It seems to me that in contemporary American life, we’ve lost a lot of the sense of authenticity to life… by which I mean that much of our experience feels muffled, muted, dulled down. Even when we’re not fully aware that we’re feeling it’s like this, we do feel like this, and those of us who dislike feeling muted rebel against it by trying to seek out “authentic” experience.
For some, the rebellion takes the form of seeking out adventures, for others, it’s life on the edge, some people seek out–well, the different ways in which “living life on the edge” can be interpreted are all ways in which people try to seek out authentic living. We want a tangible connection to the life that we’re living, and it’s sometimes hard to come by, insulated as we are by layers of entertainment, advertising, and the competing claims of so many other people and entities on our time and attention.
Not all people rebel, of course, and often when we’re at our busiest we don’t have time to think about it. Arguably, that’s also when we’re living the most authentically, though it’s easy to spend your time spinning your wheels in too many directions, so that you get nowhere and your character is barely developed. And the perpetual pursuit of distraction (entertainment, music, noise, parties, anything that gets broadly categorized as “fun”) probably is a main feature in our lack of development toward authenticity.
I was struck by this thought–as you can tell, this is something I haven’t fully thought out so forgive me if I’m a little all over the place as I write here–as I was reading reviews of the newest Narnia movie, Prince Caspian. A couple articles I encountered discussed C.S. Lewis’s views on chivalry and the roles of women in war, and how that showed up in his work. It’s a thought that has stuck with me for a few days, and I’ve grappled with my reactions to certain essays in light of that.
It seems to me that our contemporary approach to religion–primarily Christianity, here in the West–and particularly of late, has continued to water down the notions of what it means to be a person of character. “To be a good person” is a goal that has a certain blandness about it, a certain sugared niceness that lacks real definition and probably involves ridding oneself of individuality. Much of our approach to God and worship and living a good life seems to center around becoming “sugar and spice and everything nice” as if it is everyone’s dream to become a ringletted Victorian little girl. (Well, that is, anyone who wants to be “a good person”.) And understandably, people who can’t dull themselves down enough, people who can’t remain content muffling themselves in a candied coating of sweetness and light, get frustrated by this vision of what it means to be good.
Many people who find that approach stifling go the other way–if it rings inauthentic to be a pastel-candy version of themselves, maybe it’s better to embrace the darkness. People look to the occult, to vampire novels and antiheroes, because in their darkness, there’s something different, at least, about them. Others go for the heady charge of lust-filled adventuring (our culture collectively seems to have gone this way to some extent), with a heat and spice to their rebellion against bland sweetness.
I would argue, though, that these forms of rebellion from the inauthenticity that people find in established religion are just as muffling to individuality. You can muffle yourself just as easily (probably more easily) in the grave-loam of obsession with the occult, or the red-hot spiciness of sexual adventures. Any form of rebellion against that which is good is just another road away from authenticity. “Different” doesn’t mean authentic, even if being “the same” definitely emits plasticity.
It’s the thing you see in teenaged cliques–a kid is certain that they’re being more “real” when they’re being true to their subgroup, but they can’t see that they’re conforming to an even more strict set of standards and mores than when they’re in the perceived mainstream groups. (For that matter, what is mainstream? But I digress.)
True individuality, authentic living, all have a sort of tang about them that we long for but can’t find by running as hard and as fast as we can away from established standards. We have to stand up on our own feet, look the establishment in the eye, and judge what about their standards are right and wrong, and how we think they should be improved upon or whether they’re wholly out-of-sync with reality. Authenticity takes work, and self-knowledge, and an openness to admitting that we are wrong a lot of the time, with a willingness to listen to people who’ve got better ideas than we do.
Personally, I hate the idea of “being a good person” in the candied sense that it’s come to in our culture. But Good, like Truth, isn’t a candied thing. It’s like in the Narnia books how they talk about how Aslan isn’t a tame lion, but he is Good…
Hmmm. That’s all I’ve got at the moment. I’m not entirely sure where I’m going with this, as I mentioned before.
Posted by Kjirstin 
