Transcription
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In our Information Age, it has become obscenely difficult to know ourselves. We are inundated by brands, groupthink, trend cycles, and material rewards. So often, when we ask why we are doing things, our answer points to some external force. This is incredibly dangerous. The more we act on behalf of others, the more we erode ourselves. We no longer exist as mountains, but as sand dunes, happy to shift and mutate by the winds of a demanding ocean. For each new shape, we are rewarded, but we are destroyed. After some 85 years of this destruction, we are at risk to die with an index of knowledge and beliefs, but with a missing volume on our self. Our souls remain a mystery.
But things do not need to be this way. In fact, acting against this danger is not easy, but it is accessible. It is a change we can make. Ralph Waldo Emerson was a 19th-century writer and philosopher who penned the essay "Self-Reliance." In this work, Emerson extols the virtues of instinct, faith in oneself, and he rejects concepts like conformity and consistency. In the most basic terms, self-reliance is a belief that our own hearts and souls may direct us successfully through life.
Here, we are at risk for a clumsy, obtuse handling of Emerson's concept. Emerson does not believe "every man for himself." His idea is not so concrete as to call for libertarian laissez-faire public policy. Furthermore, he does not believe that each individual should act according to each and every whim that they feel. Emerson's self-reliance is not a blind faith in ourselves. It is not so much a practical guide for dealing with everyday material realities, but a fundamental shift in how we perceive, process, and appreciate the world around us.
Emerson's self-reliance can be described as a vigilant strike against seeing oneself as a finished item. We must be in tune with our instincts and our intuitions and reject holding on to values out of conformity or dogma. We must embark on an eternal quest to cast off accepted knowledge in favor of a more authentic wisdom, in favor of a true reflection of our own experiences. The idea is perhaps said best, if not cryptically, when Emerson writes, "Though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till." We must find our identities, values, and even actions from the labor of experiencing life, not from a passive acceptance of the things the world tries to imprint upon us.
For Emerson, our instincts are a type of genius that cannot be captured by hard data, science, or even material results. He notes that "a man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the luster of the firmament of sages." We are all gifted with a sublime genius. We know what we must do, what we want to do, what we believe, no matter how hard the world tells us to resist these impulses. Acting faithfully towards our own senses, being faithful to our genius, this is Emerson's self-reliance.
Imagine your intuition as a sword. When honed, sharpened, and maintained, it can cut through the most oppressive forces in our world. But likewise, each time we attempt to cut through these things, the world is like a stone which dulls the blade. Left entirely unexamined and unmaintained, the weapon of our own selves becomes blunt and useless. The world demands conformity, consistency, and obedience. These are all stones which dull our blade, which inhibit our ability to listen to our own internal guidance. But if we can sharpen our instincts so much that they slice through these things, we can truly triumph. Emerson asks, "Where is the poet who taught Shakespeare?" When we speak how we feel, and we act according to our own intuition, we ascend to a new realm of greatness.
The Plato and the Shakespeare of history were not great because they obeyed tradition and regurgitated convention. Quite the opposite. It was the bucking of these things which made their greatness. It was the wholesale prescription to their own souls. Emerson concludes that if we attempt to imitate, conform, or borrow the talent of others, that is all we can do: borrow. We never own these qualities, and we fail to even search for what makes us individually great. So instead, we should seek our own individual genius. This is not a way to find out what you can achieve; it is the only way. This genius is powerful precisely because it is ours, and it is whole. When we strike with it as our sword, we have put a lifetime of events, toil, and consideration into our blade.
It is tempting to think that Emerson's self-reliance closes us off to the world, but precisely the opposite is true. As we cast off the insistences of others, we suddenly find ourselves ready to think any thought, to experience any feeling, to live in every moment. Indeed, the mere idea of thinking, for Emerson, is to be receptive to new thoughts. Nothing hinders the reception of new thoughts like the declaration that our old ones are final and conclusive. In contrast, by embracing self-trust and reception, we experience the world much more profoundly. We tune our radar to cast off groupthink and instead examine opinions, thoughts, and ideas without regard for conformity.
Emerson notes that fate likes to trick us into thinking we have found peace. He writes, "A political victory, a rise of rents, the recovery of your sick or the return of your absent friend, or some other favorable event, raises your spirits, and you think, 'Good days are preparing for you.' Do not believe it." External stimuli are fine and good, but they leave as quickly as they arrive. They have very little forward momentum. We can never find peace if our barometers only operate by fetishizing good fortune. But when we act in a way which is true to ourselves and which makes us authentically proud of what we've done, we find a peace that is immune to the fickle winds of good or bad luck. So here we have the power of self-reliance. It is the road to peace.
Of course, the world does not exactly incentivize this approach to living. Quite the opposite. So we would be well served to consider, and thereby dismantle, the things which obstruct our path. The world seems to present us with many rewards for rejecting Emerson's self-reliance, or at least we think it rewards us. But these rewards inhibit our ability to lead a fulfilled existence. In self-reliance, Emerson says, there are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they grow faint and inaudible as we enter into the world. "Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members. Society is a joint-stock company, in which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater. The virtue in most request is conformity."
Indeed, this is true today, perhaps more than ever. Our world is made up of segments and brands. Each insists that you must accept their judgments and tastes. The trend cycle demands that you like one thing. Sections of society, be they left, center, or right, insist that you accept their ideology without question. To speak against accepted truth, no matter how authentic you are being to yourself, is to slap these groups in the face. You risk ostracization or outright penalty. Thereby, we so often encounter people, media, or groups which claim to know our own duty more than we ourselves do. As Emerson suggests, we should recognize these as what they are: charlatans.
When we volunteer our loyalties and live in accordance with the tastes of other people, this is something we pay for, not with money, but instead with the very thing which makes us alive: with our souls. The books of our consciousness become, as Emerson notes, "unreadable hieroglyphics." Unfortunately, it is tremendously easy to go through life this way. You will be rewarded socially and materially for wearing this mask. Concepts like popularity and market value seem to hinge on conformity. The world can be an already difficult place, and so it is understandable that we often go with what is most comfortable.
When we obey the imploration of other people, we put on a mask each and every day. The more you wear this mask, the harder it becomes to remove. The less you can recognize your own reflection. Emerson points out that we often measure our present selves in the unit of consistency against our past selves. Consistency in character is often said to be virtuous, but this simply is not true in self-reliance. Emerson famously says that "consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."
As we examine this idea of consistency, we can see that it provides very little worth. It is a tree which we believe will provide us sustenance, and we wait and care for it season after season, but it still bears no fruit. Why toil for this tree when the world is a garden? Emerson tells us, "with consistency a great Soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall." Consistency neuters growth. We become slaves to yesterday, slaves to old ideas, in a world which is new every day. Society moves, the world turns, and so the soul must do the same.
External factors antagonize us for inconsistency. Another person may tell you that yesterday you said X, but today you said Y. This is fine. Other people, as Emerson notes, work only with a limited set of data. They are not privy to the complicated internal machinations and circumstances which you experience. They know only the words you say, and at the very best, the tiniest kernel of your thoughts. But you know the why of each and everything you do. You can see a map which they cannot. In rejecting your yesterday for your today, you will certainly be misunderstood, but who cares? Be misunderstood as long as you understand yourself.
Emerson further suggests that if we chase after consistency, we create an illusion which is tremendously easy to see through. He says, "The soul is acrostic. No matter what we say or do on a given day, our truest selves look the same from every angle." Your soul is not expressed in actions or words, but in a place more mysterious and profound. Emerson writes, "Men imagine that they communicate their virtue or vice only by overt actions, and do not see that virtue or vice emit a breath every moment." The things you do and say are just temporary aesthetic representations of your soul. We are like a ship on course to its destination. The path looks ragged and zigzagging as we weave around coral, avoid shallow waters, turn with the tides and the currents. But the further you get from the ship, the more definite its path becomes. This zigzagging route reveals itself to be a straight line. The soul, when it is faithful to itself, moves in a definite, consistent direction, which is more profound than everyday turns and tides.
People tell you what to do, and how to think, and what you should believe. Reject all of this. Accepting these demands spoils your character. When we adopt the views of others without consideration, we become a member of a herd. We lose our state of individuality. We lose our ability to even be a person. While we may be granted some aesthetic rewards for this sort of acquiescence, we actually lose our power to act significantly in the world. As we so proudly brand ourselves with labels and categories, we become abundantly predictable. Why should anyone listen to you speak if they already know what you will say? Why should anyone beware your actions if they already know what you will do?
Consider the natural world. It is beautiful because of its individuals. On the ground, there's an ant; in the sky, a dove. Land has the wild dogs of Africa, and in the sea, pods of dolphins jumping with the tides. Snowy mountains balance tropical beaches, and each and everything is made more beautiful by its opposites. So too is a world full of individuals. The voices of each are music, and the thoughts of everyone are like the ant, the dove, the dogs, the dolphin. But if we let ourselves become instead a morass of herds, our world becomes repetitive, boring, and stale. We don't love one another; we love teams and mantras. The world holds billions of individuals, but we are so quick to reduce that number to three or four.
The world need not be armies. As Emerson notes, "we recruit each to the banner, and we become weaker." Every opinion has an opposite which are sometimes equal. If we choose one, another will suffer. If we choose another, one will suffer. We must accept this as the reality of being. Every position brings opposition. All positions are extreme, and all views require antagonism. We need not rejoice or weep in response to contradictions. The man who is self-reliant and receptive reaches conclusions intentionally, with recognition that opposing ideas carry validity. Be wary of those groups who claim their ideas to be perfected. This is an impossible task. By being receptive, we can recognize others' ideas and even understand them. We can detect their faults, their rewards, and understand what our soul desires to earn and sacrifice.
The world likes to hurl regrets at us as proof for the justness of its operating procedures, for the rightness of conformity systems and accepted syntax. But do not let this be proof. Societal expectations murder our experiences in life. They raise the stakes and can force us into despondence. We all fail at things we will inevitably do. So when the world expects us to hit and we miss, we sink into misery. But imagine, Emerson suggests, the man who is guided only by his own soul and not by the ethics of the world. Undeterred by so-called failure, he may have a dozen careers in his life, and each time he lands like the house cat, on his feet. He does not postpone his life with anxieties about failure, nor over miseries once he has failed. Instead, he simply lives.
In one of his more controversial moments, Emerson takes aim at the idea of charity. A clumsy reading of self-reliance would indicate that Emerson just rejects outright the notion of charitable deeds, but this is false. In "Self-Reliance," he writes, "There is a class of persons to whom by all spiritual affinity I am bought and sold; for them I will go to prison, if need be." It is not charity which he excuses, but the wanton institutionalization of good deeds. The idea that we can pay a tithe and that alone makes us good people. Emerson rejects the idea that we must be forced to charity out of obligation or pressure to do what the world has told us is correct. We are so quick to pay for the sufferings of others, be it through charities, political campaigns, relief efforts, or colleges. We broadcast our participation in these things and turn our life into a show. But as Emerson notes, "Life is for itself, and not for spectacle." Goodness bought, paid, and broadcasted to the world is no sort of goodness at all. Do not be good because the world insists it, or because you feel obligated, but instead act because your soul directs you to. Hurl yourself at the causes and people which are relevant and deserving of your genius, and cast off the rest.
So, to review, Emerson's self-reliance is not a simple concept, but like the most complex things of all, it has anatomy. This anatomy consists of three parts: self-trust, self-criticism, and receptiveness. Emerson writes, "What have I to do with the sacredness of traditions, if I live holy from within?" "My friend suggested, but these impulses may be from below, not from above." "I replied, 'They do not seem to me to be such; but if I am the Devil's child, I will live then from the devil.'" Emerson tells us to live by our own law, that no system is sacred except that of our own nature. He notes he is ashamed at how easily we capitulate to badges, names, societies, and institutions. Even Emerson himself falls victim to this, noting that "well-spoken individuals affect me more than is right." But in totality, we should resist this. We must live only to, by, and with ourselves. This type of goodness, Emerson says, has an edge. It will not be agreeable to everyone, and it may not always meet the accepted metrics of proper conduct or convention, but it is goodness, and it will lead us to paradise.
We should also not ignore the role of self-criticism within Emerson's idea of self-reliance. He does not tell us to blindly accept whatever conclusion we stumble upon. He does not insist that we are all perfect. In another piece called "Circles," Emerson tells us that "the way of life is abandonment." We must be constantly, always ready to abandon old ideas and replace them with the new. We cannot anchor ourselves with stale ideas, or we ourselves become stale. We live chained to antiques, ignoring the new material which we could otherwise experience. Self-reliance is not "I'm always right"; it is "I can always be right." By trusting our instincts and recognizing when things feel wrong or false, our radar becomes tuned to the world, and we can explore the endless new ideas our world will present.
Vanities, vanities, which our society is so quick to reward, things like consistency or pride, inhibit our ability to change our ideas. So we must resist these things. In another work titled "Intellect," Emerson writes, "Truth is our element of life; yet if a man fasten his attention on a single aspect of truth, and apply himself to that alone for a long time, the truth becomes distorted and not itself, but falsehood." When we hold on to ideas for the sake of consistency, acceptance, or just laziness, truths are mutated into lies. We do not only damage ourselves but our entire world. What good is a society that lives in echo? Conversely, as we criticize the things we hold dearest, we arrive at the new. We increase the value of our souls and make the world a measurably better place.
In concert with self-criticism, we must be forever receptive to the new. Emerson notes the power of other opinions as not purely antagonistic, but instead as antidotes to our own. By regularly posing our views against others in an honest way, we are enabled to reassess and understand not just how we feel, but why we feel. Emerson, for all of his belief in reception, does not implore us to just sit on the fence. Instead, we must recognize that virtually any idea we have will come with the baggage of opposition. We should seek joy in this diversity of thought, for it is this diversity which propels our world from grayscale into a vibrant garden of individualism. Do not dismay at counterarguments. Accept them and recognize that there does not exist a flawless opinion.
Emerson's self-reliance is a beautiful lens through which to see the world, and yet we still have not uncovered the most striking thing about this concept. It's not easy to reshape the mind in the way Emerson suggests, but it is tremendously possible. We can sit around and wish for wholesale society to change in a way we deem right, but we don't need to. Too, the world changes. It grows on one end and deteriorates on the other. Society acquires the new and jettisons the old. The greatest material achievements of today are disregarded as archaic, obsolete, and useless tomorrow. These tangible things, new inventions and breakthrough technologies, are not permanent. Instead, they are the product of man. Emerson notes that "the great genius returns to man." Emerson realizes that we are just pieces floating in this morass, so we don't need to strike out to change the world. Instead, we can change internally. We can change how we exist in this ever-shifting landscape.
Emerson's prescription is not so global; it is individual. Indeed, when we look at examples of greatness, we find a reliance on self. Great artists express themselves without regard for the meddling opinions of others. The most brilliant scientists are motivated by an internal compass which points towards truth. The concept of "great men being born at the right time" is a myth. For Emerson, the devices, aesthetics, and trappings which we associate with history's greatest individuals are just the costumes these people wore. Their greatness is within their souls. Emerson notes that "time and space are but physiological colors which the eye makes, but the soul is light; where it is, is day."
To that point, Emerson is not so naive as to suggest every man can be Shakespeare, Galileo, or Joan of Arc. He does not express that all people are equal, instead that we are all more powerful than we believe. We are not blank pages for the world to write upon. Instead, we are born authors. We must write our own lives without deferring haphazardly to authorities or norms. Be it poetry or scribbling that we produce, we must write ourselves. This is the only way to find peace. The search for self-reliance is not simple or easy, but it is accessible. We do not need to go on romanticized travels abroad or grand conquests. As Emerson notes, "your giant follows wherever you go." At home, we dream of the sea, and at sea, we dream of returning home. Greatness, peace, intelligence—these are not here or there; they are instead within.
Furthermore, self-reliance is immune to blunt concepts of intelligence or even material capability. An idea, a conviction of the type which Emerson discusses, wears its own armor against the judgment and authority of others. Finding these ideas is much the same. The search for them depends on virtue that we can all cultivate, not on ridiculous notions of talents or gifts which some have and others do not. The ordinary man looks at a castle as if it is alien, but the castle is made of the same stone, dirt, and metal that walks upon every single day.
In a piece called "The Poet," Emerson writes, "The fate of the poor shepherd, who, blinded and lost in the snowstorm, perishes within a few feet of his cottage door, is an emblem of the state of man." We should then fight through our snowstorms and trudge intentionally through the snow. Before we know it, we will be home, and our cottage may be much closer than we think.
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