Cynicism As A Call To Grieve Our Ideals & Expand Our Awareness
I have not historically thought of myself as a cynical person.
For the majority of my life I’ve erred on the ‘toxically positive’ side of the cynical - idealist spectrum. This has largely proved to be the more pleasurable side of the continuum to reside on, as well as the more profitable one.
But over the past few years, I’ve noticed a new pattern emerging in my consciousness, which takes the loose following shape: the more seriously I have begun taking my life, the more cynical I have become. This seems non-random. In fact, it seems to be the direct consequence of getting in touch with my desires and beginning to expect real things out of myself, other people and my life.
For my own notes, I will attempt to break this down as simply as possible:
Coming alive (combatting depression/maturing/growing up and owning one’s shit) means getting in touch with desire. Desire is the energy of wanting, but not yet having. It pushes us forward.
To be in right relationship with desire means to hold it well. If held too loosely, desire takes us nowhere. If held too tightly, desire narrows our attention until we can see nothing but the specific path forward that we have imagined for obtaining what we want.
Cynicism is a frequent consequence of desire being held too tightly. It is not about believing that Life, the Universe and Everything is doomed. Rather, cynicism is about narrowing our attention so intensely on one specific thing (or one specific path towards a thing) that it begins to feel as though that one thing is Life, the Universe and Everything. When that thing (or the path towards it) becomes doomed, it feels as though everything is doomed.
This is why cynical people can be so annoying. Their unconscious has not been made conscious and so things are constantly getting lost in translation. When you have a conversation with a cynical person they will say something like ‘I’ll never find a girlfriend!’ And you’ll say ‘Of course you will! You’re an interesting person with very straight teeth!’ - Not realizing that to you, ‘finding a girlfriend’ means finding a girl who would be happy to date them but to them, finding a girlfriend might mean finding a woman who will magically heal all their childhood trauma. And so every time they meet a girl who is interested in them but she does not magically heal their attachment wounds by the second date, they will write this person off as ‘not girlfriend material.’ They will continue to do this - and continue to insist that they will never find a girlfriend - unless and until they update their definition of ‘girlfriend’ to include women without magical powers. In the interim, it will be very difficult for them to have a conversation about the topic that makes any sense.
This is sort of how we all are when we have an unconscious ideal that we cannot name.
Cynicism can actually be a helpful signal that it’s time to pull an unconscious ideal into our awareness and mourn the parts of it that we are now realizing do not translate to reality. It is a sign that we are trying and failing, which means we are actually getting closer to the realization of our desires than we ever have before. We are bumping up against what does not work when we attempt to put it into practice.
In this way, cynicism - when worked with consciously - can help us grow up.
To be young is, in part, to want things from the world that we cannot articulate. And so we go around making half-formed demands of life, the Universe and other people in hopes that wise elders will come along to put our desires into words for us and help us find the best way to move toward them.
A big part of growing up is learning to put our desires (the ones we hold deeply and unconsciously) into words for ourselves and pursuing them consciously.
Or letting them die, if and when that makes more sense.
I think this is what George Carlin meant when he said “Inside every cynical person is a disappointed idealist.”
Ideals do not have to be grand. In fact, they are often very subtle, and hidden inside of premises that otherwise seem reasonable.
For example, I once became very depressed because I thought that earning secure attachment meant my existing relationships would all get better. It turned out that was mostly untrue. The more secure I became, the more the relationships that I formed from a place of deep insecurity began suffering and failing. I thought, ‘Okay everything is doomed. Earning secure attachment does not mean I will have healthy relationships.’
This was true, in a narrow sense. Secure attachment could not magically fix relationships with people who didn’t want to have honest and intimate connections with me. This was an ideal I had been holding unconsciously - that secure attachment would give me magical powers.
But, I could expand my awareness toward the world of people I did not know yet, who did want to have those types of relationships. It turned out my skill set was a good match for that world.I just had to mourn the thing that I wanted to happen first.
And so now there is a different question I try to ask myself when I feel myself growing cynical. I do not argue with my cynicism. I do not tell it it is wrong or to think more positively. I ask myself, ‘What am I narrowly right about, which I am mistaking for the whole truth?’
This usually helps me locate an ideal that it is time to mourn. When I do that, there is an expanded awareness on the other side.
Cynicism invites us to examine the basic premises of the questions we’ve been living with unconsciously for a long, long time. When we do that, we can start asking better questions. Ones that fall in line with the realities we could actually inhabit.
It is a growing up process, engaging with cynicism. If we allow it to be.
Cynicism is the child inside of us who has gotten stuck, calling out for a wise village elder to help them see the bigger picture and find their way.
We can answer the call.
We can teach ourselves to let the old ideals die and look around for what’s left in their absence.
It’s a scary and excruciating way to grow ourselves up.
It works a lot better than the alternative.