(2018-02-25) Our Search For Meaning And The Dangers Of Possession Quillette

Our Search for Meaning and the Dangers of Possession

There is empirical evidence that backs up Carl Jung’s idea of a religious instinct. Researchers have found that the less religious people are, the more likely they are to believe in UFOs.

David Foster Wallace agreed with Jung that traditional religions or value systems were a good place to look for meaning. He cautioned that worshipping the wrong thing can have dire consequences

pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive

Besieged by pseudo-deities such as Power, Wealth, Health, Pleasure, Progress, we grow more and more alienated from nature, from each other, and from ourselves.

Psychological Inflation

In ancient Greece, psychological inflation was called hubris,

Grizzly Man

The Fallen Goddess

prefers to be referred to as “it” or the Dragon Lady

Archetypal contents that have fallen from ancient pantheons – bears, dragons, snakes – into the unconscious represent one kind of threat in their own right, but such energies can also feed a fascination with ideologies that promise utopian renewal. These can grip not just individuals, but groups, and even whole nations. When this happens, such inflations feed mass movements that can be destructive on a larger scale.

Ideological Possession

Political or social ideologies are appealing because they tend to confer de facto special status upon adherents, and offer a clear path to transformation. They therefore set us upon a quest toward a better life or a better society, and so provide compelling structures that dictate meaning and purpose.

Psychological inflation can manifest as a sense of feeling different and special from everyone else in a positive way, but it can also be characterized by a feeling of being singled out in a negative way. In a negative inflation, we are special by virtue of our great suffering and victimhood.

“Everything is Problematic”

certainty is seen in activism along the political spectrum. Such certainty brooks no disagreement, holds space for no nuance, and cannot tolerate any doubt.

Ingroup status could be maintained only by strict adherence to the special truths

The danger of the crusader mentality is that it turns the world in a battle between good and evil. Actions that would otherwise seem extreme and crazy become natural and expected

The Religious Function of the Psyche

puts upon us a sacred obligation to the infinite

An awareness of our dependence upon that which is larger breeds the humility without which wisdom is not possible.