown to nobody but themselves and me (once they and I knew I was an appropriate reader for them) so that it was seen and appreciated, but not changed. We would then work on editing pieces seeking publication. It did seem to help create a sense that an artist can be practical about the realities of being seen, and still retain complete self-reflective expression. I think I had some idea that once someone has attained a certain stature in his or her field, that private, highly individual work could be shown, because the artist would have earned the open-mindedness of colleagues and audience.
That’s a very weird concept — earning open-mindedness — but I think there’s some validity to it. I’m thinking specifically at the moment of the great composer Haydn, who was able to conduct some of the most forward-looking musical experiments of the Classical era (such as his wonderfully iconoclastic oratorio The Creation ) because he’d built a solid reputation making people happy. A lot of people who make that strategy work on a broad scale are both incredibly astute about interpersonal and group politics, and also have a healthy sense of self, so it’s easier for them to make certain compromises without feeling that they’re losing themselves. But just because it’s easier for them doesn’t mean it’s impossible for the rest of us.
deb // December 9, 2008 at 10:22 AM |
“If we have not been loved at all, or if we have been loved in part but wounded in part, we enter adulthood confused, believing that our actual marriage to a spouse will cause oneness and wholeness, and spending 20 or 30 years discovering what a bitterly wrong idea that was. We think that having children and houses and all the right clothes, possessions, activities, and friends will get us there, too.”
This would be me. Good to know I’m not the only one:)
Eve replies:
Goodness, no, Deb. You’re not alone. And by “all the right….” things, I mean what’s “right” or perfect to that particular individual. It may not be “right” as defined by middle class, upper class, or whatever class collective value is being expressed or adopted. It’s just a person’s concept of what is perfect for him- or herself.
I’d guess that most of us have gone through that. It’s called being in our 20s and 30s! ;o)
Gerry Forde // December 9, 2008 at 4:15 PM |
What inspiring and touching reading and sharing about the great challenge of our lives. A quote from CJ that might encourage or illuminate the battle between personal authenticity and fitting in with the world:
“Personality is the supereme realisation of the innate idiosyncrasy of a living being. It is an act of high courage flung in the face of life, the absolute affirmation of all that constitutues the individual, the most successful adaptation to the universal condition of existence coupled with the greatest possible freedom for self-determination.”
In writing my latest play I’m acutely aware that what I have to say about the collapse of the Great Whyte Hunter and his huntin’ shootin’ mentality may be misunderstood by the vast majority of theatre-goers unless I make the huge effort to make my mentality meet theirs. The first draft I write directly from the unconscious – the characters speak in my imagination and I use a minimum of control and take down what they say and do. Then in the second draft I have to re-examine what I’ve written because some of it is wish-fulfilment fantasy or so personal that no one else could understand. So the subsequent drafts are very much like Jung’s active imagination – absorbing the full impact of the unadulterated image (scene), then interacting with my conscious mind, questioning it, relating it to wider reality. The challenge for me is to maintain the original inspiration when translating it into terms that society can get. The whole process is growth to me.
Clearly playwriting is a very social art form and painting is a lot more personal but I can’t help thinking that the need to reach out to the “ordinary” punter is our point of growth as artists.
DEB – Yeh, that feeling, eh? Have you read “Women who Run with the Wolves” by Clarissa Pinkola Estes or “The Pregnant Virgin” by Marion Woodman?
Eve // December 9, 2008 at 7:02 PM |
Gerry quotes My Hero! Wow, nice work. Isn’t it great that individuation is this act of “high courage”?!
Also, about what David said about doing art for oneself and then for others. This would seem, to me, to be like socializing the child to fit into the family unit and society within limits (i.e., by not demanding his soul to do it), and then also giving the child tools for the journey of Self.
I have had to do this as a writer, too: first I had to prove that I could write for others. Then I had to prove I could publish. Now I’ve proved that and I’m sitting around and asking, “Now what?”
Heck if I know.
davidrochester // December 9, 2008 at 8:57 PM |
You mentioned the person who attaches himself to a group in order to normalize but who never fit into groups well. Generally, in my experience, the group takes care of that. People who are not ‘normal’ can’t pass for normal in normal groups.
That wasn’t what I meant to say (caffeine deficiency strikes again!). What I was thinking about is people who deliberately choose to lead a group because they don’t fit into groups well. Oddballs are often pretty charismatic (as are many narcissists) which is sometimes why they don’t fit into a group, but do quite well at leading one.
My in-depth thoughts on this topic are tiresomely self-referential, and I may blather about them over on my blog someday. But they boil down to this:
1) People really want to feel that they belong somewhere.
2) If you never do belong anywhere, and you can’t fit in no matter how hard you try, chances are that you’re someone with a fairly strong personality, whether positive or negative.
3) And therefore it is tempting, once you realize that you can’t fit into a group because in some ways you’re stronger than the group, to find some weaker people who will follow you and bolster your sense of self, thereby creating a group into which you finally fit, even at the possible expense of the other people in the group who are willing to follow.
So I guess I was wondering whether it is actually ever possible for people who never belong anywhere to individuate properly. Hmmm. Now that I typed that, I’m not sure that’s what I was actually wondering, but it’s in the ballpark.
Incidentally, I just finished People of the Lie , and had a really complex reaction to it, which again, I may write about on my blog. I really appreciated Peck’s empathetic spotlighting of what I would call “everyday evil.” The book also raised some disturbing questions for me regarding how my own adolescent encounter with a therapist was handled, and will probably lead me to ask my mom (now in therapy herself, bless her heart) some hard questions about why we never had family counseling, especially based on what I clearly remember telling the therapist about my father, who is a textbook classic narcissist.
I was interested to note how sharply my opinion of and respect for Peck dropped when a central piece of his anecdote about his “evil” client Charlene revolved around her interrupting his post-workday martini. Not that I begrudge a hardworking guy his down time, and certainly the client’s borderline stalking of him was sinister and disturbing. But I have such a massive knee-jerk disapproval of people who use alcohol as a relaxation reward that I simply couldn’t get past my own feeling of disapprobation. Oh, poor guy, his martini was warm and diluted when he got back to it. Wow, my heart bleeds. (Yeah, I know this says a lot more about me than it does about Peck. *sigh*)
Irene // December 9, 2008 at 10:07 PM |
Eve, that comment about people being nice – I see it often when people might say – great show! and really say nothing, probably because it really isn’t to their taste, and they want to be polite. I know, because I do it myself, and haven’t worked out a way around that except to perhaps just say ‘Congratulations on you show, it looks like a lot of hard work, etc, etc.’ I do try to find constructive things to say, but mostly even I don’t comment unless actually asked for an honest opinion.
Yes, I agree, learning about an artist’s life (or poet or writer or anybody really) certainly enriches the understanding of their work – I certainly find I appreciate their art much more, even if I don’t actually like it (as in would have it in my home). To understand the depth of another’s motivation is truly enthralling to me.
I think in regards to my painting, I am an idealist when it comes to integrity. I do what I do at all cost. As much as I yearn to fit in, as in do what the public might like (ghost-father voice – why can’t you just paint landscapes?) so they buy it, I just can’t. There seems to be some obtuse aspect that sticks her finger up at everyone, turns around, and goes on her way regardless (actually,just quietly, I’m quite proud of her). The fact that at 40 + I am still trying to make sure the reed is actually THE reed, aka “I”, is what worries me. I am probably over-protective in regards to those boundaries (I actually typed ‘barriers’ first).
But today, the other outside voices that vary my way are more quiet as I walked to my studio and dreamed about some future paintings.
In regards to inspiration, I just want to say to you Eve that sometimes I have judged an idea that came to me as inane, shallow, not worthy, and dismissed it. Recently, I just felt the desire to paint a wolf. It had no relevance to me, but I understood it as a sign (as in symbol). So, I let myself paint it anyway, for fun. I think it became a strong work, and had resonance to a lot of people for some unknown reason, as we do not have wolves in Australia. It wasn’t an idea that really possessed me, or spoke deeply in any way. It was just a passing little bird that flitted by, and I let it in. I have closed the door on so many of those little birds I didn’t recognise, but I think now I have the confidence to just give it a try – somehow this new process of paint language has made a difference. I think I trust it and my ‘process’ more.
And you’re right about Ghost of Father Past – I think I’m going to have to use that term, with your permission!
And so you know, I love weirdos!
To David, thank you so much for taking the time to say all that. My feeling is that I have an incredible resistance to making anything that is deemed ‘palatable’ to the GP. I know artists that have done so and become stuck in the trench of market demand as a result. If they tried to do other things, their galleries hauled them in, or their work stopped selling, in which case the gallery still took issue. Of course, as you say they could keep it in their own private realm until they are more established, but I guess that’s got to be a part of that person’s character to be able to segregate their lives in such a way. I really just can’t do that – this work just consumes me so entirely, I find myself becoming prepared to just go it alone without selling. Forever. I feel that strongly about it, about why I ever picked up a brush in the first place. So my desires are in conflict, and of course, doubts waver in and out all the time, but like Eve said, in the end, I’m OK and I know I’ll be fine. Just broke!
To Gerry, I think your process is illuminating, and that refinement is something I have been thinking a lot about of late – the translation from the private unconscious language to one more ‘transmittable’ (sorry, couldn’t find the appropriate word just now). But one thing I learned from doing therapy, is how so many people share the same intrinsic personal experiences. Of course there are things in our unconscious that are deeply our own and need editing for creative purposes – I see that. But then, at least in painting, I see some very personal imagery expressed by artists, for example Neo Rauch (German), and I am entranced by the mystery of another person’s dream language – I somehow ‘get it’, just not in my brain! It seems to speak to me, like a play by Phillipe Genty.
To make one’s mentality meet that of others… I don’t know. It’s a personal issue I have, but I believe that artists – be they poets, musicians, playwrights, painters etc – are here to raise the heart/minds of people, to educate them, to lift them up to a broader consciousness, and never to dumb down. (I am not for one second saying this is what you are doing, please know that!) Obviously, some balance of communication must be found if you want to get your message across. And perhaps plays operate on a different level to a painting. A painting is possibly more immediate, and even more restricted in exploring themes and issues by its immediate, complete presence. Maybe? But for me, I actually like not controlling the message so much, to leave it open to interpretation, trusting others (though not all) will resonate.
henitsirk // December 9, 2008 at 10:50 PM |
Eve: My son was about three when he wanted to wear this one dress every single day. It was red with white flowers, I believe. We let him wear it in the house. He’s grown out of wanting to wear dresses, but he’s still struggling with the girl/boy dichotomy in terms of liking the color pink, liking sparkly things, etc. I bought a bunch of gloves for the kids for the winter, and many of them are pink or lavender and/or sparkly. I let him wear whichever ones he chooses. I think some of the kids make comments at school, but we talked about how everyone has different opinions and many people think pink and sparkly is for girls.
We are definitely going through a phase of “training” the kids to use their words…instead of yelling, whining, hitting, etc. It feels like training, because we have to repeat ourselves ad nauseam! But it also reinforces to us adults that we have to explain things and model negotiation skills.
I’m not sure what exactly you’re getting at regarding being unable to be wise mothers. Explain more, please!
Scott said: “I think the only way to be able to break free from ones’ cultural norms is to understand them.” Oh, and how hard is that! I think that’s what bothers me the most when people seem to think I’m weird for not watching TV, not buying my kids electronic toys or letting them use computers, etc.: I feel like the people judging me aren’t even aware that they are obeying cultural norms by doing those things. So many times when I tell someone that I don’t watch TV, they get a look of complete shock and incredulity, because it would never have occurred to them to even question the ubiquity of television.
Renaissance Guy asked: “I would like to understand how one can live in community without being sucked in to a collective mind set.” My thought is that you have to constantly work for consciousness in your thoughts and actions. You have to constantly challenge your assumptions and those of the group. For example, a woman in an online Waldorf education group I belong to mentioned that she thought it was possible to homeschool using the Waldorf curriculum without understanding any of the philosophy behind it. My immediate thought was, “Yes, if you just want to follow a prepackaged curriculum and not be able to form educated responses to the individual and changing needs of your children!” It’s worse than actively deciding to follow a group’s dogma, because in her case it’s like she’s consciously choosing to stay unconscious!