Social system of values and misconceptions

The craving for easy money makes us believe that happiness awaits on the trodden paths of the social worldview. We become imbued with sugary stories from films and books, and buy into their fairy-tale happy endings. To fit into the mold of these fictional stories, we have created a cutesy morality with which we rape our insides from an early age simply in order to comply with the unnatural standards of the system. We believed that by following artificial social values we would achieve real happiness. But in reality, happiness here is just as artificial. We have played so hard at pretending to be “normal” people that we have managed to deceive ourselves by mistaking collective ideals for our real desires. We rejoice at the fulfillment of our next desire simply because we have relieved ourselves of its painful thirst. And the stronger the desire, the more powerful the five-minute orgasmic sneeze of relief from this voluptuous itch is experienced. And only eternal dissatisfaction reminds you that something is wrong in all this. The next desire does not bring any joy, except for liberation from his thirst. And instead of listening to the voice of this dissatisfaction and understanding what we really need, we are again and again enchanted by other people's goals in the hope of coming to complete and final satisfaction. And again everything returns to normal - this is how the social system of stereotyped values works.

System of misconceptions

The point is that no matter how complex our world is, we believe that we understand it. The first and most important step to taking the path of truth is to understand that you are lost. But we don't want to understand this. This is too humiliating for our self-esteem. It is much easier and more pleasant to divert attention to play another hateful role of a more or less successful and advanced person, in order to get a daily dose of brain-tickling respect through this pretense.

Of course, we convince ourselves with our minds that we are not know-it-alls, because the universe is infinite and mysterious, and new discoveries only give rise to new questions. But these beautiful beliefs are just nonsense - some kind of creative self-deception. After all, if we omit our condescending rationalizations about our own modest knowledge, then in reality, that is, at the level of sensations, we all also... continue to blindly believe that we know this world. And the unknown, against the backdrop of honest sensations, becomes some strange bizarre deviation from our blind “omniscience”.

We meet the unknown with skepticism, because we once believed that our worldview is the ultimate reality. And when a meteorite flies over the clear city sky, as it did a couple of days ago over the Urals, watching this “miracle” knocks out all the usual supports of the mind from under your feet for a few seconds. Surprise and fear make you understand that life is not a rehearsal or a draft. Everything is real, and it can be whatever you want. But such an understanding for the mind is too disturbing, too destructive for the everyday supports on which the mind flounders in the swamp of its illusory omniscience.

We choose to think we understand the world because this illusion is soothing, immersing the consciousness in the dreams of the mind. And the unknown deprives one of these supports and plunges the mind into fear. We have built a whole system of knowledge about the world in our heads - a system of all kinds of ideas that our entire conspiratorial society encourages in order to extract from them the comfortable illusion of understanding the unknown.

It’s just so convenient for us... to believe that we know the world, because with this knowledge we cover up the deep-seated fear of reality, which exists not in our mind, but there - outside, in “reality”.

In this article I did not plan to talk about abstract infinities and mystical naguals. We will again talk about that very actual life with which we all come into contact every day with our ordinary unenlightened consciousness.

Types of basic values in sociology

Sociological studies have shown that society has the following basic values:

Abundance is the presence of all the necessary means to eat properly, dress properly, have your own home, and be able to provide for your family. Basically, this category is production and consumer, and reflects the material (financial) level of development of society;
Freedom is the opportunity to act in accordance with one’s will and desire, without violating the prescribed norms and rules in society, but to satisfy one’s needs;
Justice and equality - basically these two values regulate the processes of distribution of material and spiritual goods, that is, they relate to a greater extent to the sphere of consumption;
Good - determines the relationships in society between its members. This also refers to the ability to separate “good” from “evil”, as well as to provide help and support to one’s neighbor.

Basic needs also include beauty, truth, and destiny.

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Rules of the game

It's actually not that bad. People live as best they can and don’t worry about it. But somehow there are no truly happy people among us. That is, in fact, we all care. We are all immersed in the search for the “right” solutions that would expand our comfort zone. We all want free progress, so that benefits flow one after another, so that only the unnecessary is lost, and knowledge of the unknown is limited only to pleasant impressions.

In the article about the rules of life, I already tried to highlight the simplest “laws” according to which life happens not in theory, but in practice. One of the most relevant is the law of driving the stick and rewarding the carrot.

We live in conditions where we are forced to constantly be on the move in order to survive. We cannot, like lions, run after game and then lie down to rest. We are born unadapted to the local fauna, and are forced to use many tools of survival: clothes, cars, gadgets, etc. The conditions of earthly life spur our comprehensive development using the carrot and stick method.

And each of us, at the very core of all our desires, is puzzled by two basic questions: how can we make the stick weaker and the carrot sweeter?

Communism did not help in solving this serious and difficult issue. And even worse - it led millions of people into a dead end. And even in those years when, in general, the inferiority of the communist system became quite obvious, for a long time the same phenomenon occurred that I already mentioned at the beginning of the article: instead of taking the path of admitting our mistakes, we all often It’s much easier and more pleasant to divert attention by playing the roles of successful and advanced people.

We agree to remain unhappy neurotics with a sour expression at a bad game, if this game at least in someone evokes a modicum of respect for our eternally painful pride. And it seems that this “disease” haunts not only our long-suffering nation, but all of humanity. It’s no wonder that on progressman.ru a whole section is devoted to this topic.

Man is an evaluative animal. How our values affect our mental health

Table of contents
Values from a Neurobiological Perspective
Values and culture
How values relate to psychological well-being and mental health
Values and psychotherapy
What to read if meaninglessness scares you

One conquers peak after peak and still does not feel like a full-fledged, realized person; another, even in cramped circumstances, enjoys life. What causes these differences?

Our brain is like a complex system designed to solve problems: find a difficulty, set a goal, achieve it, improve adaptation.

However, we set ourselves not only simple tasks (eat, sleep, mate, not die) - give us meaning, intimacy and self-realization. The embodiment of values, in short.

How psychologists explain what values are:
― “Values are socially shared ideas about what is good, right and desirable.” ― “Values are the general tendency to prefer something to something else” (Gert Hofstede). “Personal values are clearly stated, desirable goals that govern how people allocate attention, evaluate events and other people, and explain their behavior and judgments.”

It is values that help us decide what we want; understand what to do to satisfy your needs and how to choose from the surrounding abundance what you really need. Achieving goals is perceived as something important when these goals are significant for a particular person. Therefore, Vasya happily stays late in the office and likes to spend his free time discussing work issues with colleagues, and Petya strives to get away from work as quickly as possible and go fishing - different values, different paths to a feeling of fullness of life.

But Vova doesn’t think about values in principle; he has a different agenda: Vova wants to be happy, like the people in the toilet paper ad with a flushable tube. It seems to Vova that any emotions other than “good” ones are something incompatible with normal life, and he devotes all his strength to not being afraid, not getting angry and not being sad. He falls into the “happiness trap,” as the author of the book of the same name and trainer in acceptance and responsibility therapy Russ Harris calls it, running away from negative emotions instead of thinking about where he would like to go.

“Man is an evaluative animal”

From a neurobiological point of view, understanding values is a complex process. If you put different people in a functional magnetic resonance imaging machine (fMRI, which is often used in modern brain research) and force them to think about what is important or about the meaning of life, all of them do not activate any one gyrus or tubercle with a fancy name. Our values do not live in any particular piece of the brain, but rather are the result of the coordinated work of complex neural networks.

Nevertheless, scientists love to scan the brains of people in different circumstances, and every year we have more and more data at our disposal, including about what structures are involved in these networks and what functions they perform.

In his course “Finding Purpose and Meaning in Life: Living for What Really Matters,” Professor Vic Stretcher (PhD, MPH) notes an amusing coincidence: in the place where the third eye is traditionally drawn, inside the cranium is located the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, which can rightly be called one of the centers of internal enlightenment. The vmPFC processes data about emotions and perceptions of oneself and other people. This area is closely related to socially determined decision making and the results of processing life experiences.

Research on the perception of values and meaning also often involves the orbitofrontal cortex, which works to determine the subjective value of rewards received from the environment. Let's say a person walks past a cafe and sees a photo of a hamburger - in theory, a great tasty treat. But how much does this person need this hamburger at this moment? Maybe the person is full? Or does fast food upset his stomach and eating a hamburger leads to heartburn? The OFK will calculate the answers to these questions.

The wise neural “third eye” is a kind of superstructure over the older parts of the brain, which since ancient times have been responsible for the richness of emotional life. It is they who lay the foundation, without which the understanding of values would be impossible in principle: after all, what is important to us is “good”, this is what is felt as pleasant. And what is unimportant or unacceptable is conditionally “bad” and unpleasant. Emotions, as the main guide to life, help us hear ourselves and realize our true needs.

Thinking about values, in turn, can influence the activation of different parts of the brain and, therefore, our reactions.

For example, thoughts about dear and close people made subjects more receptive to information about a healthy lifestyle, which they usually had a negative attitude towards.

Advice about the benefits of movement, the dangers of smoking and unhealthy food did not cause a strong defensive reaction if the person receiving it first turned to transcendental (allowing one to “surpass oneself”) values. Such thoughts can reduce the activity of the body systems responsible for the stress response (including the amygdala, which likes to be active in people prone to anxiety).

“During my depression, I didn’t see the point in anything. Now I can look back and say that there were still some values. I didn’t want to hurt my loved ones with my actions and thoughts. I responded to their requests. This means that care in relationships was one of the values. By the way, I was constantly thinking about the meaning of life, but I couldn’t find it for myself.
In the second depressive episode, I was more aggressive, I no longer cared about the feelings of loved ones, and my friends did not console me. I found meaning in improving my body, eating disorder appeared, but at least I changed my mind about dying. I isolated myself from society (it seemed to me that I was very fat, I didn’t want to be seen like that), I tried to communicate with people on the Internet. The values were open communication, authenticity; I honestly expressed my thoughts, but I realized that “normal” people did not understand me, as if there was a huge, insurmountable gap between [us].
Friendship was still a value - I began to look for people like myself and found a group of people with mental disorders on VKontakte, and it became my new meaning. I posted thematic posts there about mental disorders and tried to create an atmosphere in which everyone could freely express their thoughts and would not be attacked with slippers for going beyond the “normal”, as was the case with me.”
Marina (depression, suicidal thoughts, eating disorder)

Research also shows that an active response of the brain's reward and reinforcement system (specifically its element, the nucleus accumbens) to thoughts of prosocial actions such as helping and gratitude or working on long-term goals in adolescents predicts a decrease in depressive symptoms in the future. If the internal “reinforcer” actively responds to selfish hedonism, this is more likely to indicate a possible increase in depressive symptoms in the future.

Although feelings of well-being in the present are not particularly influenced by externally oriented values, psychological well-being in the long term is more likely to be associated with meanings that go beyond pleasure.

Values are a gift from evolution that help us better regulate behavior based on our intricate needs. Their appearance is associated with the process of social development, therefore, when thinking about values, it is impossible to imagine a spherical self in a vacuum - it is always a story about “I” next to “others”, about oneself in the context of relationships.

Values and culture

Values are developed based on personal experience, but in most cases it is associated with other people. The foundation is laid in the family or other social group in which a person grows. The groups in which we find ourselves throughout our lives (a group of friends, a study group, colleagues, religious organizations), the culture of the country in which we live, shape us, and we shape them.

Group values serve the same purpose as individual ones: to ensure that the group “owner” of these values survives, or better yet, prospers.

People with eating disorders often recall that parents or caregivers literally forced them to eat “by saying ‘I don’t want to’” or insisted on the need to save food. The history of the origin of such ideas about the super value of food often goes back to times of famine, crisis, when the lack of food really threatened life. In response to this, a value was formed at the group (family) level: to save food at all costs. However, when the context of the family’s existence changed to a more prosperous one and there was enough food, this value lost its adaptive meaning.
The need to abandon the maladaptive values of one’s social group is woven into the process of leaving an eating disorder (for example, you have to learn not to eat more than you want, even if you don’t dare throw away half-eaten food). When the disorder goes into remission, values also transform: for example, from “save food” to “save the body and take care of it.”

Some scholars call values the heart of culture, determining not only what we consider important, but also what we consider to be true (“social axioms”, for example, that all people are equal - or that someone is still “more equal”). . However, comparing the values that exist in different cultures is not an easy task for researchers: they are difficult to measure, easy to misinterpret and impossible to ignore. Difficulties can arise at any stage:

starting with the search for a representative sample (a group of people that will be truly indicative of the qualities of an entire people);
and ending with language barriers (when the same words mean different things or there are no analogues in different languages; for example, Belarusian “love” for beer or TV series and “kahanna” for a partner will be translated into Russian with one word “love”).

Therefore, one should be very wary of claims about differences in the values of representatives of different cultures - even those supported by references to research that found differences between residents of Moscow suburbs and Berlin squats.

In studies of the influence of culture on individual values, the Schwartz value model is often used (you can read more about it, as well as read about the values of Russians, here), which identifies 10 types of values:

self-regulation,
fullness of life sensations,
hedonism,
achievements,
power,
safety,
conformity,
traditions,
benevolence,
universalism.

Interestingly, there is often a correlation between values and the level of GDP of the country in which they were measured. Research shows that differences in values at the individual level are much greater than at the cultural level (country of origin accounts for only 2–12% of individual variation).

Often the difference in ideas about values in different cultures seems to us to be much greater than it actually is. Such perceptual distortions are dictated by our inherent cognitive errors - for example, emphasizing differences (A wears a headscarf, but B does not) and ignoring similarities (both A and B want to love and be loved). In addition, one more important factor must be taken into account: possible differences in behavior through which the same values are realized. For example, spiritual values in one community may be expressed through religious practices, and in another through non-religious development of mindfulness. Nevertheless, the group values of representatives of both communities will be very similar.

“[Due to the disorder] concern for physical well-being and relaxation came to the fore, the importance of motherhood and such roles as housewife, wife, and sexual partner decreased.
There were thoughts that I was living wrong, that I had lost my meaning. Feelings of hopelessness, despair, powerlessness, helplessness.
My reassessment of values did not occur during the disorder/its treatment, but much later, when I had already had a long experience of psychotherapy and had accumulated some knowledge about the social and political structure of the country. With ongoing support from personal and family therapists.
I wonder: if the disorder happened now, what values would help me? I assume those that have come to the fore recently: civic, social and professional activity. I also wonder if all this became important to me, would I have a disorder?”
Tatyana (anxiety-phobic disorder)

The exit is where the entry is: How values relate to psychological well-being and mental health.

No one is immune from a conflict of values or temporary loss of contact with them; the presence/absence of experience working with a psychologist or a diagnosis made by a psychiatrist is not indicative in this sense.

Nevertheless, a feeling of inner emptiness, one’s own worthlessness and lack of meaning in life (up to the desire to end this life) are found among the diagnostic criteria for various diseases (for example, borderline personality disorder and depression).

Loss of contact with values is even called one of the transdiagnostic factors in the formation of mental disorders (that is, this problem is not associated with any specific diagnosis, but rather with psychological distress as such, in its most varied forms). Moreover, this loss can be both a cause and a consequence of psychological difficulties.

On the one hand, the inability to realize one’s values, the absence or distortion of a coordinate system prevents a person from receiving full pleasure and satisfaction from life, and therefore can lead to emotional disorders (for example, anxiety or depression). Thus, a mentally healthy woman who becomes pregnant after multiple IVF attempts and loses her child may face the inability to realize her values, which, combined with the experience of loss, often leads to depression.

On the other hand, emotional disorders (for example, with depression) do not allow one to use feelings as a guide in determining these same coordinates and lead into a dead end of meaninglessness.

“[During the Depression] everything lost its meaning, what was important no longer mattered. Every day was similar to the other, and the heaviness of the meaninglessness of living it hit the psyche very hard.
Before my illness, I took advanced training courses, conducted psychological courses, managed clients, and participated in intervisions. I went to museums and for walks. And all this was very important and valuable for me. When I got sick, I didn’t understand why I got up in the morning if all the days were the same. Learning ceased to be interesting and necessary for me. The work seemed useless, helping others became worthless. I stopped cooking and just warmed up semi-finished foods for the family.
It was a “bed-down” depression: sleeping for 12–16 hours, at first as a way to forget, then I simply could not get up, I was knocked out on the go. It seemed that space was pressing on the whole body, my attention was impaired, I could not read, concentrate, and forgot simple words. The question constantly rang in my head: what am I living for?
I just wanted to sleep, it seemed that existence was devoid of purpose and the only way out was out the window. Suicidal thoughts were very intrusive. When I started treatment, the desire to gain new knowledge and write texts for social networks began to return quite quickly. I wanted to go outside to take a walk and enjoy nature, to have fun. It seems to me that the ability to derive pleasure from familiar activities plays a key role in returning the meaning of these actions.
In illness, the perception of life changes so much that any reference to meaning - both from the outside and from the inside - simply does not work. Only when healthy thinking returns are meanings and values restored. Psychotherapy and/or pharmacotherapy does this.”
Lydia (depression)

Friedrich Nietzsche (although he can hardly be considered an example of psychological well-being) formulated a principle that, in fact, underlies psychotherapeutic work with values and the meaning of life: having a quality “why” will help overcome any “how.”

Understanding the meaning of an activity, the values towards the realization of which this activity is aimed, can give strength and in itself act as reinforcement on the path of life, no matter how thorny it may turn out to be.

Unfortunately, you cannot make something important for yourself through willpower alone. If the peculiarities of the functioning of neurotransmitters or certain parts of the brain are expressed in a decrease in the significance of something for a person, he cannot say to himself: “It is important for me to be a good mother, I will live for my family” and immediately see the meaning and feel satisfaction. Where is the way out? Let's see what solutions psychotherapy offers - using the cognitive-behavioral approach (CBT) as an example.

“During the period of disorder, “normal” well-being became a super value. A certain race appeared, the meaning of which was to retain the forces that exist.
My values - creation, the joy that my hands can do something good - over the course of several years (very gradually) turned against me. Joy is gone (no longer matters). Activity became an escape from something and only took away strength. The meaning was simply lost. What I came up with for myself in order to continue my activities irritated me with its falseness and also deprived me of strength. Looking back, I am amazed at how everything gradually happened, as if unnoticed. I completely stopped dreaming and planning anything.
During the most difficult periods, everything important seemed unattainable. I was pressed by the crystal clarity of the impossibility of changing anything and my powerlessness. This was perceived as the truth, the basis. It's very hard. I repeated to myself that this was not true and did not believe myself. It is important to remember that this is not what defines you, what you see and feel is not the complete picture. Reality is bigger and more interesting.”
Evgeniya (anxiety disorder and depression)

Values and psychotherapy

Working with values in counseling, psychotherapy and coaching is closely related to clarifying the needs that a person cannot meet.

Stephen Hayes, the creator of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, identifies six basic needs (aspirations) that can be the “targets” of therapeutic work: belonging (that is, relationships with others), understanding the world, sensory experience, orientation, competence and free choice.

By understanding what needs are important to us but are not being met, we can determine a course for further movement and make choices in favor of actions that are consistent with this course, using values as a compass.

Appealing to values in CBT helps correct negative beliefs about oneself. For example, a person grew up in a family with a drinking father and was bullied at school, and he began to feel that he was a doormat. The value of “being a good father to your son” can help him overcome the inertia of his usual attitude towards himself and begin to create situations in which this belief can be refuted (for example, effectively caring for the well-being of the child, going hiking with the boy, etc.).

Working with values is also important in the process of behavioral activation (expanding the repertoire of actions in people who, due to psychological difficulties, withdraw into themselves) and exposure (when a person deliberately faces his fears, gradually reducing their significance).

The happiness pill: can a psychiatrist write a prescription to restore the meaning of life?
Since the sense of meaning and value in various aspects of life has a neurobiological basis, it is logical to assume that pharmacological interventions could alleviate the burden of meaninglessness or loss of value. However, unfortunately, not a single drug can guarantee to return the feeling that everything in life is not in vain. Restoring contact with values requires internal work to rethink your place in life. Nevertheless, many people who are faced with mental disorders note that it was thanks to the right medications that they were able to find the strength to, in principle, take the path of this rethinking.

Values studies also play an important role in working with maladaptive rules and attitudes. For example, if a woman has an internal conflict between the learned rule “only motherhood makes a woman complete,” her own professional ambitions and her reluctance to have children, clarifying her values can help determine her course choice for the coming years. And for a client with social fears, who finds it difficult to make romantic acquaintances because of obligations in the spirit of “a real man is always confident in himself and is not embarrassed; women don’t like other people,” it will be easier to find the strength to stop avoiding dating thanks to an understanding of the kind of life he wants to live (for example, receiving and giving love and being sincere in intimacy).

“The depressive emptiness did not go away immediately. The very first insights appeared when I learned the diagnosis. My psychiatrist studied CBT and had conversations with me, thanks to which I realized that my health should be my priority and nothing is more important. A revaluation of values has already occurred here. I began to understand that the desire to quickly achieve some results, demanding the impossible from myself, the desire to be good for everyone led me to depression.
Then it took some time for the medications to take effect. During the first weeks I still felt empty; I had nervous breakdowns and thoughts that I had no future. But from time to time there was a glimmer of hope for recovery; I was already beginning to realize that my negative thoughts were a consequence of the illness and that it would pass.
From time to time I again felt my own insignificance, it seemed that my illness was fictitious. Later, my hopes that everything would get better in life, the belief that everything was fine with me, became clearer. Then suddenly I began to enjoy simple things: good weather, a cup of coffee, delicious food, my hobbies. It has become valuable again to spend time with friends and enjoy communication.
I again had desires, dreams, and finally had confidence that I would succeed. I was glad that I could enjoy life again, which means it has meaning.”
Evgeniya (bipolar affective disorder)

And in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), a maximally functional attitude towards values is practiced. For example, the value of “family” in the counseling process is likely to be reformulated into something more practice-oriented. And two key questions help in this: “What kind of person do I want to be?” and “What kind of life do I want to live?”

If you cannot immediately answer these questions, various techniques can be used to discover this internal compass of values:

Appeal to bright, positive memories. What was important in the past may still be important today.
Addressing pain. Sadness and emotions on this side of the spectrum usually indicate that we have lost something important. What would your heartache say if you listened to it?
Understanding mortality. Writing our own epitaph or imagining our funeral helps us understand what kind of mark we would like to leave in the lives of others.
Understanding what actions themselves are rewarding. What brings satisfaction, even if it requires work and involves difficulties, is most likely connected with a person’s values.

Viktor Frankl, the founder of logotherapy, one of the types of existential psychotherapy, believed: we ourselves create our own meanings. The responsibility for living a full and satisfying, conscious and meaningful life lies with the living person, no matter what situation he finds himself in. It is possible to rejoice and embody what is important, even in the most dire conditions. Tragic events and losses, somatic and mental illnesses, difficulties or quiet happiness - all this is the scenery against which we stage the play of our lives. They set the tone of the story, but we write the story ourselves.

What to read if meaninglessness scares you

Books by Viktor Frankl (in particular, “Saying Yes to Life: A Psychologist in a Concentration Camp”) and Rollo May - if you are ready for difficult stories, on the basis of which inspiring ideas are born.
“Reboot Your Brain” by Stephen Hayes - if you are looking for practical recommendations on improving your quality of life, getting rid of maladaptive rules and clarifying your values.
“Staring into the Sun: Living Without the Fear of Death” by Irvin Yalom - if the question of values for you is related to the understanding of human mortality or traumatic experiences of loss.
Autobiographies of any people you are interested in. Arm yourself with a highlighter and a pencil - highlight moments in which the authors demonstrated commitment to values. State what these values are. Think about how close they are to you.
Philosophers who searched for the meaning of life according to the nature of their activities.

“There was that very moment of understanding that “something was wrong” with me, and a great desire to feel like myself. I think, from my personal experience, it will help to realize that somewhere behind all this (we are talking about a mental disorder - Ed.) there is a person whom you knew or will still know - he is inside, and you need to get to know him. And he is the one who knows the answers to all questions, and in addition speaks an understandable language, and is available 24/7. And the acceptance that the brain can deceive here and now, frighten and that you need to wait, even if it hurts (or not).
Life with a disorder may be no different from life without it, the main thing is the context. Before the diagnosis, I didn’t know myself at all, but after that everything changed. The flexibility that I had to learn helps to realize oneself and one’s values and live in harmony with oneself, even if this is not a classic scenario.”
Anya (GAD, depressive episode, possible BPD)

Social worldview

A set of our typical beliefs is built into a social worldview - a system of ideas about how to live correctly, so as not to worry about the meaning of our own life. For example, one of the most simplistic ideas about the “correct” life assures that a man should plant a tree, build a house and raise a son. Most of us believe that living “like everyone else” is right, because no matter how wrong everyone’s views may be, that’s the only way we get everyone’s approval.

Lost society is ready to show compassion and understanding to its own people - that is, to those who are just as lost and unfortunate. And if we shy away from making typical social mistakes, a jealous society does not forgive us for this. In other words, no matter what whim the collective pursues, it accepts individual participants only under conditions when they, together with this collective, bliss in unison. And, in my opinion, in today’s modern times this is one of the main principles of the social value system.

And if a person doubts the usual foundations, he is, at best, mistaken for an eccentric, slightly mentally disturbed eccentric, with whom, due to his “deviations,” one can only sympathize. And that's the best case scenario. At worst, the out-of-the-box thinker becomes a renegade and is perceived as an evil genius, a universal threat that society is relieved to eliminate.

In our information-saturated times, however, the opposite effect also occurs. Fed up with our swamp comfort, we sometimes crave “threats” to our own worldview in order to tickle our nerves, slightly shaking ourselves out of the boring sleep of a “normal” life just for the sake of entertainment.

Serious measures to free yourself from collective visualization, most often, do not lead to anything meaningful, because they become yet another self-deception within the framework of the basic values of the system. By rebelling against established social foundations, we, as a rule, simply amuse our pride in a new, slightly more sophisticated method - we choose to believe that we were once in a herd of blind sheep, and now we are becoming free and strong lions.

In other words, this is still the same race for the carrot of self-affirmation, generated by the social value system. It’s just that earlier this carrot seemed to be for the approval and respect of our fellow tribesmen - we tried to be like everyone else, so that these same “everyone” would accept us as “their own”. And now, having become disillusioned with the social system, we perceive the crowd as a gray mass of mere mortals, over which, having become the chosen renegades, we rise majestically.

Often outcasts rejected by society become victims of various sects. There they find a narrow circle of fellow tribesmen, in which collective self-affirmation now occurs due to elevation above the social “herd”. The sectarian collective creates its own microsociety - another system of limited worldview, the main function of which is most often aimed at creating in its adherents a feeling of their own chosenness. It is with this illusion that sects bind their adherents. The main function of the sectarian worldview is to create among sectarians the feeling that their new worldview is better and higher than the previous one - the social one.

Thus, sectarians replace a more or less adequate social worldview with a new one, filled with “spiritual” illusions about their own superiority. If a person manages to go through this experience, having figured out what exactly happened to him, he gains a bit of wisdom - an understanding of what a worldview is and how it affects the psyche. Otherwise, the sectarian gets bogged down in his own illusions and is completely divorced from reality.

Values and Misconceptions

If all artificial values are false, where is the truth? I am reminded of Lao Tzu’s saying: “The Tao expressed in words is not the true Tao.” In practice, this means that true values do not exist. All concepts are superficial. All that remains for us is to simplify life by eliminating multi-tiered misconceptions. Then, even if the enlightening truth is not revealed, at least the tension will definitely be reduced.

One can conditionally accept the so-called “true values” as principles that help clear the mind of useless clutter that is divorced from reality. But even here it is easy to be deceived, replacing practice with newfangled beautiful ideas to amuse one’s vanity - this happens all the time.

I already said above that our life at a basic level is dictated by carrots and sticks - that is, pleasant and painful anticipations. This is where our initial misconceptions come from. Losing sight of the real strings that move our minds, we begin to rationalize and spin a cascade of beautiful theories about noble intentions, right desires and high aspirations around simple experiences.

In general, all our aspirations can be reduced to success - to achieving well-being in work and relationships. And everything would be fine, but only, as was already noted above, for the most part we have forgotten how to listen to the voice of our gut. We don't know what we really want, but we believe in artificial happiness based on Hollywood values. We remain completely deaf and blind to our true needs because we have believed that happiness lies in social success.

Following the influences of collective hypnosis, we sometimes achieve long-awaited goals from the system, and as if we understand that something important has happened - a dream has come true. Just as in a dream we run from dreamed horror stories and rejoice in illusory blessings, socially approved “happiness” by the power of our faith can cause the feeling as if we have really achieved it, because all the external signs of achievement have been observed.

Imagine an analogy. Empty cardboard box. A person has been trying to get one for a long time. He was told that there was happiness and success in her. And now, after years of effort, he finally achieves his long-awaited dream, and of course, he rejoices. They envy him: “Oh, this man has found a box! Wow! The real one?! Yes! Cardboard..." He receives the desired dose of respect and approval from society, striving for similar stereotyped goals. That's all! Do you understand?

There has never been any happiness behind the goals from the social system. And all pleasant sensations are limited to the false joy of achieving these goals. But due to our mental blindness, we believe that this fleeting joy was a piece of eternal happiness. It’s just that, as it seems to us, we missed something, didn’t complete it, or some new circumstances were discovered, having dealt with which, we will finally overtake happiness. These unfinished gestalts haunt us all our lives.

The relationship between values and social behavior

System of misconceptions

Types of basic values in sociology

Rules of the game