Archetype and Fullness: A Crash Course
C.S. Lewis in his influential Mere Christianity introduces the notion of theosis, or deification, in the following manner: he likens it to putting on a mask every day; and, over time, having one’s likeness conform to the mask. This image has stuck with me since I read it in my teenage years1. In Christianity the every day acts of repentance, prayer, “loving thy neighbor as thyself,”2 et al are, by their nature, working to restore the Imago Dei of each of us. This is the telos of the Sacraments and the purpose and reason behind the disciplines and praxis of the Church. We all fall short of the Glory of God: nevertheless, we all struggle to become our whole selves, our highest self, and our best self. Why not be utterly changed into fire?
This is the fundamental drive and arc of every Christian. To become aligned with and continually participating in the energies3 of the Almighty, filled with them, transformed by them into new Man, and to see your fallen nature restored to what was intended.
Often in Church teachings, there is the notion that pieces of Truth are given to or discovered by humanity outside of the Church. As an example, many societies and religions witness and understand the seemingly miraculous regeneration and the burgeoning of life after death in spring. They know this cycle is worthy of celebration, and create rites, rituals, and tales around it. With and through Christ, the Truth is revealed in full during Pascha: that Christ, the Son of God, of one essence with the Father, was buried, and rose again on the third day. That glimpse of the divine in nature is now revealed in full.
In society today we have been moving away from Christ and from the divine in belief only in man and his reason; and now find ourselves desperate for community, meaning, and lost as to how to orient ourselves best in life. This sees some turning to dead pagan religions, others embracing politics as the sum of human existence, and yet this is not the form that most people in America today end up pursuing. No, they aim even lower, for they accept the default checkbox that society marked for them before they were born.
Discipline and praxis are central to theosis. The disciplines provide the rule, meaning both ultimate ideal and the form of how to go about your praxis. The praxis is the struggle: the attempt to conform yourself to the rule and reshape and restore yourself4 through the every day fight. Anyone who says they don’t struggle is lying, because, buddy, I have eaten copious amounts of meat during just about every Lenten season since I converted to a sect which observes Lent. We all miss the mark, yet we must at least aim in the right direction for any hope of success in this life.
Hamartia
We live and breathe in a culture cut off from traditional community; atomized and carried away by the whims and winds without anchor; and in floundering panic and spiritual emptiness people turn to what is readily available to fill the hollowness in their souls. How many times have you heard someone say, “They’re really into local microbrews”, or how big into “The Walking Dead” they are. TWD can provide brainless entertainment, and yet many people seek community and comfort through the product and through the brand. “I am a Walking Dead fan5, can you believe what happened in the season finale?” This discipline and praxis here are of watching and discussing a show about nothing, for nothing, and with no edification in sight. The show is, of course, fungible, but the desire to watch and keep up and discuss reveals something true about the people doing so.
In their straining and yearning they reveal the inward reality of who they want to be when they consume this or that show or purchase one product over another. Essentially, they are buying the mask to put on in an attempt to effect the same sort of transcendental changes as the discipline and praxis of Christianity does. Most of the time this is not particularly grandiose or elevated: a woman with greying hair and no children buys hair color to present herself as younger than she is. Straightforward, simple, and always a let down. She missed acting in accordance to reality because she bought society’s patently false lies about her own biology and highest role, and the lies that she could have it all and want for nothing. Yet she is aware that she has lost her youth and seeks to recapture what she once had. She knows that the men who once found her desirable in her rosy blossom now see the crows feet, the slack collagen, the breast drooping beneath her button down blouse she wears to work every day. They used to approach her at the bars, even in line at Corporate Coffeehouse #119 on Main and Commerce, and now she drinks alone. What she wouldn’t give for some company again, not to feel so isolated, to have someone wrap their arms around her every morning. She follows the instructions to a T, the ads all have husbands in them; she won’t have one and the cats will eat her eyes and tongue first.
A man, slighted at every turn by women, told he’s worthless in society, shoved and stepped on at work, is looking to be a man and be in control of something, anything. To this end he wills himself to a statement of intent: he buys motorcycle gloves. Motorcycles are manly, after all; at least, they’re portrayed that way in advertisements. He wants to be a man who undertakes something with a little edge, something that might get women talking to him, or at least a little tingle when he strides up to them in his leather jacket6. An attempt to point his life in a new direction and restore something he knows is missing, but isn't quite sure how to bring into his life. Something always comes up to keep him from getting the bike. Another expense, another meeting, another excuse not to act. Now, every time he looks at it he thinks of money wasted and how much of a loser he is that he thought he could change anything about himself. He wanted to feel like a man, he wanted to feel alive, and he wanted to feel free out from under the dingy fluorescent lighting that washes him daily.
The Church of Consumerism
Marketing priests chant from every radio; titillate with visions of what could be beamed straight into one’s mind at all waking moments. Their whispers fill up ears and their tentacles insinuate themselves in the heart. Open up your favorite website and be instantaneously drowned in a flood of advertisements targeting the machine coalesced image of you. Turn on the TV and think, “I could be a handsome guy in a Audi with a dark haired beauty7 sitting next to me. All I need is an Audi, and that pussy."
False idols and failed hopes arise constantly from consumerism and leave behind a destructive wake of unfilled promises and human debris. People do everything right, everything the ads said to do, and still they’re lonely; still they’re single; still they lack courage. This is confusing to them because they are bombarded constantly by propaganda and they are too detached from reality and a caring community to know that they’re drinking salt water and growing thirstier every moment. “You meet the nicest people on a Honda.”8
People experience a fleeting glimpse of happiness when they lovingly gaze upon their latest acquisition. They have completed the Rite of Purchase and await the bountiful blessings to come spilling forth, as promised by the High Priests of Marketing. Two weeks later and they find that their lust has been inflamed once more by those same marketers and they need to sate it. Their wallets are opened again to engage in the same praxis as before knowing that, this time, they will find happiness, meaning, it’ll last I swear, I just need one more pair of shoes, another rifle, I just need more9.
Devout practitioners of Consumerism embrace zealotry and fight flame wars that echo in the vast halls of the internet. They have passed beyond the mere Rite of Purchase and entered into Worship of Brand.
This will never work, neither the buying to become someone or worshipping a brand, because it is not aligned with the purpose of a human or humanity. Consumerism is an inversion/twisting/mockery of that which is good and true. Akin to pair-bonding with a Fleshlight, you’ll find that no matter how much it feels right in the moment you’re always left empty and wanting more. It is squalid and a squandering and sullying of the soul.
They white knight for the Xbox against the heretical PlayStation simps and expend sums of energy feeding conflagrations just a shade short of Fat Man all over a video game console. Repeat ad nauseum across cars, computer graphics cards, and any number of inane schisms based on what one buys.
Consumer Culture :: Indoctrination
From a young age we are exposed to advertisements. First on the TV or now YouTube streaming on the television. We learn from the excited voices, the music, and flash cuts showing how cool this cheap plastic toy with slave labor quality control is and the unbidden desire is inflamed in our hearts and minds. I’m watching this happen to my own children, and it is astounding. They see an ad and immediately turn to me, “I need this bauble.” No, kid, that bauble ain’t even on the horizon of need.
I remember being that child. When the change happened, I don’t know. I see hype reels and I don’t care, I can’t be moved. Elden Ring released months ago, I have 400 hours sunk into Dark Souls, Dark Souls III, and Sekiro; I still haven’t bought the game even with the knowledge that it’s tailor made mind cocaine for someone who mainlines the prospect of getting good. I can’t remember the last time I saw an advertisement and thought “I need that.”10
I want you to consider that many, perhaps most, of the human population doesn’t have the wherewithal or ability to self-escape the sea of advertising. Ads11 targeting adults are more sophisticated, but only slightly so; it’s not as if they exist on an entirely unfamiliar plane and spotting the manipulation and ignoring it should be easy. And yet, in spite of this, the majority of advertisement is geared towards adults and apparently works on the majority of adults. The adults who have lost touch with their communities, and who are seeking fulfillment, they just don't know how and they don't understand why what they're trying never works.
Metanoia
I think I know some practical steps that can be taken to remove oneself from the maelstrom and calm the soul. They’re simple, they don’t require you to have faith12. All that’s needed is a praxis to match a discipline. The discipline is refraining from purchasing items one believes will result in a better self. To this end I can recommend the following praxis.
Disengage from consumption of popular culture for a week or two. Whether or not one realizes it one is in bathed at each and every moment in media propaganda. The current shows have product placements, some more blatant that others, they have cultural programming embedded in them13, and all too often they are not shows about anything. Feed yourself nothingness and then act surprised when you’re hungry all the time and can’t stop gorging yourself. Milo and subtraction stew come roaring forth from the darkness of middle school memory.
Turn off the news. The news, such as it is, is worse than watching some mindless shows pushing nonsense propaganda. Do you really need to buy a flag to support Ukraine? Sure, its colors complement the ones of our true flag14. Not a lot of people are Ukrainian, and I can’t figure out why we’re having them kill themselves in the Russian artillery grinder other than it was apparently a great cover for laundering money. This should not be a surprise to anyone, but millions upon millions of Americans have been duped into tying themselves and their energies to this? How is it they are so easily programmed if not that they have been trained to be the ultimate recipients of programming without so much as a checksum to see if what they received was sensical. If an event is truly as big as the news makes it out to be then you’ll see its repercussions in your life.
In the meantime slow down in your life and pay attention to who is around you15 and what is going on locally instead of everywhere all at once. When you aren’t inundated with constant pressure and take time to step back you find that your passions begin to fade. What once seemed so urgent, so critical, becomes a phantom of desire and then disappears into nothingness.
I would also urge you to begin a practice of regular exercise with your newfound time, but then I might suggest you buy something and that would really undermine the piece right at the end, wouldn’t it?
And not since, as it’s one of a few dozen books I loaned out before learning not to loan out books!
The originator of the Non-Aggression Pact would later be denied by reddit atheist libertarians
As distinct from the essence, of which we can never be a part. Think essence as who you irreducibly are, and energy as your actions and the way in which your essence is revealed to the world
Faith and works both being required, as man cannot accomplish this solely by himself but only through Grace
Couldn’t you tell with my TWD mug and matching socks?
He lets his imagination carry him away
A Maine Coon
Clever, are the people I meet nice, or the people on these Hondas?
What is hedonic adaptation
For whatever reason the algorithm has managed not to serve up endless ads for laser chain alignment tools or a front wheel chock and yet they are things I think about buying often
To borrow a line “What does the advertiser want to be true?” might be a fun variant of “What does the writer want to be true?”
My faith being on the level of praying, “Oh, Lord, I believe. Please, help me to believe.”
What are the populations and rates for certain identities and why are they prominent in every broadcast and cable television show. Weird.
You know, the rainbow one
I do poorly at this, but I also think I could have been a hermit given the right circumstances