“A Hobbit, A Wardrobe, and a Great War”

Thus the crisis of faith in postwar Europe was multilayered. There was an erosion of what might be called civilizational confidence, a widespread disillusionment with the West and its supposed cultural achievements. Liberal democracy, constitutionalism, capitalism, progressivism—all seemed in a state of near collapse …. Since Christianity was considered integral to Europe’s political and economic system, the perceived failure of that system was a spiritual failure as well.

  

-Joseph Loconte*

Setting the frame for the history of Tolkien and Lewis’ friendship and the writing of their most famous tales, Joseph Loconte points to one of the Great Illusions leading up to the Great War: The Myth of Progress. Given the massive leaps in technological progress, scientific discoveries, and the near unanimous acceptance of 18^th century Enlightenment thought and Darwinism, the soul of Western civilization was anchored in the belief that progress was inevitable. “Western civilization was marching inexorably forward, that humanity itself was maturing, evolving, advancing—that new vistas of political, cultural, and spiritual advancement were within reach.” (Loconte)

Of course, to help insure this inexorable “advancement,” eugenics was all the rage … because nothing says “Utopia” like killing off blacks, cripples, and those whom The Powers That Be deem unfit.

“It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerating offspring for crime, or let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind. Three generations of imbeciles are enough.” So wrote Oliver Wendell Holmes, Supreme Court Justice, upholding Virginia’s sterilization law, supported by many of the cultural leaders of the times, including ministers. (Loconte)

When the First War erupted, national leaders on both sides of the conflict ran headlong into the fray, claiming the God of the Bible was on its side; that this war-to-end-all-wars was a Holy War. In Britain, “Clergymen dressed Jesus in khaki and had him firing machine guns.” (Loconte) When the war ended, more than nine million soldiers lay dead and roughly thirty-seven million wounded. The aftermath was a world awash in despair, disillusionment, and the rejection of religion.

With the Myth of Progress being exposed as an illusion, hundreds of novels were published in the 20s and 30s punctuating the futility of life, depicting existential angst as the new norm, and belief in God as “an attempt to protect against suffering, ‘a delusional remodeling of reality.’” (Freud, cited by Loconte)

Pacifism replaced patriotism, and the ancient virtues were scorned.

“For the intellectual class as well as the ordinary man on the street, the Great War had defamed the values of the Old World, along with the religious doctrines that helped to underwrite them. Moral advancement, even the idea of morality itself, seemed an illusion.” (Loconte)

So, how is it that given the depth of despair, the wholesale rejection of the values upon which Western civilization had been built, and the widespread jettisoning of religion and belief in (any) “God,” that the books of JRR Tolkien (A Hobbit) and CS Lewis (A Wardrobe) not only made it past editors, but went on to garner both men worldwide acclaim? How is it that stories extolling the ancient virtues of goodness, beauty, and faith, as well as advocating valor in battles against evil, captured the imagination of those who were convinced that despair, amorality, and hedonism, were the only honest responses to what the world had just suffered during the Great War?

The Power of Stories

“It seems that Tolkien, even in the throes of combat, consciously sought to retrieve a martial tradition that would become a casualty alongside all the other casualties of the First War. Already he was constructing a mythology (The Silmarillion) about England meant to recall its long struggle for noble purposes. ‘I was from early days grieved by the poverty of my own beloved country: it had no stories of its own (bound up with its tongue and soil), not of the quality that I sought,’ he once explained. Thus he set out ‘to restore to the English an epic tradition and present them with a mythology of their own.’” (Loconte)

For Tolkien, a devout Roman Catholic, myths — even Pagan ones — originated with God and were filled with splinters of true light, revealing, however shadowed, eternal realities. “They are his means of communicating at least a portion of his truth to the world.” (Loconte) It would be years later that his best friend, CSL, would begin to accept his view of myths, and a bit longer until he embraced the True Myth of Christianity.

Years after the war, Tolkien, while grading papers as an Oxford Don, scrawled on a blank piece of paper, “In a hole in the ground there lives a Hobbit.”

Anyone familiar with CS Lewis is aware of George MacDonald’s (1824-1905) influence on his life and writings. While reading GM’s Phantasies, Lewis wrote that his imagination had been “converted” and “baptized.” While not yet a Christian, a new way of looking at and interpreting the world had begun. Later, after being wounded in battle and discharged, CSL was riding a train home to London and looking at the beautiful countryside: what he saw was that, “(T)here is Something right outside time & place…and that Beauty is the call of the spirit to the spirit in us.” (Loconte) While not yet a Christian, he now accepted that there was “Something” behind the beauty of the world. He was beginning to catch “A Glimpse of Narnia.” (Loconte)

George MacDonald wrote, “The best thing you can do for your fellow, next to rousing his conscience, is – not to give him things to think about, but to wake things up that are in him; or say, to make him think things for himself.” Both Tolkien and Lewis would go on to create epic stories so as to “wake up” truths that, however vehemently denied, were, nevertheless, still laying deep in the souls of their readers.

* “A Hobbit, A Wardrobe, and a Great War: How J.R.R Tolkien and C.S. Lewis Rediscovered Faith, Friendship, and Heroism in the Cataclysm of 1914-1918,” Nelson Books, 2015

Copyright, Monte E Wilson, 2015

Next Post: A Hobbit, A Wardrobe, and a Great War: Triumphalism and Human Nature

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The Power of an Infinitely Expressive Communicator…In Only Two Steps!

It was his (Merlin’s) voice that fascinated me. Infinitely expressive, it served him in any manner he wished. When he lashed, it could raise welts on a stone. When he soothed, it could have shamed nightingales into silence. And when he commanded, mountains and valleys exchanged places.

--Stephen R Lawhead, Arthur

One of the differences between a decent communicator and an individual who is powerfully persuasive is found in the melody produced by their words and the tonality with which those words are spoken.

Your words have a melody. The question is this: Does this melody serve or deter from the intent of your communication?

Listen to the melody of the words of Merlin’s father, Taliesin, when he was first wooing Princess Charis

...tell me the word that will win you, and I will speak it. I will speak the stars of heaven into a crown for your head; I will speak the flowers of the field into a cloak; I will speak the racing stream into a melody for your ears and the voices of a thousand larks to sing it; I will speak the softness of night for your bed and the warmth of summer for your coverlet; I will speak the brightness of flame to light your way and the luster of gold to shine in your smile; I will speak until the hardness in you melts away and your heart is free... (Stephen R. Lawhead, Taliesin)

Taliesin’s choice of words creates pictures, feelings, and sounds, surrounding Charis’ senses with his message of love. However, what if his tonality sounded like a John Philip Sousa military march? The message would have been lost in the incongruities.

Compare this with Merlin’s words to the Knights of the Round Table when they were about to go in search of the stolen Holy Grail

Hear, Men of Britain, Valiant Ones … the Head of Wisdom speaks. Heed and take warning … the battle is joined, and every man who would achieve the quest must face many ordeals. Be not dismayed, neither be afraid, but face the trials to follow with all forbearance, for the Swift Sure Hand upholds you, and the Holy Grail awaits those who endure to the end. (Stephen R Lawhead’s, Grail)

Well chosen words: words that elicit courage, strength, and valor. However, what if the tonality of the spoken words sounded like something sung by The Carpenters?

Be not dismayed (“They long to be”) or afraid (“close to you…”)

Listen to the conversations taking place around you today. Each person’s words have a peculiar melody: some are monotone, others utilize a few notes, and others create melodies and harmonies that carry their words into the hearts and minds of their listeners. I can have all the relevant facts at hand and choose fairly precise words to convey these facts, but if the tonality conflicts with the intent and words of my message, the message is muted.

Read the following two quotes aloud.

Men speak foolishly of the beauty that slays, though I believe such a thing may exist. But there is also a beauty that heals, that restores and revives all who behold it. (Stephen R Lawhead, Merlin)

Morgian, rarest of beauty, frozen and fatal, mistress of the sweet poison, the warm kiss of death. (Merlin)

You intuitively knew that there is a specific sentiment behind each passage and changed your tonality accordingly. Now, go back, reread each passage aloud: only this time swap tonalities. You can hear the incongruity between the words and the sentiment behind the words (via tonality), can you not? You not only hear it, you feel it. So do those with whom we are communicating.

Copyright, Monte E Wilson, 2015

Defining Life By Your Causes

You can gain a great degree of insight into how a person approaches life and defines what constitutes “living,” by the predominate metaphors he uses regarding life.

From my book, Legendary Leadership:

Complete this sentence stem: “Life is like …”

For Forrest Gump, “Life is like a box of chocolates.  You never know what you’re gonna get.”  Life is a series of surprises.

Albert Einstein said, “Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile.”  Life is service.

Helen Keller said, “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.”  Life is an adventure.

[….] Each belief creates a particular kind and quality of life. 

Which brings me to this question: What happens to people whose predominate metaphor is, “Life is a War”? Well, to begin with all of life is framed, thusly: Us v Them, Good Guys v Bad guys, Winning v Losing. Individuals whose overarching metaphor for life is War for a Cause approaches relationships, church, business, society, the political arena, and everything else, as a warrior. Consequently …

Homes become boot camps

Churches are gatherings of Navy Seals for Jesus

Education is where I am provided weapons and ammo with which to destroy the enemy

Art is propaganda

The Political Arena is where we “take no prisoners”

In Business, we destroy competitors

Recreation is “resting up so I can get back out there and crush the enemy.”

And all the people in my world are sized up, measured, evaluated, and judged, by the standard of my (present) Cause, be it religious, political, or societal.

“Come on, Wilson, join us and make your life count for something.”  

If you aren’t joining their Cause, if you aren’t with “us” fighting against “them,” then your life counts for nothing … and you’re probably one of “them.” Such people are often clueless as to how in the world St Paul could write, “Mind your own business, lead a quiet life, and work with your hands, so as to not stand in need of charity.”

“Man. I guess even Paul could be a slacker.”

Ah, there’s nothing like a Great Cause to make us feel that we are doing Something Important, as it defines and imbues us with feelings of significance and meaningfulness. Now, think about that for a moment. Does this mean that people whom choose to not join our cause are insignificant and meaningless? Is my sense of self and even my worth as a human being derived from my fighting for a Cause? And tell me, if my Cause goes down in smoke, who am I now? What do I do now, so as to regain my sense of worth?

Is it any wonder that so many of these people run around picking fights, creating enemies where there are none? They are worthless, or at least lack meaningfulness and a sense of significance, unless they’re bludgeoning an enemy.

When your dominant metaphor for life is War, tell me this:

Do you ever enjoy a night out with friends, where you simply enjoy the presence of others, or do conversations invariably turn to the battles, the Cause, the burning issues of the day (to you)?

Do you have any friends who aren’t fellow combatants, or potential converts to the Cause?

Can you sit and watch a sunset, being overwhelmed by the beauty and grandeur of creation, with a still mind and soul, or does your brain start tracking the progress of the Cause, the players and combatants, and the next move against The Enemy?

Do you only read books that are directly related to your Cause? How long has it been since you dove into a book solely to lose yourself and be inspired by a great story?

Newsflash Battles for Causes are events that we may engage in, while we are living life: they are not Life, not “what life is all about.” If we choose to define our selves in terms of our battles, then the potential for living and experiencing life as God intended actually diminishes to the point where the human inside the armor disintegrates and disappears. If this is you, I’m thinking you may want to take off the armor and tend to your self. It’s okay. Really. It’s not like God is helpless without your being on the battlefield.

Copyright, Monte Wilson, 2105

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Our Need For Friendship

It is not good for man to be alone.  -God

Some years back, a man whom I had known for a long time was describing me to some new acquaintances of ours. It was all very positive and complimentary, but with one small problem: he wasn’t describing me. In fact, the more he waxed eloquent about the attributes, gifting, and talents, of Monte Wilson, the more invisible I felt. All I could do was sit there thinking, “You really don’t know me.”

A friend responds to me the same way I would if I were seeing and sensing myself through the mind of my friend. In other words, he acts as a mirror that reflects the image of how I see and experience myself. He sees what I know to be true of myself, both good and not so good, senses how I experience life.  In other words, true friends are psychologically visible to each other.

Of course, friends also help us discover the, heretofore, unseen aspects of our self. You’ve had this happen before, when a friend complimented or criticized you about something and you instantly intuited that, yes, “That’s me!”

Certainly, the mere fact that we are (relatively) visible to someone doesn’t mean that we are going to be good friends. However, there can be no true emotional connection and companionship where there is little or no visibility. How can you say," I love you," if you are blind to my “you”? Am I really going to believe someone loves me who doesn’t Get Me, get who I am (“warts and all”)?

In our quest for realizing our true self and what we were placed here on earth to do, we know by intuition and experience that such cannot be accomplished alone, that autonomy and isolation is the path to disintegration, not wholeness. It’s not just visibility that we desire. We also have an innate need to love and to be loved. While there are many reason why this is so, two jump out at me:

External validation and affirmation “You really are you!” However self-aware I am, however brutally honest with myself that I seek to be about the nature of my true self, I need feedback as to the veracity of my self-evaluation. Caveat: I am not referring to a craving for the approval of others, as if I were asking permission to be myself. I am referring to the acknowledgment that my evaluation of my self is, indeed, accurate.

Mutual support I know that I need the love, gifts, and wisdom, of others to make my journey in this life, just as others need mine. I instinctually know that it is neither healthy nor wise to be “alone.”  Think back to the stories many of us grew up reading: Arthur and the Knights of the Roundtable, Frodo and Samwise, The Three Musketeers, Harry with Ron and Hermione, Robin Hood and his Merry Men, King David and his Mighty Men, and Jesus and the Twelve. One of the things that draw us to such stories is that we too long for a Band of Brothers.

Being alone is not good for us. We know this. So, what are we actively doing to seek out or maintain the health of our present relationships? What are we doing about discovering who our Band of Brothers is: those men and women with whom we make ourselves visible and available, and to whom we offer our love and support, in their quests? What steps are we taking to develop meaningful relationships?

Copyright, Monte E Wilson, 2015

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The Isolation of Invisibility and Inauthenticity

“It is not good for man to be alone “… but my o my does he go out of his way to be alone.

In the case of our God-created need for visibility, understanding, and companionship, many choose to remain invisible. The thinking here is that loneliness is far better than revealing a self that we believe will probably be rejected. One of the ways we do this is by pretending to not be ourselves. Rather than increasingly becoming the person we were created to be, like actors on a stage, we take on roles and pseudo – personalities.

We are like Kirk Lazurus (played by Robert Downy, Jr), in Tropic Thunder:  I know who I am! I'm the dude playing the dude disguised as another dude!

My parents insisted I become this person and, so as to garner their approval, I became that person.

My mother or father are like this-and-that and, in reaction to their shortcomings, I build a persona around the intent to Not Be Him or Her. What role is being taken on here? “Not-him!” (Bad news: when I do this, I cannot help but become whom it is I am focusing on.)

No one will love me as I am, so I have to pretend to be the kind of person others will love. Or, if I believe no one will love me, period, I go out of my way to reject them before they reject me. In this case, I take on the persona of the lone-wolf, or the perpetually misunderstood victim who must connive and manipulate others to love me.

And the award for Best Actor goes to … the Lonely Guy!

We are the dudes playing the dudes disguised as other dudes. So, which dude are people relating to? And are any of these dudes actually the real “me”? No. Therefore, as I know people are relating to a role I am playing, I know without a doubt the relationship is not real. However many people may appear to be in my world, because I am not being real, my world is not real, therefore these friends are not real.

I say we know, but, with some, they have forgotten what they knew: that the self they are projecting, what people are seeing, is not real. They have been playing a role for so long that they are invisible to themselves!

Interestingly, one of the ways we can discover that we, in fact, are pretending to not be our true self, is feedback from the individuals in our lives whom we know are authentic. Real people spot role players fairly easily.

Role players are seldom comfortable in their own skin

Dudes playing dudes are constantly calibrating for approval where, if they sense they aren’t performing as expected, they morph into another role or character, not understanding that what an authentic person is looking for is … authenticity!

Actors are all buttoned up, perfectly put together, with just the right lines. Even the disheveled look that The Victim takes on is perrrrfectly cast: tears flow just so, and guilt-manipulating phrases are spoken with Academy award winning timing and pathos.

So. When you are ready for some reality, ask the authentic people in your life about how they experience you, as well as the “you” they see behind your mask. And, Yes: you DO know who these people are, for as soon as you read that sentence, he came to mind; she popped up on your radar. 

Copyright, Monte E Wilson, 2015

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Your Strengths Come With Weaknesses

I see it all the time. People go to war against what they perceive as weaknesses in their personality, only to discover that they have shot and mortally wounded their strengths. Rather than merely tempering their weaknesses or guarding against some of the more potentially dangerous consequences of these weaknesses, they wish to root out the buggers tooth and nail. They then wake up surprised that they have lost their edge.

The sensitive poet seeks to steel his emotions only to discover that he can no longer see, hear, and feel, the words that use to flow from of his soul.

The utilitarian businessman seeks to become more altruistic and loses half his earnings, has to lay off loyal employees, as well as battling insurrection with his stockholders.

The scientist that never accepts dogma without question after question decides that she must be a bit more submissive toward conventional thinking…and begins falling prey to old stale thinking that leads to paths of ever increasing ignorance.

As I understand human nature, God has given us all certain talents and gifts that go a long way toward shaping our personalities and informing how we as individuals will move through life. The poet was made in such a way as to make music with words, the businessman intuitively knows what will and will not produce a profit, and the scientist was born asking “What if…?” Each gifting will then express itself in unique ways within the personalities of these individuals.

Your unique combination of talents and gifts come with certain personality traits that compliment them. Not being endowed with all possible talents and gifts, there are some personality traits that you are not inclined toward, just as there are some tasks that do not appeal to you, and some things that you will never desire to master.

This is not to say there is never any need to stretch yourself, only that, for you, your capacity for exercising certain traits will not be the same as your friend’s who is gifted and, subsequently, shaped in others ways.

Copyright, Monte E Wilson, 2007

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The Road Less-Traveled

My one regret in life is that I am not someone else. - Woody Allen

For the longest time I was intrigued by and a bit jealous of those people that appeared to have their lives all mapped out. “In five years I will be here; in ten years, there; and, in fifteen years, at the top of the heap.” While their career path looked like a highway with signs that read, “In two miles you will be turning onto the Yellow Brick Rd.,” mine has been more like a snaking pathway through a dense forest enveloped in foggy mists that swallow you up and never spit you out.

“How in the heck did I get here?”

“Maybe I should have gone there.”

“This is not even a pathway … is it?“

“Whisky-Tango-Foxtrot!”

“I took the one less traveled by, and that made all the difference,” (Frost) sounds so romantic and adventurous when you are twenty, but after a decade or two you begin wondering if the reason your road is less traveled is because no sane person would ever freely choose to walk this way.

Fact is, however, even those people zooming down a well-lit highway are often wondering if they are wandering.

“Do I really want to go here?”

“What difference is it really going to make if I don’t go there?”

“This is a fairly wide road … maybe I am headed toward destruction?”

My guess is that when most people evaluate their journeys they wrestle with would’a-could’a-should’a, imposter syndrome, and other such second-guessing brought on by self-doubt. After all, not being gods, none of us are omniscient. This is why our journeys—the quests we engage in—are acts of faith, not certainty.

I have come to believe that, at the end of the day, what matters most is not so much what path we chose, but who we are becoming while we traverse our chosen paths.

Are we giving ourselves to what matters most? (And what, he asks, “Matters most”? Why faith, hope and love, of course!)

Are we constantly educating ourselves in great ideas and values?

Are we caring for our bodies and souls?

Are we seeking after the God who is Love, Light and Life?

So, whether you are zooming down an interstate or crawling along a path through underbrush, don’t become so focused on the destinations for which you aspire that you lose sight of the one that is taking the journey… for what does it profit a man or woman who arrives at the Yellow Brick Rd with a shriveled up soul?

Copyright, Monte E Wilson, 2009