The End of the Faustian Epoch
The myth of the Faustian "Becoming" has reached its telos, and a transition to another form of being has gradually begun.
An excerpt from my favorite poem, The Calf-Path by Sam Walter Foss:
And many men wound in and out,
And dodged, and turned, and bent about,
And uttered words of righteous wrath,
Because 'twas such a crooked path;
But still they followed—do not laugh—
The first migrations of that calf,
And through this winding wood-way stalked
Because he wobbled when he walked.
In my podcast discussion with Auron MacIntyre, he brought up an interesting point: the Faustian Spirit, the concept of producing and creating at an exponential rate for some unrecognized telos, had surpassed the realms of the West, as it wrought growth in undeveloped nations. The spirit seems to have hit a technological ceiling of sorts, and is only starting to become aware of its own limits.
Our language, our lives, our minds, our hearts, are so utterly controlled by the myth of progress. That the very idea of becoming is so fixated on a hypermaterialistic economic growth, with not even just a spurned hatred of, but simple misapprehended recognition of a spiritually-rooted life. Since the ignition of the glorified suburban life, that was even so hastily mocked in the 1960s, becoming has become rooted in the ability for both man and woman to chase unfruitful careers with upper-middle class salaries, but never any level of wholeness. Back then, at least the rigidity and communitarianism that kept the American “way of life” together provided some level of meaning for the average Joe, albeit, this was not tantamount to the preoccupied Faustian Spirit of his frontiersman ancestors.
That was it, it was over - the West was on a downward spiral after WWI, as our worship of ever-expanding and ever-ambitious fixation on economic and territorial growth wrought less and less gains and more and more liabilities. As this unknowing egregore grew to the Eastern man, and yet the yields could only last so long, the entire world has awoken to the smell of rotting corpses, mildewed carpet; the sight of a raging fire in the distance, and a panicking knowing that won’t go away, but continues to be the cause for a depressive denial throughout the entirety of the Modern Man’s collective soul.
The Myth of a Materialistic Becoming aged poorly, as the technological ceiling has finally been hit. Some will argue it was hit a long time ago, but in my opinion, it’s only become obvious in the last fifteen years. As people, nowadays, grow evermore aware that they can no longer move up the career ladders that they wanted to, achieve the materialistic dreams they hoped to achieve, and live within their self-deception of chasing a wholeness that could only be brought to them via bread and circus, the people turn inward looking for hope, or outward, looking to stay occupied.
Ever since the Industrial Age, that brought on so much excitement for a new world of discovery and creation, man has been on a train that has only sped up for nearly three-hundred years with constant new innovations, inventions, toys, and institutions for him to stay occupied. What this Faustian Man did not realize is that there’d be a ceiling to how much he could grow. When the limits to his ability to conquer were met after empires fell and he put a man on the moon, when the realization that economies could only exponentially grow so much before the diminishing returns set in from a lack of innovation, a bovine-like lifestyle of constant desire-searching, a cheaper life than ever (to achieve the dopamine hits that man has become so addicted to), and technology that could only grow so great; the Spirit has begun to realize it cannot create anymore, and is thrashing about, becoming anxious and frustrated, gnashing away, blindly groping around for an antidote to the poison that it thought was a potion of eternal life.
Being brainwashed and barked at to follow one way of life, that is utterly antithetical to a spiritually fulfilling life, or even simply a natural life, the average modern person, especially in the West, has grown understandably cynical and pessimistic. It is harder for them, than anyone ever, to achieve a goal or become ambitious for anything, as the diminishing returns have set in for a long time, and the need for more things has dissipated. They are told to buck up and make more by their dimwitted elders, and yet the world that those very elders grew up in was the height of the fruits of the Faustian Man’s material offerings to humanity. The entirety of the culture, so far away displaced from the dead and gone generations that understood a fulfilling, simple life to some extent, and yet so obtuse that they think they can easily bring back such spirit, is bound towards some level of proverbial stomach aches and sicknesses.
The decay truly set in when we refused to accept that we had nowhere else to expand, and yet continued to. However, that is not some person or people’s fault, but apart of a grander cycle that has come to pass in the past, and will continue to come to pass to greater and lesser extents in the distant future. We ensued lifestyles where meaning could only be fashioned and varnished in a way that pleased our dopamine receptors. The wholeness, that we think we must seek through educational, vocational, relational achievements has reached a peak, and as this myth of progress comes to a gradual close, the understanding of what it was, and what is to come, is only just setting in on the minds of the average person.
From only understanding, only in part, what wholeness is, the average modern person who seeks a life in the chains of the economy, in the material world, in fleeting achievements, can never embrace what happiness is. For them, it seems to last only a time, and then the dread of feeling like there is no reason for them to be around sets in. What they do not know is that they are only partially filled. Even if they achieve, and reach great heights, they still feel a sense of sadness. They look at people they perceive as happy, basking in the joys of good food, great wealth, grand properties, luxury vehicles, but not understanding these very people are in an equally-depressive state, if not worse. The very elders of their society being materially rich, and yet are still spiritually childish, still seeking wholeness from living in their young self’s envisioned dreams of driving a sportscar in Milan.
This is no doubt the end of the ever-seeking spirit to produce and accomplish, and yet never taking the time to understand its place, what brings it peace and meaning, what ejects its own shame, what makes good, long-lasting relationships, the transcendental beauties of the natural world. The reactions of socialists and capitalists thrashing about, still trying to justify, what is essentially, their own interpretation of what is the logical conclusion to liberalism, and not realizing that their desire to bring great wealth and hedonic freedom is only what leads societies to great spiritual distress and misery, is even more proof of this raucous ending to an epoch.
What man perceives as his own justified being as a becoming man, yet without any understanding of when he has become other than his own death, is what has alotted his short life on this planet one of great misery and spiritual ungrowth. He spends his entire life seeking council and meaning from men, wealth and power of his nation, ascending to great status, and yet never growing up and knowing his blessed existence. He outright rejects his blessedness, his anointment of God, his holy duties, and instead, feels so ashamed, so disgusted of himself, he outright denies God’s power and existence, and the promise his Lord gave him of salvation and eternal peace.
The modern man is over, and is going to realize his need to know the greatness in his soul. He will learn he must tend to his garden, and not seek acceptance of and power over other men. He will see time less exactly, his own thoughts and opinions as less concrete, and his own sins as shameful. However, on the bright side, he will learn that his shame is nothing to fear, and that it is okay to let it all go. He will learn that the myth of progress wasn’t meant to last forever, because his journey isn’t one of just this world, but one of another; one that is higher.
In summary:
The onwards and upwards spirit has reached its telos - one of sorrow, pity, shame, and embarrassing demise. What man has realized, as he reaches his own ability to exponentially expand ever-upwards is that it comes to a grinding halt at a certain point. The vastness of space represents his own limits. Much like it is a short distance away from the complete vacuum of space, man has realized that such a vacuum of never-ending need to achieve will not end in nanobots creating and expanding forever and ever into the deep mystery of space, but rather, the empire of this spirit can only go so far, before it falls back to the ground. Yet, all the way down, he will be denying and rejecting that his empire of expansion has come to an end, because the physical limitations of our material reality only go so far, and only make so much sense before we have to all collectively come to a realization that it is all for none and completes nothing in man’s soul, except make him hunger for more and more meaning, that he feeds nothing but cope and sugar.
Stop living in the future or past, stop pretending that worldly achievements will bring you a transcendental wholeness, and stop looking for more windows to keep breaking so that you feel like you are doing something productive. Rather, understand that man’s promise means nothing, and that only God’s does. Realize that this world isn’t a game for you to win. Your greatness isn’t defined by your worldly achievements, that will only become harder, more useless, and more meaningless to chase after, but rather, the quality of your soul.
“Thus mingled still with wealth and state,
Croesus himself can never know:
His true dimensions and his weight
Are far inferior to their show.
Were I so tall to reach the pole,
Or grasp the ocean with my span,
I must be measured by my soul:
The mind's the standard of the man.”
Excerpt from False Greatness, a poem by Isaac Watts