Bodenomics at work
We seem to be more free than we would like to be, and yet, depression and burnout run rampant amongst society. In fact, suicide is the #1 killer of men under 30.
When was the last time you felt that you were enough?
We are always striving to improve ourselves, to do more and to be more. This cultural emphasis on self improvement leads to why we feel fundamentally burnt out.
In such a culture, we embrace hyperactivity, finding ourselves compulsively striving for bigger and better things. Ironically, this leaves us looking inwards constantly and boxes ourselves out of the outside world. You can be sitting at a restaurant on your phone doomscrolling and the person across the table is in their own digital version of the world, only a few feet away.
Western culture, or taking the red pill, is not good for mental health. Kasser’s 4 principles of American capitalism: self interest, a desire for financial success, consumerism, and competition, continually lead us down darker paths.
Foucault wrote extensively on a surveillance society. Towards the end of his career, he introduced a more specific concept which he called the technologies of the self.
People that follow this philosophy may abide by morning routines such as cold plunging, taking athletic greens, and subscribing to podcasts such as Joe Rogan, Chris Williamson, and Andrew Huberman.
They take pride and feel a sense of freedom in doing these things. The willingness to put oneself through strict discipline stands in stark contrast to the fearful subject of the disciplinary society, as they aren’t being compelled to suffer by an authoritarian ruler, but rather it is self-imposed. They are free to become who they have always wanted to be.
Instead of a society that tells people what they SHOULD do, they show the world what they CAN do. Rather than inhibiting or repressing, smart power motivates us to self-optimize.
Instead of the tireless surveillance of disciplinary societies, we have now taken surveillance into our own hands, through bio-wearables such as the Oura Ring and the Apple Watch. This goes as far as temperature controlled mattresses and even bloodwork, as shown by ex-CEO of Venmo Brian Johnson.
If we see ourselves as a project that can always be worked on, then there is always more for us to do. We are compelled to measure ourselves and constantly improve ourselves, under the guise that this is fundamentally good for us.
This concept of the self as a work of art is one of the greatest second-level matrix wall. It is a beautiful but deceptive illusion that the neoliberal regime maintains in order to extract maximum value from its subjects.
We are therefore capable of unlimited self-production, by making ourselves into better and more marketable commodities. Physical optimization such as athletic endeavors and going to the gym regularly can then take over our entire lives.
This leads to culturally induced narcissism, such as what we see in corporate America. The self fixation of promoting ourselves is to never let your guard down, to compulsively market and improve yourself to reach a degree of perfection that cannot be achieved. This inevitably leads to burnout as the ego grows exhausted and wears itself down. In other words, we exhaust ourselves, with ourselves.
Even worse, burnout is often seen as a weakness, lest we fall short of realizing our goals of self-optimization. I believe that burnout and depression are symptoms of the issue, not the cause.
In other words, the depressed and burnt out individual is unable to measure up to his own standards, and is tired of having to become himself. We lose sight of our present self as we fixate on the future of who we can become.
This leads to a hellish cycle of excessive self-reference. “We alienate ourselves when our inner sense of value becomes status driven, hinging on externally imposed standards of competitive achievement and acquisition, and a highly conditional acceptance In others eyes” - Addiction Physician Gabor Mate.
Freedom alone leaves us unhappy, alienated, and worst of all, vulnerable to authoritarianism. Negative-freedom, or the absence of constraints, does not lead us closer in finding the true meaning of life, nor does it solve the question of who we are. I have personally discovered this to be true.
We have become automatons who live under the illusion of being self-aware. Everyone and everything viewed through a lens of utility, as each one of us becomes part of the machine that our own hands have built.
The cure is simple. Spontaneity. This is an embrace of the activity for the activity itself. Any disruption from the outside world is seen as a threat to self-improvement. Our world has made us rigid and incapable of spontaneity.
Spontaneity, the flow state, finds ourselves alive only once we risk destabilizing the promise of self improvement.
With this, I’ll leave you with a quote from Bertrand Russel.
“The secret of happiness is this: Let your interests be as wide as possible, and let your reactions to the things and persons that interest you be as far as possible friendly than hostile.”
Until then, I will continue on my path forwards. See you in the next update.