Narcissism and the New Age

Aaaaah the drama of it all.

I recently found myself trapped in a room with an injured new ager. Now I'm not talking about someone who watched 'The Secret' a couple of times, but the real deal. Budhha heads (the new age fruit bowl) adorning every surface, a morning circle of the house with Tibetan bells and arcane chanting to scare away the evil spirits (amazing how easy it is to scare away evil spirits these days), twice weekly smudging to cleanse the house of 'negative vibes', prayer flags hanging across every opening lest dark entities seek admittance in the middle of the night - you get the picture.

So anyway, it seems that during a terribly meaningful new age social event someone knocked a wine glass over, causing it to shatter and impale this persons foot. To the average person this falls into the 'shit happens, deal with it' category of life experience. But to the dedicated new ager this is a highly symbolic event involving deep messages about 'lack of support', spiritual interventions to get the person to 'slow down' and unhealed childhood wounding. Quick someone call a clairvoyant. Of course such an event requires intense discussion with a large range of friends and any poor sucker who hasn't managed to escape the persons immediate orbit with sufficient speed.

Now it seems that this person is in need of a pair of crutches for a little while, which for most people would involve a quick trip to the emergency department of the local hospital to loan a pair. Not so easy for the new age mind though. There are many dangers inherent to such an adventure, a myriad of social implications about supporting the 'system', the psychic risk of entering such an unenlightened institution, the potential for other peoples negativity to attach itself to the unwary traveler and of course the fact that it might cost a small amount of money. All of this must of course, be weighed and considered in a conversation that takes at least an hour, eventually requiring an elaborate escapade involving at least 4 people (the injured person plus three others to provide psychic protection in their time of disability).

GOOD GOD. Will you people PLEASE get a life.

Half the planet is starving to death and most of the rest live under the burden of poverty, oppression, tyranny and debilitating disease and your making a spiritual saga out of a minor injury. This is the travesty of western privilege and narcissism taken to the very extreme. People who's lives are so empty of anything truly meaningful that they have to construct an endless drama in which everyday mundane occurrences are imbued with universe shaking importance. Apparently the great creator, with the responsibility of endless life forms on endless planets circling endless stars in an endless universe is taking time out to give deep meaningful 'messages' to a bunch of spoilt, unemployed, self indulgent children who can't find anything useful to do with their lives.

With all the suffering in the words, all the people who are truly in need of a helping hand, all the causes and injustices that could do with some real attention and energy - the best these people can find to do is to gaze endlessly into the reflection of their own spiritual ego. I guess I should be more compassionate and understanding, but I hate to think of all that 'good energy' going to feed something so irrelevant when it could be feeding starving children.

People ask me why I'm so anti new age. I'm not really. Anything that connects people to something greater than themselves or inspires them to a more loving and engaged life is OK in my book. However I have little patience for things that simply give people the licence to live useless, small and self focussed lives. Life is a gift that requires us to be engaged and participating if it is to have any meaning. It is our interaction with the 'whole', with life itself that make it worth doing. Or in other words, the meaning of life is life.

The true tragedy of our new age friends injury is that it can create for them such a sense of tragedy and drama. For someone who was engaged in a life worth living, this would be nothing more than a minor inconvenience - easily overcome and soon forgotten. Certainly not something that requires hours of discussion about what it really 'means'. I can't imagine that Nelson Mandela ever spent much time cogitating over a stubbed toe or sprained wrist.