There is a seesaw oscillation, Tim found, between materialistic concerns on the one hand and prosocial values like empathy, generosity, and cooperation on the other: the more the former are elevated, the lower the latter descend. He points to four central principles of what he calls ACC - American corporate capitalism: it "fosters and encourages a set of values based on self-interest, a strong desire for financial success, high levels of consumption, and interpersonal styles based on competition." Depression, anxiety, and substance abuse also tend to be higher among people who value the aims encouraged by consumer society." "Research consistently shows," he told me, "that the more people value materialistic aspirations as goals, the lower their happiness and life satisfaction and the fewer pleasant emotions they experience day to day. “Is it possible nevertheless that our consumer culture does make good on its promises, or could do so? Might these, if fulfilled, lead to a more satisfying life? When I put the question to renowned psychologist Tim Krasser, professor emeritus of psychology at Knox College, his response was unequivocal. The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture You can check your own experience: What's it like when each of the above needs is met? What happens in your mind and body when it's lacking, denied, or withdrawn?” None of this tells you anything you don't already know or intuit. "The statement that the physical and mental life of man, and nature, are interdependent means simply that nature is interdependent with itself, for man is a part of nature." So wrote a twenty-six-year-old Karl Marx in 1844. purpose, meaning, transcendence: knowing oneself as part of something larger than isolated, self-centered concerns, whether that something is overtly spiritual or simply universal/humanistic, or, given our evolutionary origins, Nature. trust: a sense of having the personal and social resources needed to sustain one through life genuine self-esteem, not dependent on achievement, attainment, acquisition, or valuation by others autonomy: a sense of control in one's life belonging, relatedness, or connectedness Among psychologists there is a wide-ranging consensus about what our core needs consist of. The more we define ourselves that way, the more estranged we become from vital aspects of who we are and what we need to be healthy. We are steeped in the normalized myth that we are, each of us, mere individuals striving to attain private goals. Because it transpires on so many levels and so pervasively, we almost take it for granted it is the water we swim in. If a gene or virus were found that caused the same impacts on the population's well-being as disconnection does, news of it would bellow from front-page headlines. "When people start to lose a sense of meaning and get disconnected, that's where disease comes from, that's where breakdown in our health - mental, physical, social health - occurs," the psychiatrist and neuroscientist Bruce Perry told me. To say so is not a moral assertion but an objective assessment. “A society that fails to value communality - our need to belong, to care for one another, and to feel caring energy flowing toward us - is a society facing away from the essence of what it means to be human.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |