Addiction #33 – Resignation (04/26/12)
LICKING THE RAZOR’S EDGE
Addiction #33 – the final challenge: RESIGNATION
“All over the world there is constant pressure to make people feel that they are helpless, that the only roles they can play in life are to either obey the decisions of others or be pleasured by their own possessions.” ~ inspired by Noam Chomsky
Though cleverly subtle and seemingly harmless, it is no accident that Resignation occupies the place of honor as the last addiction discussed in this series. Not only depressing & de-Meaning in its own right, it is our addiction to resignation that actually keeps all our other addictions firmly cemented to the centers of our existence.
*It is resignation that has us believing that we cannot do anything of importance to solve the world’s problems or abate our own society’s evils …
*It is resignation that has us believing that we can’t make any real difference in the lives of others …
*It is resignation that has us believing that things “simply are the way they are” – that life is simply “unfair”, and that we simply have to learn to “make the best of it” …
*And it is resignation that has us believing that we are all “only human”, and that our progress – both as individuals and as a species – will be only slowly attained or not attained at all.
It is resignation that keeps us glued to our television sets instead of actively volunteering in our communities … It is resignation that has us feebly complaining to one another about injustice & poverty & bigotry, instead of actively confronting the same … And it is resignation that has us ignoring, discounting or even ridiculing those courageous few who are championing “radical Kindness” — instead of actively joining them in their cause.
Make no mistake: this is not an isolated problem. In-deed, almost everyone I have ever met has displayed at least some symptoms of hopelessness. Maybe Thoreau was right; maybe most of us do “lead lives of quiet desperation” –- feeling stuck in jobs lacking in Meaning, feeling stuck in relationships devoid of intimacy, feeling stuck in neighborhoods steeped in fear &/or countries soaked in indifference.
And no one seems to know from whence it came – this malaise of meaninglessness. Perhaps it came in response to the unique moments of powerlessness we all faced in childhood. Perhaps it is simply our reasonable response to living on a planet in a very real state of crisis; from being bombarded every day with news of imminent ecological collapse, intensifying economic instability, the shrill specter of international terrorism, the debasements of political corruption, animal cruelty & human slavery and seeming omnipresence of material greed.
That being said, this thin fog of foreboding – this vapored haze of hopelessness – is a deliciously subtle one, with many people not even admitting its existence. Because we have been led to believe that it is rationale to feel powerless to effectuate change of any real significance – both in our own lives as well as in the world at large, most of us do not even recognize the dysfunction inherent in maintaining such a belief.
Of course, there IS an effective alternative available to all of us. And yet, how can we hope to free ourselves of a dysfunctional mindset of which we aren’t even fully aware?
RECOGNIZING our own ADDICTION to RESIGNATION
Initially, it is important to understand that I am not speaking of resignation’s more extreme manifestations – chronic depression, catatonic lethargy or objective victimization. Indeed, the ways in which we freely give our personal power away are much more varied (and equally more insidious) than those more flagrant symptoms. We have been given the blessing of a conscious existence not merely to sow lives of great length and reap moments of intense pleasure. No, my friends, we have – each & every one of us – also been blessed with the power to do “small things” of Great Power. And so, to help you identify some of the ways that you might be unknowingly abandoning this glorious birthright, consider answering the following questions:
Do you ever use the phrases “I’m only human”, “That’s life” or “That’s the way it goes”?
Do you believe that life has no intrinsic Meaning or that you have no vocational Purpose?
Do you regularly see a therapist, consult a counselor or question a life coach?
Do you own more than one “self help” book?
Do you believe that you — as “only one person” — cannot make a significant difference in the world?
Do you ever engage in “self sabotage” via poor performance, procrastination &/or passive-aggressive provocation?
Are you generally dissatisfied with your job? your relationship(s)? your family life?
Does your sense of humor express itself via sarcastic comebacks or mildly self-degrading remarks?
Do you get visibly angry or openly express your frustrations more than once a month?
Do you find yourself regularly engaged in melodramatic interactions with others?
Do you worry about your future &/or the future of friends or family members?
Do you regularly use the words “should”, “must” or “have to”?
Do you regularly gossip about co-workers, classmates or other associates?
Do you believe that life is essentially unfair?
Do you regularly complain about domestic politics or the state of the world?
Do you use the words “can’t”, “impossible”, “crazy” or “would”?
Do you believe that life demands a “healthy balance” between times of joy & times of sorrow, between moments of success & moments of failure, or between being treated well by others & being treated poorly by them?
Do you believe that “evil” & “injustice” & poverty are simply innate facets of “the way things are”?
Do you feel powerless – or at least a bit daunted – by the thought of “battling” the 36 addictions mentioned in the articles of this series? Do you possibly think it is impossible to effectively do so?
As a human being living in a global industrial society that actively encourages us to feel powerless, the chances are quite high that you answered “yes” to more than few of these queries. If you did, FEAR NOT, for to do so in no way makes you “weak” or “inferior” or “less than” in any way. You are simply a human being – a member of a young species in a relatively young stage of its sociological development; an individual still subconsciously (and sometimes consciously) steeped in fear; a member of a species still drenched in competition & conflict, still teetering on the precarious brink between transcendence & disaster. As such, it is perfectly reasonable for you to feel at least a bit helpless in times such as these …
Even so, many of you are probably questioning the significance of this article’s meander on meaninglessness. After all, what’s so bad about recognizing the “fact” that we don’t have much say in the way the world works – much less the way our lives play out? What’s so wrong with accepting that we don’t have the power to do any lasting Good in the world? What’s so incorrect about accepting that “truth”, and then getting on with simply “doing the best we can”?
Well, as it turns out, not only do most of us drastically underestimate our personal Power, it is actually extremely harmful for us to do so.
The CONSEQUENCES of submitting to RESIGNATION
It is well-established in the realm of the health sciences that prolonged feelings of resignation, hopelessness &/or meaninglessness inevitably lead to many serious health problems, including digestive difficulty, varying degrees of insomnia, intense fatigue, and an enhanced likelihood of accruing more chronic physical maladies such as Alzheimer’s, heart disease & various forms of cancer.
And yet, as serious as the aforementioned illnesses & effects may be, they are NOT the true dangers of living a life of listlessness. No, the most damaging harms that stem from our resigned minds are as subtle as they are destructive. Consider the following:
*Harm #01: RESIGNATION INTENSIFIES all other ADDICTIONS
Quite logically, feeling powerless intensifies the presence of our subconscious fears; fears that are the primary generators of each and every self-destructive behavior we engage to mask the same. It follows, then, that the more helpless we feel about our lives, the more fear coats our perceptions of that life. And the more fear we have to mask, the more intensely we will engage addictive behaviors aimed at doing just that.
*Harm #02: RESIGNATION CAUSES PREMATURE DEATH
Instead of investing in living lives that are in some way(s) Meaning-full, our feelings of powerlessness have us striving to merely “get by”. Instead of courageously leaping past our illusory limits to live life to the fullest, we resign ourselves to lives of idle entertainments, superficial relationships and emotional indifference. Essentially, to live a life of resignation is to waste the only life we have … to give up our personal power is to die well before our death.
*Harm #03: RESIGNATION ENSURES the EXTINCTION of HUMANITY
Sociological studies have shown that hopelessness is not only a personal challenge – but that hopelessness is contagious as well. In fact, our own resignation easily spreads not only to those in our immediate surroundings who are feeling “down” themselves, but also infects many of the people who offer us their assistance in such times.
Let’s face it, our species is already wobbling on the brink of our next epoch of violence & despair, and the only way we are going to transcend this impending “Dark Age” is for a small-yet-significant critical mass of us to have the courage to set aside the “facts” about how hopeless it all is – and to start DOING SOMETHING KIND anyway.
“Worrying is using your imagination to obtain the things you do not want. Resignation is doing nothing about those things once they arrive.” ~ anonymous
“People who call themselves ‘realists’ are actually simply the folks who have given up on Happiness.” ~ inspired by Marty Rubin
“In the last analysis, the individual person is responsible for living his own life and for finding himself. If he persists in shifting his responsibility to somebody else, he fails to find out the meaning of his own existence.” ~ Thomas Merton
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