The Age of Absurdity: Why Modern Life Makes it Hard to Be Happy (2010) (2 page)

There is also the happy fantasist who lives blissfully on illusions. And is this not a convenient and harmless way of feeling good? The problem is that life takes a malicious pleasure in shattering illusions and this experience is more painful and costly than dispelling illusions or preventing them from developing in the first place. Illusions can become immune to reality only by turning into full-blown delusions. You really have to believe you
are
Napoleon. So, once again, it comes back to understanding the world and the self and how these interact.

Nature abhors a vacuum – and nowhere more than in the human mind. For our understanding of how the mind can be colonized we should thank Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud, thinkers revered in the twentieth century and often reviled in the twenty-first. But their great central insights remain valid and relevant: Marx showed how much of what we assume to be independent thought is actually imposed by society; Freud how much actually arises from the unconscious. So there is intense and relentless pressure from both directions – without and within – and the result may well be no independent thought at all.

However, there is no hope of escaping entirely – or even largely – from either pressure. To live in the world but outside of its prejudices is an impossible ideal. As we live in the age so the age lives in us. And ages are as narcissistic as the people who belong to them: each believes itself to be unassailably superior and demands to be loved more than the others. These demands are usually met. We tend to prize our own age as we prize our native country – it has to be good if it produced
us
.

The current age has been hugely successful at inspiring fealty – and a key factor may be its ability to promote the illusion that fulfilment is not only possible but
easy
, even
inevitable
. Regular economic crises expose this illusion – but usually only to some people, for a short period, and in a limited way. There is a questioning of the mechanics of the system but not its underlying assumption that, if there is unlimited personal freedom and infinite choice, then anyone can
be
anything and
have
anything. No thought or effort is necessary. Only want and ye shall become and possess – this is the message propagated covertly by advertising and overtly by the self-help industry. And the age’s ideal is the ‘bubbly personality’, its symbol the smiley face and its mantra ‘Have a nice day’. But there is a fundamental axiom: you do not have to pretend to be what you are. So it should come as no surprise that the bubbly, smiley age of nice days is increasingly dosing itself with antidepressants. The brightly smiling depressive seems to be a phenomenon of the times. Depression memoirist, Sally Brampton, says of herself and a fellow sufferer, ‘We both know that each of us is capable of smiling and talking cheerfully while at the same time planning our own deaths.’
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Now those too far out are both waving
and
drowning. And, if everyone is presenting a bubbly personality, it appears as though there must indeed be automatic, universal fulfilment. So the depressive cannot understand what has gone wrong and feels atrociously isolated among the smiley faces, perhaps not even aware of also presenting a bright smile.

This is an example of what Erich Fromm identified as a new phenomenon in modern society – ’ anonymous authority’
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– a cultural pressure all the more effective for being invisible and sourceless and therefore difficult to detect and resist. Like Satan, authority has realized that the smart move is to convince everyone you no longer exist.

And anonymous authority is becoming even more anonymous and therefore even more insidious and difficult to counteract. In Western society there is no longer any overt repression. Most of the old taboos have faded away. On prime-time television a serious, distinguished-looking older woman, a doctor, sits at the centre of a semicircle of earnest, attentive young women, holding in her lap what appears to be some sort of anatomical model. Is this an Advanced Midwifery seminar? No – a masterclass in delivering a blowjob, described with breezy familiarity as a ‘BJ’. ‘But it always gives me jaw ache,’ complains one of the young women. The doctor explains soothingly that the secret is taking the strain with the right hand, which she demonstrates on the model. Meanwhile the left hand should be expertly engaged with the often-forgotten testicles: ‘I call them the stepchildren because they’re always neglected.’

As for overt authority, the last vestiges have disappeared, with presidents and prime ministers discussing their family pets and favourite football teams on the sofas of chat shows, religious leaders playing the bongo drums and doing parachute jumps for charity (‘Archbishop in 12,000 feet leap of faith’) and managers publishing in the company newsletter photographs of themselves passed out at the Christmas party with trousers down and anal cleavage packed with cream cheese. So where is the problem? Where is the coercion? Everyone is cool now. Even God has been obliged to attend anger management classes for wrath. Anything goes, provided of course that it does not denigrate women or those of a different race, religion or sexual orientation and causes no damage to the environment or suffering to animals.

Anonymous authority’s most effective trick is making its recommendations self-evident. It is impossible to argue against the self-evident. Only a crank would attempt to do so. This too is self-evident. The way we live now is the natural law.

So resistance will incur charges of crankiness. Worse, it may be that a resister must not just
appear
but also actually
be
a crank. This alarming insight came to me many years ago while watching a film based on the autobiography of Frank Serpico, an ambitious young New York cop who eventually made it to detective, only to discover that his new colleagues were all corrupt. They pooled and shared out bribes as calmly and coolly as if they were running a coffee cooperative. And these weren’t repulsive characters but ordinary, friendly guys prepared to accept and like Frank. So, when he refused to join the club, he was obviously a crank. But here is the twist that made the movie so fascinating. The scenes from Frank’s personal life revealed that
he really was a crank
; attractive and engaging girlfriends left him; his friends found him impossible.

This suggests that to behave with principle it is necessary to be a crank. Think of any principled objector. Even Christ was a crank.

So who wants to be a crank in this cool, relaxed, open-necked age, when everyone, and especially the boss, is one of the guys?

Then there are the pressures from within, from the under-self with its toxic pit of desire and aggression and its dangerous ability to persuade the upper self to do its bidding, to put a plausible and even sophisticated veneer on its demands. So, even as I deride television, I am fantasizing about propagating this view on talk shows. And even as I give the impression of being coolly indifferent to the opinion of others, I am coolly calculating the best way to impress. What I want is to be loved for never wanting to be loved.

There are resourceful enemies without and within – the ad and the id – and each is cunning and relentless, constantly adopting new guises to appear acceptable. Neither may be defeated and merely to keep both at bay requires unremitting vigilance. But, since thinkers of various kinds have been exercising vigilance for thousands of years, there are rich sources to be tapped. In the last century philosophers mostly abandoned happiness as an unserious and, worse still, unfashionable subject (black became as sexy for intellectual thought as for cocktail dresses) but, more recently, other specialists, in particular psychologists and neuroscientists, have provided fascinating discoveries and insights.

So the approach in this book is to trawl philosophy, religious teaching, literature, psychology and neuroscience for common ideas on fulfilment, then to investigate how easy or difficult it might be to apply such strategies in contemporary life and finally to apply them to areas of near-universal concern. Most of us have to work for a living, many of us would like to enjoy a lasting relationship with a partner and, in spite of tremendous advances in cosmetic surgery, all of us are still obliged to endure growing old. ‘One can live magnificently in this world,’ said Tolstoy, ‘if one knows how to work and how to love, to work for the person one loves and to love one’s work.’
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And, he might have added, one can even grow old, if not quite magnificently, then at least without feeling entirely worthless.

However, investigating the sources is unlikely to produce a set of instructions. An axiom for literature also applies more generally: the only prescription is that there can be no prescriptions. The complexities of individuals and their circumstances make universal prescriptions impossible. In fact, the demand for prescriptions is another sign of the times. It is only our own impatient, greedy age that demands to be told how to live in a set of short bullet points.

But another useful axiom is that defining a problem is the beginning of a solution. Developing a richer awareness of problems may be one way of indirectly generating the miraculous by-product, happiness. Which may in turn generate its own miraculous by-products. Which may then enhance the original. For happiness, like depression, is a self-reinforcing cycle. Depression is a descending spiral where being depressed reduces volition, which in turn increases depression…and so on down. Happiness is an ascending spiral where being happy enhances volition, which in turn increases…and so on up. The greatest gift of happiness may not be the feeling itself as much as the accompanying thrill of possibility. Suddenly the world is re-enchanted and the self born anew. Everything is richer, stranger and more interesting. The eye sees more clearly, the mind thinks more keenly, the heart feels more strongly – and all three unite in enthusiasm, delight and zest.

The Sources

The Ad and the Id

T
here is a faery land, never buffeted by wind or lashed by rain, without clocks, closed doors, beggars, litter, graffiti, garbage, vermin or dark alleys, where the temperature is always pleasantly constant and the light evenly bright and the Pipes of Pan vie in sweetness with the tinkling of euphonious fountains at the intersections of the broad esplanades. On all sides shining emporia display garments, shoes, lingerie, creams, lotions, fragrances, chocolates, toys, mobile phones, games, televisions, flowers, music players, jewellery, sports gear and digital picture frames restlessly changing content every few seconds. In WH Smith, on parallel racks that extend into the distance, hobby magazines gleam, sleek and fat, bulging with complimentary booklets, vouchers, sunglasses, CDs, DVDs, and samples of personal fragrances. In Cards Galore there are facetious congratulations for every occasion from birth to retirement (‘Our workmate who art retiring, pensioner be thy name…’). In the Disney Store a multitude of creatures, in a variety of sizes, colours and materials, offer identical wide eyes and innocent smiles. In Build-A-Bear Workshop there is an invitation to ‘Make Your Own Furry Friend (the pawfect furreal gift’). In the open area Le Munch Bunch Sandwicherie announces a special offer for any roll, cake and cold beverage. For dessert Joe Delucci’s proposes a Cow Fodder Sundae of chocolate and baked cream ice cream, soft marshmal-low and chunky caramel. Outside the SingStar™ booth a youth in a World War II flyer’s helmet, several layers of fleece and outsize jeans with the fork at his knees, holding three carrier bags in his left hand and a microphone in his right, nevertheless manages to boogie energetically while singing along to the video of ‘Get This Party Started’. Behind him a queue of restless hoodies is further unsettled by the gaze, from the doorway of Essensuals, of an eight-foot young woman in bra, pants, suspenders, black stockings and stiletto heels, pouting mischievously. A real pouting princess, a senior nail technician (from California Nails), golden haired from organic colouring (in Hairport) and golden skinned from vertical turbo tanning (in Stand By Your Tan), strides past Sunglass Hut and a great wooden horse that has overweight children swarming all over it but no foes concealed within. Approach, knock for resonance. Wooden all through.

Everything about a shopping mall is designed to encourage the feeling that not to want anything would be atrociously churlish. Firstly, a mall eliminates distractions such as depressing weather and accusing clocks. Then, if it is a multi-storey building, a soaring atrium or central well makes an immediate, profound impression. Planners, from the architects of Gothic cathedrals to those of contemporary corporate headquarters, have understood that the key to inspiring awe is redundant space, especially overhead. Any structure with its own firmament must have been created by God. To enhance the religious atmosphere there may be background piped music as soothing as organ chords. And there will certainly be many fellow worshippers to provide reassurance. The most persuasive argument for any activity is that everyone is doing it – and here everyone is shopping. The company of the faithful is immensely comforting but, as in church, there is no need to engage. The real engagement is with the icons in the window displays, promising to confer distinction, enhanced status and sexual attractiveness. These material goods even enhance the religious feeling. Brain scans have shown that high-end brands evoke the same neural response as religious images; that, shocking and lamentable though it may be, an iPod has the same effect as Mother Teresa.
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Also, the windows displaying these material icons extend from floor to ceiling, completely exposing the bright interiors, and the entrances are wide and doorless, so the instinctive fear of entering an unfamiliar enclosed space is overcome. Inside, young, attractive sales staff approach, seeking eye contact with friendly encouraging smiles, creating the illusion of youth and attractiveness in the shopper. The loud soul music suggests a bar or club where mutual attraction can blossom but, unlike the brutally competitive bars and clubs, here there is no possibility of rejection. Spending money is the easiest orgasm. Open the wallet and flash the bright card.