Survival
and the Impersonal Will

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When a person’s idealism seems to be consistently blocked by circumstance or fate, then he may go to the extreme of denying personal evolution. Every time the person tries to overcome major obstacles he finds that no matter what he does he only experiences frustration and sorrow. In this situation, the only way that a person can consistently use free will is by denying all opportunities for development that come his way. This is a negative use of free will and is explored in depth by Arthur Schopenhauer.[¹]. (See also the article Will and Representation). I have had to use this strategy many times in order to ensure my own survival.

Destiny is not always benign or beneficial: it is quite prepared sometimes to push a person beyond his limits, the result of which is often tragedy (for example, the life of  Friedrich Nietzsche, who spent much of the last few years of his life in what appears to be a state of catatonia, alternating with bouts of paranoia).

The level of survival is the lowest level of existence, and carries no sense of morality with it. A voluntarily-accepted code of ethics is always dependent on a sufficient attainment of security and culture.

Two Components to Survival

I consider the level of survival in life and what it means. There is both a psychological and a metaphysical component to it.

A person’s will can be considered to have two components, the impersonal will (the metaphysical component) and his own individual will (the psychological component).

Schopenhauer describes the impersonal will as a blind striving for expression and manifestation within the material world. This impersonal will ensures that life is a constant struggle for existence. I consider that he was nearly correct in his view. The impersonal will is seen in its clarity in Nature, where ethics plays no part and only survival matters.

I modify Schopenhauer’s view. I understand the striving will as the will to survive (that is, the will of the immanent god within the material worlds).[²]. This will embraces all physiological instincts and the needs of the mind. In Nature it oscillates between competition and co-operation, in a dialectical way. Some species emphasise competition more, others emphasise co-operation. Nevertheless, both competition and co-operation are present in all species – that which is emphasised in any species depends primarily on its survival potential for that species.

This impersonal, striving will flows through mankind, too. The will functions through desires and beliefs. As well as satisfying physiological needs, this will acts as a source of power for the fledgling infant as it begins to create its ego. The ego is constructed by means of the beliefs that become important to the infant.[³]. The striving will acts through these beliefs and so maintains the ego in its existence. This will also acts to protect the person’s sense of identity. Without a secure sense of identity the person will become unstable and vulnerable.

Man oscillates between being a social person and being an individual. So the impersonal will can also act as an unconscious collective will functioning through the subconscious social belief systems of the person. As in Nature, this impersonal will stimulates both competition and co-operation. The competitive aspect is the source of much of man’s conflict, since this will has no ethical component to it. The impersonal will of Nature, in its role as a collective (or social) will, helps to explain why sometimes in history a whole mass of people have done something new together, for example, mass migrations, revolutions, radical social change.

This impersonal will can also use the person’s own personal desires as its means of expression. It will function when the person feels that his survival is at stake. Its only purpose is to enable the individual to survive, and it may be strong enough to make that individual violate his ethical norms. It functions through his concepts of survival.

Examples 1

Survival can mean many things.

• If the person is destitute and hungry, the striving will may force him to steal food.

• If the person has become very sensitive and defensive about relationships, the striving will may force him to avoid any situations where he is expected to be open about his relationships.

• In a situation of actual or imagined danger a person may feel the influx of amazing strength with which to deal with that situation ; this strength comes from the striving will.

• Concepts of survival can underlie secular and religious themes. Warfare is often centred on the attempts of minority groups (religious or secular) to survive efforts to eliminate them by politically-powerful orthodox groups (royalty, churches or political parties). The need to survive may turn a peaceful people into militant activists. Hence the need to survive can shape ideologies.

Violence and Confusion

The meaning of a person's life makes most sense when it is placed within a scenario of reincarnation. This is because a person only learns to understand both himself and reality very slowly. A person changes and developments, in terms of character and moral ideals, only a little in a single lifetime.[4].  Therefore in order to account for the big differences between cultured and non-cultured peoples, it is reincarnation theory (and not genetics) that we can turn to. [ Reincarnation is a theory of learning, whilst genetics is a theory of social control.]

As the person evolves through countless incarnations on Earth, he has to learn to control the impersonal will. Control is obtained by adhering to some form of idealism or ethics. If control is too severe, if the person represses this will too strongly (for example, by becoming too much of a puritan), then he loses his strength of character and becomes weak. A popular method through the ages of camouflaging this weakness is to emphasise the hate mode of pride [5] – the person mistakes the rigidity of pride for strength (and so the religious person hates heretics and non-believers). If control is too lax, then when he is under severe stress he returns to being amoral and does things ‘out of character ’.

This striving will is the source of all power, so it gives strength of character to a person, but it is also a source of conflict. This means that the potential for violence lies at the core of every human being.

The violence that seems inherent in society and the individual has several components to it. The mainspring of violence is the will to survive. This primary influence cannot be eliminated but can be controlled, through idealism and ethics (or just plain fear). Most of the other kinds of violence can be viewed as secondary effects of this impersonal will.

The impersonal will acts through belief systems but is independent of their correctness, morality or immorality. Many beliefs are derived from the interpretation of events and relationships, and so can be confused and irrational. When such beliefs are powered by the impersonal will, then determinism is created as a form of compulsion, whether of thought or of behaviour. [See the article Determinism]. The impersonal will does not of itself produce determinism or confusion, since it is simply a perpetual flow of power. Determinism and confusion are products of secondary effects ; determinism and confusion are always products of interpretations of events and relationships, especially events and relationships of childhood.

If a person is currently in a situation that he finds unpleasant, then the impersonal will generates experiences of sorrow and violence as secondary effects.

Examples 2

Some examples of secondary effects :

• The consequences of childhood trauma or being the victim of gratuitous violence by someone else. These consequences, which come under determinism, can usually be erased by suitable psycho-therapy, so long as the therapy is carried on for a sufficient length of time.

• Fear of change, fear of strangers, fear of the unknown ; or, in effect, the fear of freedom. Fear de-stabilises a person, and can easily precipitate anger and violence as a defensive reaction. [6]

• The feeling of being trapped. This occurs when the person feels that the boundaries of freedom are not large enough for him. He may feel trapped in any of three ways.

My consciousness is trapped within the body.
My mind is trapped within the prison of  abreaction.
My behaviour is trapped within social rules.

• Revenge can have survival value, especially if the group that a person belongs to is being threatened or persecuted.

Revenge can also work in another fashion. If a person suffers under an authoritarian regime for long enough (whether parental or political) then it is likely to have a marked effect on his character. If he subsequently rises to a position of authority then he may begin to oppress and abuse his subordinates or other people that are now in a junior position to him. In effect, he reverses his values and roles from being a victim to becoming a victimiser. The reversal of values and roles is a marked characteristic of the subconscious mind.[7]

These secondary effects reflect the manner in which the impersonal will is energising the negative aspects of a person’s character.

Violence can also be independent of survival.
For example: sadism and masochism are common forms of gratuitous violence, a personal liking for
inflicting harm on other people or oneself.
But even these forms mainly arise as particular interpretations of childhood sorrow.

I have dwelt on the negative features of the flow of the impersonal will for a purpose. During my 40s and 50s  I had an imperative need to understand the sources of sorrow in my life. I had to examine the destructive side of reality.

The positive features of the flow of the impersonal will enhance the good life - creativity, happiness, achievement - but these features are not the concern of this article.

The number in brackets at the end of each reference takes you back to the paragraph that featured it. The addresses of my other websites are on the Links page.

[¹]. Schopenhauer, Arthur. The World as Will and Representation. Dover Publications, USA, 1969. Translated by E.F.J. Payne. In two volumes. [1]

[²]. For a description of my ideas on the immanent god, see the article Monism and Dualism. [2]

[³]. For my ideas on the creation of the baby's ego, see the article Relativity of the Ego. [3]

[4]. My site for articles on reincarnation theory and the difficulties of spiritual evolution is Patterns of Spirituality.

[5]. Pride is a compound emotion consisting of two simpler emotions, those of vanity and hatred of other people. See the article Emotion and Abreaction for a description of my ideas on Emotion. [5]

[6]. A good account of such fear is given by Erich Fromm, in The Fear of Freedom. Routledge, 1997. [6]

[7]. There is an article on the Reversal of  Values on my website The Subconscious Mind. [7]

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