Another audio book which I purchased at a very exceptional price at a local library.
In this book, Junger discusses many things of great interest, and he makes some fascinating observations.
Among them are things that seem to defy our conventional thinking, like how what we tend to think of as success, in fact, more often than not leads to greater unhappiness. Suicide rates climb along with the standard of living in many developed countries. The higher the standard of living, often times, the greater the rates of clinical depression and suicide.
He talks a bit about this trend in the early history of the United States, and how many whites, including Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine, could not help but notice that many whites seemed to voluntarily deflect to live in Native American culture. Also, they were quite often not keen on rejoining the "civilized world" of white culture, something that felt like a huge mystery to them. Why wouldn't they want to take part in the more advanced culture, with all of it's knowledge and achievements and creature comforts? Still, those whites who had been acclimated into Native American culture generally wanted to stay there, and did not transition back into white society easily or quickly or, even, often voluntarily.
Yet, the opposite was hardly ever true. Native Americans generally did not gravitate towards white culture. And it became more and more difficult to simply accept the supposed superiority of modern ways of living given these facts.
Another surprising element is that people living in modern societies generally tend to come together and act as cohesive communities when they face serious adversity of crises. This was the case both in Britain and Germany during World War II. It was true in other war torn nations, as well as countries and places which suffered horrific natural tragedies.
Also, war itself seems to bring people living in it together. Depression and suicide rates seem to decline, at least for the duration of the war. Then they climb back up once the war is over and done.
Soldiers often struggle to reacclimate into society after seeing major conflict. Native Americans knew this. Some tribes had a "cooling down" period of about 15 days before warriors who had seen combat could enter back into the norms of everyday society. Somehow, though, we in our modern society expect soldiers to simply get acclimated on their own. The sense that they get is one of disorientation, not knowing what to think, and that the very society that they were sent to fight for and protect seems filled with people who would not return the same favor to them. Meanwhile, they reminisce longingly for the sense of belonging in the group - which is similar to a tribe - which they were a part of when they saw conflict.
People seem to long for a sense of meaning and belonging, to feel like their lives have purpose, and that they are valued as essential members of the community. Crisis situations allows people to feel this way, which likely accounts for their sense of being part of something greater than themselves.
This book was truly a fascinating read. In this day and age, when the United States sometimes feels as if it is tearing itself apart, we should be aware of some of these things which Junger talks about in this important work.
It also happens to be the last book that I finished in this calendar year of 2023. So it seemed fitting to post this review as my last official book review, and overall post, for this year as well.
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