Do You Realize???

In honor of adult existential development, I wanted to post the following video of Gretchen Liebererum's rendition of 'Do You Realize?' by The Flaming Lips. I think the song is one of the all-time great existential works of art, and this rendition and video are just stunning. Enjoy...

Do You Realize - that you have the most beautiful face

Do You Realize - we're floating in space

Do You Realize - that happiness makes you cry

Do You Realize - that everyone you know someday will die

And instead of saying all of your goodbyes

Let them know you realize that life goes fast

It's hard to make the good things last

You realize the sun doesn't go down

It's just an illusion caused by the world spinning round

Do You Realize - Oh - Oh - Oh

Do You Realize - that everyone you know someday will die

And instead of saying all of your goodbyes

Let them know you realize that life goes fast

It's hard to make the good things last

You realize the sun doesn't go down

It's just an illusion caused by the world spinning round

Do You Realize - that you have the most beautiful face

The Four Existential Concerns of Adulthood

Researchers in the field of Developmental Psychology have historically focused most of their attention on childhood development. While this line of study has yielded great advances in our understanding of how children grow and learn, it has also come at the expense of our understanding of adult development. One needs only to look at the major established theories - those by Freud, Piaget, Bowlby, Vygotsky, and Bronfenbrenner, for example - to see this bias. Erikson's work on psychosocial development may be the most glaring exception, although I've described what I believe to be the problems with his theory here. Other thinkers who have explored adulthood, meanwhile, have either focused on select aspects of adult development (Kohlberg's stages of moral development) or specific circumstances we encounter in adulthood (Kubler-Ross' Stages of Grief). As a result, I've always felt a little shortchanged by the field of Developmental Psychology. I mean, we can't all be doomed to be the people we were in 12th grade forever. Can we?

Consequently, one goal I've had for this blog has been to gather all of my scattered thoughts on adulthood, mix in a few big ideas from some big-wig psychologists, and create a sort of personal theory on adult development. And yet, while I've so far managed to eek out a few posts on particular aspects of adult development (see posts on pain, identity, and differentiation of self), I've been uncertain as to how these ideas might fit into a more cohesive model. Recently, however, in paging through one of my beloved therapy references, 'Existential Psychotherapy' by Irvin Yalom, I may have chanced upon the theory that effectively captures all of the varied ideas I've been exploring. In his classic text, Yalom outlines what he considers to be the 4 ultimate concerns of humankind: 1) Death, 2) Isolation, 3) Meaningless, and 4) Freedom. As a psychotherapist, Yalom was primarily interested in how these existential concerns informed the therapeutic process. He believed that our psychological difficulties stem from an inability to reconcile ourselves with these existential concerns. In order to feel better, then, we need to make peace with these concerns. In reviewing Yalom's ideas with my current focus in mind, it has occurred to me that his concepts may be just as relevant to the process of adult development as they are to the clinical treatment of psychopathology. In fact, one could make the argument that adult development is simply what happens to us as a result of our negotiations with our existential concerns over the lifespan. Depending on how we respond to death, isolation, meaninglessness, and freedom, we either get stuck, or move forward to new levels of consciousness and functioning. But more on this link between existentialism and adult development later. First things first. Here's a description of the four ultimate existential concerns, according to Irving Yalom...

Death: Human beings are unique creatures in that we are conscious that we will eventually die. This awareness causes us a great deal of psychological pain and can lead to the development of pathology. Responding to this reality in a healthy and positive way, meanwhile, is one of the great challenges of adulthood, which I've already begun to write about here. Yalom believed death to the be the biggest of the four ultimate concerns. 

Isolation: We are all, ultimately, alone. We can use language and other symbols to describe our lives to others as best as we can, but no one will ever fully understand our individual experience. Responding to this unbridgeable gap in a healthy way, then, becomes another major challenge of adulthood, which I've written a little bit about here. The difficulties we experience in connecting with others often brings us to either cut off relations with friends and family, or develop unrealistically close, co-dependent relationships. Developing a healthy acceptance of isolation, on the other hand, can propel us towards new heights of emotional and relational functioning.

Meaninglessness: The universe has no inherent meaning other than that which we bring to it. All of this meaning that we create (our understanding of ourselves and our world, our values, our spirituality, our goals, etc) gets captured in our individual identities. Finding peace with the existential concern of meaninglessness, then, requires one to develop a healthy identity, which I've already written about some here. The goal is to develop an understanding of ourselves and the world that is accepting of the full picture, but also affirming of our own unique perspective.

Freedom: This is probably the most difficult and complex aspect of existentialism. Mainly because the word has a great many meanings, and engenders a great deal of political, philosophical, and religious debate. The main thing to consider for this post is that existentialists use the term in a very specific way. The existential concern of freedom refers to the reality that, as humans, we are all capable of a broad range of actions, and that experiencing this level of freedom, and the responsibility it brings, is an uncomfortable reality. While it may seem strange to some that 'freedom' is considered an existential concern (it is often assumed to be a desired state), if one considers some extreme examples - that we can, for example, gamble our life savings away in a game of poker, or try meth for the first time, or cross the median and drive headfirst straight into traffic - the anxiety we all experience in response to our existential freedom becomes more clear. Like I said, though, this is probably the most complicated of Yalom's four concerns, and worthy of a bit more attention than I can devote here. So keep an eye out for a full post on 'existential freedom' in the not so distant future.

Well. That's it for now. The four existential concerns. Pretty intense stuff. Next up, I'll be working on an interactive page for my model of existential adult development.

Finding My Inner Kid (or How I Learned to Love the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy)

You heard it here first. I am a big fan of the Star Wars prequel trilogy, in all of its poorly-acted glory. Of course, this wasn't always the case. I was one of those Star Wars fans who, for years, thoroughly derided the films. I grew up on the original trilogy. I spent my childhood collecting the toys and staging elaborate battles between Boba Fett and Luke Skywalker in the trees of the Ewok Village, and between Darth Vader and Ben Kenobi in the Imperial Attack Base. I even went so far as to freeze Han Solo in real ice in my freezer, which sadly causes his arms to crack off. So when the new movies came out, I was pissed. I analyzed every flaw in acting, script, and characterization. The plot, you see, was far too political and convoluted. And the heavy inclusion of droid armies, I felt, had completely removed the human element that was so rich with the original trilogy. And my god, the pacing. I mean, almost nothing happens in the first two movies, and then the third movie has enough material for at least two movies on its own. WTF? And then there was, of course, Jar-Jar, the destroyer of all that was holy about Star Wars. I could go on, but I won't. Because something really weird happened of late. My nerd rage subsided. And I actually became a fan.


I'm not sure how or why the change came about. Maybe it was having a baby boy. Or maybe it was the Buddhist thinking I've been doing of late. Whatever the reason, I was able to release myself of some delusional thinking and realize that in order to appreciate the new Star Wars trilogy I had to let go of what I wanted these movies to be (i.e. the greatest movies ever made) and accept them for what they are (which is three deeply flawed, acolescent-level sci-fi films that also happen to be spectacular triumphs of the imagination). And once I was able to let go of my expectations, turn off my overly-analytical "adult" brain, and watch the trilogy through the simple innocence of my childhood eyes (believe it or not, they do still exist), the movies suddenly became very cool. I was able to appreciate all of the aesthetics; the spaceship designs, the costumes, the sprawling city landscapes. And I found myself thoroughly enjoying the plot, the philosophy, and yes, even the dialogue. And, while I don't think that I'll be laughing at Jar-Jar's jokes any time soon, these movies have become worthy parts of the Star Wars canon in my eyes, for which I'm thankful. They really are incredibly imaginative films and I look forward to watching them with my son (not to mention buying him the toys and seeing him come up with his own playful reenactments of the movies most iconic scenes). So, in commemoration of my newfound appreciation of the prequel trilogy, here are three of the most iconic scenes from the new Star Wars movies.

Episode One: The Phantom Menace

Episode Two: Attack of the Clones

Episode Three: Revenge of the Sith

The Shadow in Popular Culture

Adding to my previous post, I wanted to share a few popular modern examinations of Jung's notion of the Shadow Self...

Fight Club

Fight Club (both the book and movie) is a dark, dark, dark look at the shadow self. And yet, the gloomy tone of the film is, I think, appropriate to the actual terror that we can develop in response to our repressed selves. The unnamed protagonist of Fight Club is an everyman who spends his weekdays working a soulless job and his weekends shopping alone for apartment furniture. Carrying on this isolated modern existence has required the protagonist to repress so much of his humanity that his shadow has become a sort of monster - a hyper-violent instinctual creature. For those who haven't seen or read it, I'll stop my plot overview there. The movie is probably Brad Pitt's best ever performance.

 Black Swan

Some have called Darren Aronofsky's recent film the "female" fight club. And there might be a grain of truth to that. While Fight Club's male protagonist's deals with his repression by becoming outwardly aggressive towards others, the female protagonist of Black Swan responds to her repression by directing her frustration and hostility inward towards herself, as seen in her depression, anxiety, and self-mutilation. While, by no means do the experiences of all men and women fit into these neat categories, I do think that the gender restrictions of our culture result in many boys and girls responding to repression in these predictable ways. In any case, Black Swan is another dark, dark, dark movie. Beneath the surface of a talented dancer's sweet and controlled demeanor lies a monstrous shadow self. I would say that this was Natalie Portman's best performance yet.

video for 46 and 2 by Tool

I'll let this song (with lyrics shown in the video above) speak for itself. It was fun to go back to this song and actually understand it thanks to my recent introduction to Jung's Shadow Self.

About Schmidt spoiler alert

This is one of my all-time favorite movies, and Jack Nicholson is just amazing in the lead. Having lived his entire life in an unhappy marriage and a thankless job, Schmidt has come to think of himself as a failure. Only in this last scene does he finally come face to face with his shadow, which in Schmidt's case is his ability to have a positive impact on another human being. The film is a good illustration of how the shadow self is not all gloom and doom. It's also about finding our repressed human potential.

The Lives of Others

One more amazing film. This one includes a major character change when the protagonist breaks free of his oppressive role as a state spy and discovers his repressed humanity. One could argue, in fact, that all "character changes" involve some level of confrontation with the repressed self. I definitely recommend this movie to anyone who hasn't yet seen it.



That's all for now. Coming up, I'll be revisiting my model of adult development.