Tossed Salad and Scrambled Eggs: Pearls for the Therapeutic Generation
It's Mental Health Awareness Month, and I have a curmudgeonly opinion. Don't get me wrong insomuch that I'm happy we've come far enough to where we don't have to hide flasks in our blazers or shout "I'm fine!" to shut down concern. But let me open with our modern diction.
Some of you reading this are not on social media, but for those in the know, you'll also recognize, like I, that most kids above 10 years old are fluent in these pop psychiatry buzzwords.
Self-Care, Codependency, Depression, Narcissism, INTJ vs ENFP, Gaslighting, Introvert, Trauma, Triggers, Anxiety, Spectrum, Wellness Check, Fragility, I Don't Feel Safe
I grew up loving Frasier, the sitcom spin-off of Cheers. Though it centered around the life of a Seattle psychologist, I don’t remember hearing much of that lexicon from the show dialogue. Nobody even spoke this clinically fifteen years ago, but now mental wellness is an absolute maelstrom on social media and a nouveau re-coding that blankets everything. Even when I attended the recent Social Media Conference in Orlando, hosted by Ragan Communications Inc, psychological hygiene was the talk of the town, and social media is now the chosen battlefield for all our inner struggles.
Posting is called "sharing." Funny, that.
Go ahead. Put it out there!
Admittedly, I do sometimes pine for a simpler era when we didn’t diagnose every experience. In the 90s, coworkers who behaved like juveniles weren’t narcissists per se—we just called them a four-letter word and left it at that. High schoolers of my time would talk about “getting high,” but if you listen to podcasts, kids now meet their shamans, self-activate with fungi cordyceps, and embark on a Hero’s Journey.
Now, I AM happy that my daughter’s autism is destigmatized, so that’s progress. Still, I do sometimes wonder if we give our monsters power by belaboring them, and if there isn't a balance between denial and fixation. As an avid reader of Freud and Jung, I wonder if either of them would be surprised that their clinical lexicon is now retailed to every TikToker.
Unresolved issues are the demon possession of the modern era, and though I am a religious man on Team Abraham, I cannot help but notice the overlap between exorcism and psychology. In both disciplines, a critical step is to obtain the demon’s actual name. Asmodius. Legion. Daddy issues. In fact, heroes who could discover the name of a monster often gained magical power over it. In the Torah, Jacob (ever the manipulator) asks the angel for his name, but the angel doesn’t take the bait. For some, the diagnosis is as pressing as the cure—to pluck the word on the tip of everyone’s tongue and pin down the shared feeling.
I don’t suppose the drive to resolve one’s issues in this life is a total misfire, but as the kids self-diagnose across the cables, I would temper it with two apples of timeless wisdom:
Your refinement isn't just for you. The myths and fables demanded that we look beyond solving our own problems for our own isolated self-perfection. Rather, we refine ourselves for the Hero’s Journey to move towards a goal and contribute to our social fabric. The Bodhisattva ascends and seeks to bring all other beings with them into Nirvana, and Christ suffered for the vision of a higher world order. Campus activists might be apt to rip down a statue of Lincoln for his warts and sins, but the only greatness in the icons they’d replace him with is that, in their lack of accomplishment, they never fell short. Lincoln's deeds, failings, and growth were for us. We don’t get better remaining isolated and aimless—aim and connection make us better. God offers both.
Not everything needs a name. Most religions and ancient mystery initiation rites assume a finitude to our understanding, that mystery is inevitable and inescapable, and that learning to accept and embrace mystery is part of life. Moreover, mystery is a vitamin, a mainstay, and Hope’s shadow. The admission that you’ll never have it figured out needn’t be a cause for anxiety—it can be the greatest unburdening, knowing that life will go on whether you’re there to see it and that meaning flowers whether you fully understand it. It’s nice not having to hold up the skies. You might not be able to go on the Grail Quest like Sir Percival, but for everyone else, there’s always a cup at Mass. Humility is the path to Awe, and Awe, according to Rabbi AJ Heschel, is “a way of being in rapport with the mystery of all reality.” In other words, much of what matters eludes diagnosis altogether.
You perfect yourself to journey and to journey with others, and in journeying with others, you perfect yourself. The feelings you can name are many (terror, exultation, love, beauty, envy, sorrow), but we reserve The Sublime for the ones you can’t pin a word to. The nameless sublime is often the port that opens to all adventure.
"Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced." -- Søren Kierkegaard
Be well.
Drake Dunaway
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