Cracks in the Foundation of Being
How to Distinguish Between Being Anxious and the Existential Crisis
What does it mean to face the abyss? I've mentioned this idea before, that the individual must face the abyss on the way to become oneself. What does that mean?
One way we can talk about "facing the abyss" is through the language of anxiety. But here we must immediately distinguish much of the anxiety we are likely familiar with already and this "abyssal anxiety." We’ll borrow from Kierkegaard here and his work The Concept of Anxiety1 (it's probably relevant) and separate anxiety into two categories: anxiety of the finite and anxiety of the infinite.
Anxiety of the finite is much of the anxiety we already think about when we think of anxiety in the psychological sense. Anxiety about an upcoming important meeting, anxiety about the future of a romantic relationship, etc. Generally, we can identify anxiety about the finite from the following characteristics: anxiety of the finite often comes from an external source or is, at the very least, related to an external source (e.g., the aforementioned meeting or romance), and as such, it is limited in scope. We can imagine someone suffering from these finite anxieties, managing to escape them, and perhaps even growing or learning from them. But finite anxieties are only "finitely formative.”2
Anxiety of the infinite, on the other hand, comes not from any external source but from within. It requires not any external situation, but dwells deep within the human spirit. It recognizes the fragile and broken foundations upon which we have built our very understanding of ourselves. And in those cracking, crumbling foundations, we see through to the emptiness—the abyssal emptiness—that terrifies, frightens, and intimidates our very existence. This is the anxiety of the infinite. And this is an anxiety of a very different sort. It is an anxiety that recognizes the guilt of a man that shall never be held accountable in the human courts, but rather is the deep, near-unknowable guilt that lives deep within each of us.
A great acting teacher of mine had this brilliant way of helping young actors recognize this guilt. These students, some of which had never even experienced anxiety of any kind, whether finite or infinite, would ask him, "how can I play this character and portray these deep emotions when I've never experienced anything like that? I've never been such a bad person, etc." and he would respond:
You know that thing? That thing you know about you, about yourself, that no one else knows, and if anyone ever found about, you would be absolutely mortified? You know that thing? You don't have to tell me what it is. But think about that. Use that feeling.
And you know what? It worked every time. Because at the most basic, human level, no matter our life experiences, our social status, our age, our family, we all contain these cracks in our foundations that we desperately try to hide away. These cracks of infinite anxiety, these crumbling stones. And the more we try to build upon them, the further away we endeavor to remove ourselves by building higher and higher, the more they crack and the more they crumble.
And the lesson here, the way to fully become oneself, one's essential task as an individual, is to peer through the cracks and face the abyssal emptiness: bring on the anxiety into oneself. A terrifying prospect, for sure.
But upon facing this anxiety, one can experience, perhaps for the first time, faith. And by faith, I mean the "inner certainty that anticipates infinitude.”3 An inner certainty that anticipates infinitude. This faith, then, permits one to face such infinitude and not be overwhelmed by it (for one can easily face what we commonly call an "existential crisis" when facing such infinitude without certainty) but rather remain calm, allow such infinite anxiety to search through the crevices of our very Being, destroy whatever it is that we are clinging to that we do not need, that are not necessary for our existence as individuals, and continue on.
In this way, anxiety becomes a tool in the hands of faith. This is the very reason I have stated in the past that one must either laugh at the abyss or die. This is the choice we have. We can choose to identify that which provides certainty in the face of infinitude, which enables us then to laugh at such infinite nothingness, or we can choose to remain terrified. To let the abyssal, infinite emptiness overwhelm us in its infiniteness, which can destroy a person. Quite literally, it can destroy a person.
So, this is what it means to face the abyss. The question not addressed here is how one attains the faith that permits certainty in anticipation of the infinite, but at least for now, that is not the question.
That is what it means to face the abyss. Now, do you laugh, or die?
Kierkegaard, Soren, and Alastair Hannay. The Concept of Anxiety. A Simple Psychologically Oriented Deliberation in View of the Dogmatic Problem of Hereditary Sin. London: W W Norton & Co Ltd, 2015.
The Concept of Anxiety, 189.
Id., 190.
Fascinating post. A few things that came up for me. We're living in an age of ubiquitous self-diagnosed mental illness, with self-diagnosed anxiety being perhaps the most common. I've wondered if that self-diagnosed anxiety is a certain lack of resilience that is taught and rewarded by our current culture. And, conversely, our current social media culture has demonstrably harmed the emotional and mental health of people, especially younger folks. Now I'm wondering if the rise in American anxiety, whether self-diagnosed or not, is related to the decrease in religious faith? What does the anxiety of the finite and infinite mean in an increasingly-secular country?