144
by SkronkFronkerdale_Archive
catwoman wrote:I just learned that there's a psychology branch called Existential Psychology. I stumbled upon it when I was reading about anxiety, and the article pointed to a youtube video about Existential Anxiety. After doing a bit more reading about it, it's a bit more than "what's the point of it all?". I suspect that many of the times my anxiety goes into high gear, and I feel like, "why bother?", and my depression kicks in, this existential thing may be in play. Hell, I was hoping it was just bad biochemistry....I've spent a lot of my life pondering anxiety in all its forms, largely cause I've been swamped with it from a very young age. There appear to me to be at least three different and distinct "types" of anxiety. There's the standard primordial "fight or flight" anxiety originating from our reptilian brain, from the amygdala, which is necessary for our physical survival. It responds to external stimuli perceived as threatening to our physical survival. Then there is the anxiety that comes when the amygdala becomes hijacked and inadvertently programmed to respond to stimuli that has no bearing on our survival, yet, as it is internally imagined into being via the power of our subconscious, makes us respond as if our life depended on it when met with what could be literally anything at all, the most mundane thing eliciting the same panic response that would normally be reserved for dangling off a cliff or some catastrophe. This second kind is what society typically refers to when we speak of "anxiety", "I have an anxiety problem" etc. It may be caused by a hyper-sensitive imagination or a subversion in the biochemical workings of the brain(often genetic), both of which can make a healthy relationship with our subconscious very difficult(the subconscious mind follows the lead of the conscious mind and can easily become "trapped" in the new "Anxiety-driven Reality"), or else a traumatic previous experience of some kind that has reconditioned the subconscious to react to stimuli it has come to perceive as threatening... Gosh, I'm sorry I sound like a textbook or something with my armchair psychology. Just trying to organize my silly thoughts. Anyways, the first kind of anxiety, the basic primordial one, is inherently healthy for us, and we need it to survive. The second kind, though there may be some incidental advantages that come along with it, is terrifying in how horrific and all-consuming it can be for our existent being. We don't want it or need it, it destroys our lives and makes us want to die, which is sorta ironic, as the purpose of the panic response was initially due to the fact that we inherently seek our survival as living beings.The third kind is the kind you speak of here, Existential Anxiety. This one, unlike the other two, is both inherently good and necessary for us yet also often unnecessary, and has the potential to destroy our quality of life and drive us to despair. It can be the best thing that ever happened to us as well as the worst thing that ever happened to us. It has many potential angles and can take on many forms in regards to our relationship with our own self. It is inherently a spiritual anxiety, where we become conscious of our own freedom and capacity for choice. Without such mortal choice, there would be no cause for such anxiety. In the words of Soren Kierkegaard, who I believe was the first person to ever write about existential anxiety specifically(and to that extent is its discoverer.) "Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom".Probably best to ignore this Unrelated Nerd-Off cause I'm stoooned yo: (Kierkegaard was astoundingly brilliant. The heavy-handed religiousness is probably what has kept him from becoming a household name, as well as how intensely esoteric a lot of his writing is, while I think the 21st Century latched on to Nietzsche instead because he better suited the times in its contemporary aesthetic. But they are extremely similar, come to almost all the same initial conclusions while living very similar lonely and misunderstood lives, only Kierkegaard did it first and goes far deeper than Fred in his insights. Though a lot of people prefer Fred cause he's Kierkegaard without the religion, Kierkegaard Is Fred without the shitty asshole parts, and I think that is far more important. In fact, Kierkegaard would've had a whole lot to say about the whole Ubermensch thing, and he would've been right, or so I reckon. In a way, the motive behind Kierkegaard's authorship was to destroy the notion of the Superman. He had enough practice with Hegel amirite lol. I even think he would've had a huge positive influence on Fred if Fred had had a chance to read him, partly because Fred would have seen a true peer, and also perhaps for the same reason Fred claimed to have had much to learn from Dostoevsky. You could not get a more perfect response to the notion of the Ubermensch than Crime and Punishment, and Nietzsche would have likely read it a few years before his mind went cause of that damn horse! Pretty sure he found Dostoevsky near the end of his life. But anyways, there is no way Kierkegaard's ideas could be insinuated into the Third Reich, Kierkegaards primary concern is very much an ethical one, advocating absolute personal responsibility as well as the transformative consciousness of guilt that comes with our growing awareness of our own being. Aren't the supposed "Supermen", those who consider themselves to be beyond morals and to make their own rules, a big part of the psychology that goes into the supposed "elite" ranks of privileged rich folks that can observe their own role in the horrors and disparity of the world, caused by their insatiable greed, without remorse? It was a misuse of Freds ideas to assimilate them into Nazi propaganda, of course, but still. It wasn't that much of a stretch. I find it interesting that his last act before the loss of his great mind was in direct refutation of his philosophy: taking pity on a helpless animal. Again, Dostoevsky is full of scenes almost identical to Fred's scene with the Turin horse. I wonder if Nietzsche's world-view ultimately collapsed on itself, or else was destined to do so. Though it is complete speculation on my part, and it is of course bullshit to insist that any such speculation proves anything at all).Continuing on now lol. Existential anxiety is anxiousness over what we must do. Existential anxiety seems to be necessary for the survival of our spiritual existence in a similar way to how Reptilian anxiety is necessary for the survival of our physical existence. Without either of them there is no need for movement. Both tell us when we need to move, one physically and the other, well, existentially. To a large extent existential anxiety is misunderstood. It is the driving force behind our own becoming, and we need it to bother with that whole burdensome and terrifying process. It forces us to make choices important to our development that it would be easier not to make. Here again there is a sort of "fight or flight" that manifests itself. The "fight" being our ability to take control of our situation, to the extent that is possible, and the "flight" being avoidance of our given existential situation, which is really avoidance of our existential anxiety. Procrastination has been shown to be very much anxiety related in modern psychology, leading to a cycle of impulsive avoidance behaviors. And the more we avoid existential anxiety, the worse and worse it gets, until it drives us into despair and depression, a feeling of helplessness. When we take back some semblance of control over our existence, generally speaking, we feel the anxiety begin to be broken up and our spirit begins to revitalize. But first we must learn to not avoid existential anxiety or see it as a bad thing, but to use it for its given purpose, to spur us forward over the next giant wave on the horizon. Each time we succeed in doing so, we regain our confidence back a little more, and our lives seem to have some meaning again, despite what appears to be the inherent meaninglessness of life haha. In some ways, existential anxiety may tell us that we have some sort of misalignment with our own being, like how pain tells our body something is wrong and our amygdala tells us we are in danger. Perhaps existential anxiety also warns us of some danger? Maybe not, but its a thought anyway.I'm just rambling about things I'm interested in cause I figure that's what the internet must be for ha. And I smoke too much pot. Don't mind me! Love to all you people suffering under your own horrid dark cloud. I've been extremely fortunate in recent years to be one of the few people that benefited immensely from medication. I hope so much that you all can find your own relief, in whatever form.