Individualism and independence of mind

(note inspired by the reading of Guénon, La Crise Du Monde Moderne)

It is important not to confuse individualism with psychological independence.

The former is a bonding force, the latter is a liberating force.

Individualism consists in believing that the individual can do anything and that this only level of existence is relevant to understanding the world and successfully navigating through the problems it invites us to solve.

An intellectual deceit lurks in the attempt to pass off as ‘individualistic’ what is really the expression of independence of mind.

As often, there is a major confusion here: the individualism (refusal of the collective) mentioned in such a condemnation has nothing to do with contemporary individualism, that of Guénon’s Modern World.

True independence of mind is not incompatible with sharing or taking into account the collective interest…Simply, it consists in not howling with the wolves or rather, bleating with the sheep and their washed-out brains.

If adherence to the collective project is recognized as noble, psychological independence is what will allow the individual, body, mind and soul, to subscribe to it, to a greater or lesser extent.

Individualism is an obscuration, a smothering of transcendence under a crust of opacity.
With the unfolding of this ideology, the interior space, while pretending to increase, to expand, becomes more and more restricted.

Psychological independence is precisely what makes it possible to take a clear look at individualism, when it is now so normalized that any critical look becomes impossible.

Contemporary spiritual expressions (new age type), contemporary societal tropisms (wokism, consumerism, any type of unhealthy obsession with « telling oneself ») are, among others, manifestations of unbridled individualism, extreme individualism, freewheeling, working without knowing it, if not to its own destruction, to the destruction of the minds of those who are its hosts, which amounts to the same thing.

Franck – August 2023
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