Patterns of self-destructive addiction in the face of unbearable feelings of fragmentation and loss is the very definition of TRAUMA–All of our literature since the midterm, in one way or another, through both content and form, illustrates the effects of cultural and personal trauma and the tragedy of dealing with them ineffectively.
In lectures since the midterm, I discussed trauma, at length, and identified three aspects:
Loss of control
Loss of communication
Loss of meaning.
-feel seen,
-feel heard, and
-feel accepted,
rather than having someone “stamp” their own imprint upon us until we agree to appear as they need us to appear and, in the process of submitting to this, actually DIS-appear. This forced “conversion” is done by “the worst” . The “worst” are made so because their “soul-destroying” treatment of others allows them to remain ignorant about their own shortcomings . In the short-term, this ignorance, bought at the expense of others, seems to provide a sense of satisfaction that is, in fact, a more profound emptiness .
Our task, then, as readers/viewers, becomes:
-How to discover a way to renew, to regenerate, and/or to restore, a new sense of value that nurtures us, rather than a price that depletes us.
-How do we distinguish the establishment of sustainable relationships from an apparent satisfaction that is actually indifferent to social relations, devoid of meaning, and incapable of regeneration ?
-How do we remind ourselves to remain engaged in the necessary discomfort of meaningful rituals– rather than pursuing the endless deferral loops of addiction, so readily supplied and aggressively promoted by the consumption-stimulating myths of modernity?
– How do we communicate in the culture of perpetual distraction, and continual discontent, that this stimulation produces?
