PHILOSOPHER: What do you think the reason is that he can’t go out?
YOUTH: I’m not really sure. It could be because of his relationship with his parents, or because he was bullied at school or work. He might have experienced a kind of trauma from something like that. But then, it could be the opposite—maybe he was too pampered as a child and can’t face reality. I just don’t know, and I can’t pry into his past or his family situation.
PHILOSOPHER: So you are saying there were incidents in your friend’s past that became the cause of trauma, or something similar, and as a result he can’t go out anymore?
YOUTH: Of course. Before an effect, there’s a cause. There is nothing mysterious about that.
PHILOSOPHER: Then perhaps the cause of his not being able to go out anymore lies in the home environment during his childhood. He was abused by his parents and reached adulthood without ever feeling love. That’s why he’s afraid of interacting with people and why he can’t go out. It’s feasible, isn’t it?
YOUTH: Yes, it’s entirely feasible. I’d imagine that would be really challenging.
PHILOSOPHER: And then you say, “Before an effect, there’s a cause.” Or, in other words, who I am now (the effect) is determined by occurrences in the past (the causes). Do I understand correctly?
YOUTH: You do.
PHILOSOPHER: So if the here and now of everyone in the world is due to their past incidents, according to you, wouldn’t things turn out very strangely? Don’t you see? Everyone who has grown up abused by his or her parents would have to suffer the same effects as your friend and become a recluse, or the whole idea just doesn’t hold water. That is, if the past actually determines the present, and the causes control the effects.
YOUTH: What, exactly, are you getting at?
PHILOSOPHER: If we focus only on past causes and try to explain things solely through cause and effect, we end up with “determinism.” Because what this says is that our present and our future have already been decided by past occurrences, and are unalterable. Am I wrong?
YOUTH: So you’re saying that the past doesn’t matter?
PHILOSOPHER: Yes, that is the standpoint of Adlerian psychology.
YOUTH: I see. The points of conflict seem a bit clearer. But look, if we go by your version, wouldn’t that ultimately mean that there’s no reason my friend can’t go out anymore? Because you’re saying that past incidents don’t matter. I’m sorry, but that’s completely out of the question. There has to be some reason behind his seclusion. There has to be, or there’d be no explanation!
PHILOSOPHER: Indeed, there would be no explanation. So in Adlerian psychology, we do not think about past “causes” but rather about present “goals.”
YOUTH: Present goals?
PHILOSOPHER: Your friend is insecure, so he can’t go out. Think about it the other way around. He doesn’t want to go out, so he’s creating a state of anxiety.
YOUTH: Huh?
PHILOSOPHER: Think about it this way. Your friend had the goal of not going out beforehand, and he’s been manufacturing a state of anxiety and fear as a means to achieve that goal. In Adlerian psychology, this is called “teleology.”
YOUTH: You’re joking! My friend has imagined his anxiety and fear? So would you go so far as saying that my friend is just pretending to be sick?
PHILOSOPHER: He is not pretending to be sick. The anxiety and fear your friend is feeling are real. On occasion, he might also suffer from migraines and violent stomach cramps. However, these too are symptoms that he has created in order to achieve the goal of not going out.
YOUTH: That’s not true! No way! That’s too depressing!
PHILOSOPHER: No. This is the difference between etiology (the study of causation) and teleology (the study of the purpose of a given phenomenon, rather than its cause). Everything you have been telling me is based in etiology. As long as we stay in etiology, we will not take a single step forward.
Trauma Does Not Exist
YOUTH: If you are going to state things so forcibly, I’d like a thorough explanation. To begin with, what is the difference you refer to between etiology and teleology?
PHILOSOPHER: Suppose you’ve got a cold with a high fever, and you go to see the doctor. Then, suppose the doctor says the reason for your sickness is that yesterday, when you went out, you weren’t dressed properly, and that’s why you caught a cold. Now, would you be satisfied with that?
YOUTH: Of course I wouldn’t. It wouldn’t matter to me what the reason was—the way I was dressed or because it was raining or whatever. It’s the symptoms, the fact that I’m suffering with a high fever now that would matter to me. If he’s a doctor, I’d need him to treat me by prescribing medicine, giving shots, or taking whatever specialized measures are necessary.
PHILOSOPHER: Yet those who take an etiological stance, including most counselors and psychiatrists, would argue that what you were suffering from stemmed from such-and-such cause in the past, and would then end up just consoling you by saying, “So you see, it’s not your fault.” The argument concerning so-called traumas is typical of etiology.
YOUTH: Wait a minute! Are you denying the existence of trauma altogether?
PHILOSOPHER: Yes, I am. Adamantly.
YOUTH: What! Aren’t you, or I guess I should say Adler, an authority on psychology?
PHILOSOPHER: In Adlerian psychology, trauma is definitively denied. This was a very new and revolutionary point. Certainly, the Freudian view of trauma is fascinating. Freud’s idea is that a person’s psychic wounds (traumas) cause his or her present unhappiness. When you treat a person’s life as a vast narrative, there is an easily understandable causality and sense of dramatic development that creates strong impressions and is extremely attractive. But Adler, in denial of the trauma argument, states the following: “No experience is in itself a cause of our success or failure. We do not suffer from the shock of our experiences—the so-called trauma—but instead we make out of them whatever suits our purposes. We are not determined by our experiences, but the meaning we give them is self-determining.”
YOUTH: So we make of them whatever suits our purposes?
PHILOSOPHER: Exactly. Focus on the point Adler is making here when he refers to the self being determined not by our experiences themselves, but by the meaning we give them. He is not saying that the experience of a horrible calamity or abuse during childhood or other such incidents have no influence on forming a personality; their influences are strong. But the important thing is that nothing is actually determined by those influences. We determine our own lives according to the meaning we give to those past experiences. Your life is not something that someone gives you, but something you choose yourself, and you are the one who decides how you live.
YOUTH: Okay, so you’re saying that my friend has shut himself in his room because he actually chooses to live this way? This is serious. Believe me, it is not what he wants. If anything, it’s something he was forced to choose because of circumstances. He had no choice other than to become who he is now.
PHILOSOPHER: No. Even supposing that your friend actually thinks, I can’t fit into society because I was abused by my parents, it’s still because it is his goal to think that way.
YOUTH: What sort of goal is that?
PHILOSOPHER: The immediate thing would probably be the goal of “not going out.” He is creating anxiety and fear as his reasons to stay inside.
YOUTH: But why doesn’t he want to go out? That’s where the problem resides.
PHILOSOPHER: Well, think of it from the parents’ view. How would you feel if your child were shut up in a room?
YOUTH: I’d be worried, of course. I’d want to help him return to society, I’d want him to be well, and I’d wonder if I’d raised him improperly. I’m sure I would be seriously concerned and try in every way imaginable to help him back to a normal existence.
PHILOSOPHER: That is where the problem is.
YOUTH: Where?
PHILOSOPHER: If I stay in m
y room all the time, without ever going out, my parents will worry. I can get all of my parents’ attention focused on me. They’ll be extremely careful around me and always handle me with kid gloves. On the other hand, if I take even one step out of the house, I’ll just become part of a faceless mass whom no one pays attention to. I’ll be surrounded by people I don’t know and just end up average, or less than average. And no one will take special care of me any longer . . . Such stories about reclusive people are not uncommon.
YOUTH: In that case, following your line of reasoning, my friend has accomplished his goal and is satisfied with his current situation?
PHILOSOPHER: I doubt he’s satisfied, and I’m sure he’s not happy either. But there is no doubt that he is also taking action in line with his goal. This is not something that is unique to your friend. Every one of us is living in line with some goal. That is what teleology tells us.
YOUTH: No way. I reject that as completely unacceptable. Look, my friend is—
PHILOSOPHER: Listen, this discussion won’t go anywhere if we just keep talking about your friend. It will turn into a trial in absentia, and that would be hopeless. Let’s use another example.
YOUTH: Well, how about this one? It’s my own story about something I experienced yesterday.
PHILOSOPHER: Oh? I’m all ears.
People Fabricate Anger
YOUTH: Yesterday afternoon, I was reading a book in a coffee shop when a waiter passed by and spilled coffee on my jacket. I’d just bought it and it’s my nicest piece of clothing. I couldn’t help it, I just blew my top. I yelled at him at the top of my lungs. I’m not normally the type of person who speaks loudly in public places. But yesterday, the shop was ringing with the sound of my shouting because I flew into a rage and forgot what I was doing. So how about that? Is there any room for a goal to be involved here? No matter how you look at it, isn’t this behavior that originates from a cause?
PHILOSOPHER: So you were stimulated by the emotion of anger and ended up shouting. Though you are normally mild-mannered, you couldn’t resist being angry. It was an unavoidable occurrence, and you couldn’t do anything about it. Is that what you are saying?
YOUTH: Yes, because it happened so suddenly. The words just came out of my mouth before I had time to think.
PHILOSOPHER: Then suppose you happened to have had a knife on you yesterday, and when you blew up you got carried away and stabbed him. Would you still be able to justify that by saying, “It was an unavoidable occurrence, and I couldn’t do anything about it”?
YOUTH: That . . . Come on, that’s an extreme argument!
PHILOSOPHER: It is not an extreme argument. If we proceed with your reasoning, any offense committed in anger can be blamed on anger and will no longer be the responsibility of the person because, essentially, you are saying that people cannot control their emotions.
YOUTH: Well, how do you explain my anger, then?
PHILOSOPHER: That’s easy. You did not fly into a rage and then start shouting. It is solely that you got angry so that you could shout. In other words, in order to fulfill the goal of shouting, you created the emotion of anger.
YOUTH: What do you mean?
PHILOSOPHER: The goal of shouting came before anything else. That is to say, by shouting, you wanted to make the waiter submit to you and listen to what you had to say. As a means to do that, you fabricated the emotion of anger.
YOUTH: I fabricated it? You’ve got to be joking!
PHILOSOPHER: Then why did you raise your voice?
YOUTH: As I said before, I blew my top. I was deeply frustrated.
PHILOSOPHER: No. You could have explained matters without raising your voice, and the waiter would most likely have given you a sincere apology, wiped your jacket with a clean cloth, and taken other appropriate measures. He might have even arranged for it to be dry-cleaned. And somewhere in your mind, you were anticipating that he might do these things but, even so, you shouted. The procedure of explaining things in normal words felt like too much trouble, and you tried to get out of that and make this unresisting person submit to you. The tool you used to do this was the emotion of anger.
YOUTH: No way. You can’t fool me. I manufactured anger in order to make him submit to me? I swear to you, there wasn’t even a second to think of such a thing. I didn’t think it over and then get angry. Anger is a more impulsive emotion.
PHILOSOPHER: That’s right, anger is an instantaneous emotion. Now listen, I have a story. One day, a mother and daughter were quarreling loudly. Then, suddenly, the telephone rang. “Hello?” The mother picked up the receiver hurriedly, her voice still thick with anger. The caller was her daughter’s homeroom teacher. As soon as the mother realized who was phoning, the tone of her voice changed and she became very polite. Then, for the next five minutes or so, she carried on a conversation in her best telephone voice. Once she hung up, in a moment, her expression changed again and she went straight back to yelling at her daughter.
YOUTH: Well, that’s not a particularly unusual story.
PHILOSOPHER: Don’t you see? In a word, anger is a tool that can be taken out as needed. It can be put away the moment the phone rings, and pulled out again after one hangs up. The mother isn’t yelling in anger she cannot control. She is simply using the anger to overpower her daughter with a loud voice and thereby assert her opinions.
YOUTH: So anger is a means to achieve a goal?
PHILOSOPHER: That is what teleology says.
YOUTH: Ah, I see now. Under that gentle-looking mask you wear, you’re terribly nihilistic! Whether we’re talking about anger or my reclusive friend, all your insights are stuffed with feelings of distrust for human beings!
How to Live Without Being Controlled by the Past
PHILOSOPHER: How am I being nihilistic?
YOUTH: Think about it. Simply put, you deny human emotion. You say that emotions are nothing more than tools, that they’re just the means for achieving goals. But listen. If you deny emotion, you’re upholding a view that tries to deny our humanity, too. Because it’s our emotions, and the fact that we are swayed by all sorts of feelings, that make us human. If emotions are denied, humans will be nothing more than poor excuses for machines. If that isn’t nihilism, then what is?
PHILOSOPHER: I am not denying that emotion exists. Everyone has emotions. That goes without saying. But if you are going to tell me that people are beings who can’t resist emotion, I’d argue against that. Adlerian psychology is a form of thought, a philosophy that is diametrically opposed to nihilism. We are not controlled by emotion. In this sense, while it shows that people are not controlled by emotion, additionally it shows that we are not controlled by the past.
YOUTH: So people are not controlled either by emotion or the past?
PHILOSOPHER: Okay, for example, suppose there is someone whose parents had divorced in his past. Isn’t this something objective, the same as the well water that is always sixty degrees? But then, does that divorce feel cold or does it feel warm? So this is a “now” thing, a subjective thing. Regardless of what may have happened in the past, it is the meaning that is attributed to it that determines the way someone’s present will be.
YOUTH: The question isn’t “What happened?” but “How was it resolved?”
PHILOSOPHER: Exactly. We can’t go back to the past in a time machine. We can’t turn back the hands of time. If you end up staying in etiology, you will be bound by the past and never be able to find happiness.
YOUTH: That’s right! We can’t change the past, and that’s precisely why life is so hard.
PHILOSOPHER: Life isn’t just hard. If the past determined everything and couldn’t be changed, we who are living today would no longer be able to take effective steps forward in our lives. What would happen as a result? We would end up with the kind of nihilism and pessimism that loses hope in the world and gives up on life. The Freudian etiology that is typified by the trauma argument is determinism in a different form, and it is the road to nihilism. Are y
ou going to accept values like that?
YOUTH: I don’t want to accept them, but the past is so powerful.
PHILOSOPHER: Think of the possibilities. If one assumes that people are beings who can change, a set of values based on etiology becomes untenable, and one is compelled to take the position of teleology as a matter of course.
YOUTH: So you are saying that one should always take the “people can change” premise?
PHILOSOPHER: Of course. And please understand, it is Freudian etiology that denies our free will and treats humans like machines.
The young man paused and glanced around the philosopher’s study. Floor-to-ceiling bookshelves filled the walls, and on a small wooden desk lay a fountain pen and what appeared to be a partially written manuscript. “People are not driven by past causes but move toward goals that they themselves set”—that was the philosopher’s claim. The teleology he espoused was an idea that overturned at the root the causality of respectable psychology, and the young man found that impossible to accept. So from which standpoint should he start to argue it? The youth took a deep breath.
Socrates and Adler
YOUTH: All right. Let me tell you about another friend of mine, a man named Y. He’s the kind of person who has always had a bright personality and talks easily to anyone. He’s like a sunflower—everyone loves him, and people smile whenever he’s around. In contrast, I am someone who has never had an easy time socially and who’s kind of warped in various ways. Now, you are claiming that people can change through Adler’s teleology?
PHILOSOPHER: Yes. You and I and everyone can change.
The Courage to Be Disliked Page 2