Love this. You used that Iris Murdoch quote in another post and it sent me into a state over how too much unconventional digging into personhood leads to neurosis. But it also reminds me of Lionel Trilling: “The poet is in command of his fantasy, while it is exactly the mark of the neurotic that he is possessed by his fantasy.”
Along those lines, I think what’s missing in this exploration of convention vs. neurosis is the crucial difference between thought and feeling. When you talk about the “gloomy, myth-like variety of self-knowledge” (big fan!) that leads to some state “on the other side of despair” (so starchily intellectual of these starchy intellectuals not to just call it what it is: joy), what’s missing is the crucial difference between thinking your way into this “other side of despair” vs. arriving and feeling the joy (and love and understanding) there.
The point of rejecting convention and sometimes turning away from at least *the conventions* of community is to reach this place beyond despair that’s described by countless of these unconventional thinkers not as a neurotic destination but the very opposite of that, a place of understanding and love and connection to other humans. I think the crucial distinction here is that the unconventional path certainly leads through the brambles of neuroticism, and that can make you more neurotic, just to put it in simple human terms. But the task at hand is to keep cutting through the brambles until you can FEEL that place beyond despair, where an understanding that the moralism and rules of Ordinary Language Man are hopelessly inadequate, in the face of the higher sensation of understanding, peace, and acceptance that comes from celebrating your own unique, natural, and yes, sometimes gloomy gifts as a human animal. It’s a place beyond thought and judgment and hatred, but as long as you’re neurotically (and might I add CONVENTIONALLY telling yourself, using ordinary language) I NEED TO BE LESS ME AND MORE FULL OF LOVE AND UNDERSTANDING! then you’re just stuck on the brambly neurotic path. You caN FEEL your way off that path, and into a more joyful, loving, understanding state. Thinking your way is harder and slower and when it doesn’t work, it kicks up shame and self-hatred, i.e. I DID THIS BEFORE WHY CAN’T I DO IT NOW?
The answer is to become a poet, in command of your fantasy but never possessed by it. You feel as much as you can. When thought makes you gloomy, you think less and feel more, in that squidgy (did you use that word?) place free from judgement. When your fantasy possesses you, you back up and treat it as a route to creating and celebrating (instead of indulging the illusion that your whole life could become one beautiful sunset orgy of light and sound, which is also the illusion our commercial culture upholds and reinforces, an illusion that makes human animals deeply self-hating and neurotic because they can never reach that imagined nirvana).
Too many words here! LORD, BLESS THIS MESS! <- see how Ordinary Language Man has a lot of conventional paths away from neuroticism? He’s always inserting himself into shit and saying “Stop thinking so much and LIVE LAUGH LOVE motherfuckers!”
In some ways, that understanding of peace is what binds Ordinary Language Man to Totalitarian Man. Ultimately, in spite of appearances, they’re *both* trying to let go of thought and feel more joy. But sadly, they only recognize thinkers who are MEN so the wisdom of the most brilliant human animals in their midst is lost to them forever and ever. lol
I've spent all morning sharing this comment with people (friends, colleagues), mostly because it's such a good extension and application of these ideas, and partly because I guess there are some things I will brag about, and occasioning this comment is one of them.
I *still* have profound difficulties with thought and feeling and their relationship; in theory, a psychiatrist told me everything I needed to know about my dilemmas in this area about 20 years ago; but that was thinking. I remain very scared of feeling, and specifically scared that "I don't feel the right things" and "I cannot control my feelings well," such that "society will wheel around and destroy me if I don't work things out intellectually / behave according to sound thinking."
The best part about parenthood so far —other than: I like the kid, I mean— is how often there's only feeling, or feeling sufficient that it does keep me off that "brambly neurotic path," although I probably have to credit Buddhism for some of how I experience those moments. I don't grasp them, for whatever reason; it seems unnecessary, obviously impossible anyway, as though on a deep level I can tell they're not something to seek or attach to, just something to be with. But my child is only 2 1/2, and we only have the one, so who knows where this'll net out if we add more and as she grows.
Obviously: thanks for this; a bunch of us are sitting around talking and thinking about it this morning! (If Substack's velocity declines, that's why).
Thank you; I'll do my best to remember this comment and believe that it happened. I was just talking to Hamish, one of our founders, the other day about how you might be the writer I've liked the longest in my life, so, well, thank you very much.
God I love this! “Judgment can feel like understanding, of course, and indeed I think is mostly used for that precise purpose: as a substitute for an understanding we cannot achieve or which we actively resist.” Nailed this. And then your next line about judgment and hatred being dead ends, and the role literature has to play in all this. It’s really beautiful. Can’t wait to read the Murdoch essay.
We definitely can! I quixotically want to “reclaim” neurosis, but then I also want to bring back “hang ups” as a phrase so I’m just living in the past, man, as the fella in the movie said!
I am aware of Iris Murdoch in the way that a love of literature makes you 'aware' of many great writers but never have enough time to get properly acquainted with them all. Now, upon this most wonderful of recommendations, I absolutely have to spend some time with Iris. Thank you for correcting my oversight of brilliant woman, and such astute analysis.
I think so, but I'm certainly not sure! I think the case would be something like: to fully understand someone, you must be capable of imagining the world from within their mind + their mind itself, and if you've done so, you cannot help but identify with them as much as you do with yourself. (Of course, many do not love themselves; but then, many do not understand themselves, and that also seems related!).
I think an interesting tangent of this idea is to think about someone you definitely hate; Hitler, as ever, springs to mind. I once read a book called "Understanding Hitler" which more or less argued that even attempting to understand him was an insult to the victims of the Holocaust, a thesis I disagree with; but the book went into great depth about how unintelligible he was, how we'll never understand him, etc.
I've read far too much about Hitler, however, and at the risk of seeming insane: I don't find him especially hard to understand. By that I mean only: I think I can roughly imagine the world from his POV, why he thought and did what he did, how he felt (I think his heavy use of drugs and general mania- and psychosis-oriented lifestyle is a big part of that). I'm not a relativist, so this isn't a problem: I still hate him without any diminishment; I don't find him "sympathetic." I suppose we might say that Murdoch's argument / our belief covers *most* cases; a really radically ethically expansive Buddhist might e.g. say "No, it should even include HItler," but I know my limits!
Intriguing. I get your point. It seems like what you’re describing re infiltrating someone’s interior life experience via their mind is a description of empathy...but I’m not sure that’s exactly the same as understanding them. In the end I’m not certain anyone can fully understand another person. (Hence the need for fiction and philosophy.) I’m with you re Hitler. I’ve read books on him as well. As a book editor I also edited a (reformed) neo-Nazi’s memoir. We dialogued in depth about his past thinking. He had a TV show for a bit. Anyway: Yes, I think Hitler is just an extreme example of feelings perhaps many men have felt over the eons, in a general way, but he obviously perverted it all and took it to its farthest illogical conclusion in a fit of madness.
You're spot on there. But it's also people who think hell *isn't* other people. It's sort of implied in that sentence. So it's also a problem to think:
"Oh, it's not me, it's just those cynical assholes".
Mmmm. No, not quite.
There's a callous and egocentric nature to all people, even the most benign and benevolent ones. We're just not that good, even the best ones, and everyone throws their chips into hell somehow.
God, that’s true; every pithy sentence fails to acknowledge that this is inescapable! I do find it surprising how much you can sense behind a great deal of moralizing activity an implicit sense that people should be, can be “quite good” or largely without moral defect; I don’t see how anyone could have that view! Any goodness is partial, tentative, at risk always of being somehow turned into evil!
Love this. You used that Iris Murdoch quote in another post and it sent me into a state over how too much unconventional digging into personhood leads to neurosis. But it also reminds me of Lionel Trilling: “The poet is in command of his fantasy, while it is exactly the mark of the neurotic that he is possessed by his fantasy.”
Along those lines, I think what’s missing in this exploration of convention vs. neurosis is the crucial difference between thought and feeling. When you talk about the “gloomy, myth-like variety of self-knowledge” (big fan!) that leads to some state “on the other side of despair” (so starchily intellectual of these starchy intellectuals not to just call it what it is: joy), what’s missing is the crucial difference between thinking your way into this “other side of despair” vs. arriving and feeling the joy (and love and understanding) there.
The point of rejecting convention and sometimes turning away from at least *the conventions* of community is to reach this place beyond despair that’s described by countless of these unconventional thinkers not as a neurotic destination but the very opposite of that, a place of understanding and love and connection to other humans. I think the crucial distinction here is that the unconventional path certainly leads through the brambles of neuroticism, and that can make you more neurotic, just to put it in simple human terms. But the task at hand is to keep cutting through the brambles until you can FEEL that place beyond despair, where an understanding that the moralism and rules of Ordinary Language Man are hopelessly inadequate, in the face of the higher sensation of understanding, peace, and acceptance that comes from celebrating your own unique, natural, and yes, sometimes gloomy gifts as a human animal. It’s a place beyond thought and judgment and hatred, but as long as you’re neurotically (and might I add CONVENTIONALLY telling yourself, using ordinary language) I NEED TO BE LESS ME AND MORE FULL OF LOVE AND UNDERSTANDING! then you’re just stuck on the brambly neurotic path. You caN FEEL your way off that path, and into a more joyful, loving, understanding state. Thinking your way is harder and slower and when it doesn’t work, it kicks up shame and self-hatred, i.e. I DID THIS BEFORE WHY CAN’T I DO IT NOW?
The answer is to become a poet, in command of your fantasy but never possessed by it. You feel as much as you can. When thought makes you gloomy, you think less and feel more, in that squidgy (did you use that word?) place free from judgement. When your fantasy possesses you, you back up and treat it as a route to creating and celebrating (instead of indulging the illusion that your whole life could become one beautiful sunset orgy of light and sound, which is also the illusion our commercial culture upholds and reinforces, an illusion that makes human animals deeply self-hating and neurotic because they can never reach that imagined nirvana).
Too many words here! LORD, BLESS THIS MESS! <- see how Ordinary Language Man has a lot of conventional paths away from neuroticism? He’s always inserting himself into shit and saying “Stop thinking so much and LIVE LAUGH LOVE motherfuckers!”
In some ways, that understanding of peace is what binds Ordinary Language Man to Totalitarian Man. Ultimately, in spite of appearances, they’re *both* trying to let go of thought and feel more joy. But sadly, they only recognize thinkers who are MEN so the wisdom of the most brilliant human animals in their midst is lost to them forever and ever. lol
I've spent all morning sharing this comment with people (friends, colleagues), mostly because it's such a good extension and application of these ideas, and partly because I guess there are some things I will brag about, and occasioning this comment is one of them.
I *still* have profound difficulties with thought and feeling and their relationship; in theory, a psychiatrist told me everything I needed to know about my dilemmas in this area about 20 years ago; but that was thinking. I remain very scared of feeling, and specifically scared that "I don't feel the right things" and "I cannot control my feelings well," such that "society will wheel around and destroy me if I don't work things out intellectually / behave according to sound thinking."
The best part about parenthood so far —other than: I like the kid, I mean— is how often there's only feeling, or feeling sufficient that it does keep me off that "brambly neurotic path," although I probably have to credit Buddhism for some of how I experience those moments. I don't grasp them, for whatever reason; it seems unnecessary, obviously impossible anyway, as though on a deep level I can tell they're not something to seek or attach to, just something to be with. But my child is only 2 1/2, and we only have the one, so who knows where this'll net out if we add more and as she grows.
Obviously: thanks for this; a bunch of us are sitting around talking and thinking about it this morning! (If Substack's velocity declines, that's why).
Early parenthood is such a good, feeling-led space! More to say, but mostly just want to reiterate that I'm enjoying your newsletter a lot!
Thank you; I'll do my best to remember this comment and believe that it happened. I was just talking to Hamish, one of our founders, the other day about how you might be the writer I've liked the longest in my life, so, well, thank you very much.
Dang it Mills this is very good.
It’s almost so good that I don’t want to sully it with a nominative determinism joke about how Iris is so perceptive. Almost.
I’m liking your comment because I agree but NOT because I endorse your nominative determinism joke
Ha 😎
God I love this! “Judgment can feel like understanding, of course, and indeed I think is mostly used for that precise purpose: as a substitute for an understanding we cannot achieve or which we actively resist.” Nailed this. And then your next line about judgment and hatred being dead ends, and the role literature has to play in all this. It’s really beautiful. Can’t wait to read the Murdoch essay.
So love requires nuance, which is antithetical to scaled-up communication.
I don't love "neurosis" as the opposite of "convention" because of the negative connotation. Can we substitute "idiosyncracy"?
We definitely can! I quixotically want to “reclaim” neurosis, but then I also want to bring back “hang ups” as a phrase so I’m just living in the past, man, as the fella in the movie said!
I am aware of Iris Murdoch in the way that a love of literature makes you 'aware' of many great writers but never have enough time to get properly acquainted with them all. Now, upon this most wonderful of recommendations, I absolutely have to spend some time with Iris. Thank you for correcting my oversight of brilliant woman, and such astute analysis.
Oh, I've loved reading her; I hope you do too, and thanks so much for the kind words!!!
““understanding” and “love” are at least related”
I’ve always assumed this to be inherently true. But I don’t know. Is it?
I think so, but I'm certainly not sure! I think the case would be something like: to fully understand someone, you must be capable of imagining the world from within their mind + their mind itself, and if you've done so, you cannot help but identify with them as much as you do with yourself. (Of course, many do not love themselves; but then, many do not understand themselves, and that also seems related!).
I think an interesting tangent of this idea is to think about someone you definitely hate; Hitler, as ever, springs to mind. I once read a book called "Understanding Hitler" which more or less argued that even attempting to understand him was an insult to the victims of the Holocaust, a thesis I disagree with; but the book went into great depth about how unintelligible he was, how we'll never understand him, etc.
I've read far too much about Hitler, however, and at the risk of seeming insane: I don't find him especially hard to understand. By that I mean only: I think I can roughly imagine the world from his POV, why he thought and did what he did, how he felt (I think his heavy use of drugs and general mania- and psychosis-oriented lifestyle is a big part of that). I'm not a relativist, so this isn't a problem: I still hate him without any diminishment; I don't find him "sympathetic." I suppose we might say that Murdoch's argument / our belief covers *most* cases; a really radically ethically expansive Buddhist might e.g. say "No, it should even include HItler," but I know my limits!
Intriguing. I get your point. It seems like what you’re describing re infiltrating someone’s interior life experience via their mind is a description of empathy...but I’m not sure that’s exactly the same as understanding them. In the end I’m not certain anyone can fully understand another person. (Hence the need for fiction and philosophy.) I’m with you re Hitler. I’ve read books on him as well. As a book editor I also edited a (reformed) neo-Nazi’s memoir. We dialogued in depth about his past thinking. He had a TV show for a bit. Anyway: Yes, I think Hitler is just an extreme example of feelings perhaps many men have felt over the eons, in a general way, but he obviously perverted it all and took it to its farthest illogical conclusion in a fit of madness.
Of possible interest: https://michaelmohr.substack.com/p/how-a-former-neo-nazi-became-my-esteemed
Phew. You are damn good. Thorough. Very thorough. Thank you for this level of quality.
> Hell is people who think hell is other people
You're spot on there. But it's also people who think hell *isn't* other people. It's sort of implied in that sentence. So it's also a problem to think:
"Oh, it's not me, it's just those cynical assholes".
Mmmm. No, not quite.
There's a callous and egocentric nature to all people, even the most benign and benevolent ones. We're just not that good, even the best ones, and everyone throws their chips into hell somehow.
God, that’s true; every pithy sentence fails to acknowledge that this is inescapable! I do find it surprising how much you can sense behind a great deal of moralizing activity an implicit sense that people should be, can be “quite good” or largely without moral defect; I don’t see how anyone could have that view! Any goodness is partial, tentative, at risk always of being somehow turned into evil!
Have you read any of Matthew Crawford's work? Murdoch is very important to him and he has some interesting insights to derive therefrom.